Light from 1932 for today's semi-colonial economy

It would not be an exaggeration to describe my dear friend, Economic Historian Dr. Serdar Şahinkaya, as an "Atomic Ant." (1) With the meticulousness of a jeweler, he has added a new volume to his series of books on the founding of the Republic and its founding philosophy: "Kadrocularda Toplumsal Olaylara Bakış ve Devletçilik-Planlama İlişkisi" (The Kadro Movement's Perspective on Social Events and the Relationship Between Statism and Planning) (Telgrafhane Publications).

The struggle for liberation that began after the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the occupation of the homeland, the struggle for the founding of the Republic of Turkey, the revolutions of the Republic, the abolition of the capitulations, and the creation of an independent economic model built from scratch are known to a greater or lesser extent, but the contributions of the "Kadro" (Cadre) movement, which revealed the intellectual dimension of economic independence, planning, and statist development, have remained behind the scenes.

The Turkish Revolution is a struggle for economic and political independence by a country of poor peasants that had fallen into a semi-colonial state. During this revolutionary process, until the end of the Second World War, the country began to gain its economic independence and embarked on a tremendous development drive. However, after 1947, it fell back under the influence of imperialism and today presents the appearance of a semi-colonial state where the capitulations of the late Ottoman period have resurfaced and economic and political independence have been largely lost.

It is in such a period that remembering the intellectual world of the Kadro movement will be inspiring. Serdar Şahinkaya examines all the articles and discussions in the monthly Kadro magazine published between January 1932 and January 1935, offering us the search for an ideological framework for the Liberation and the Founding.

Who are these Kadro members? Şevket Süreyya Aydemir, Dr. Vedat Nedim Tör, İsmail Hüsrev Tökin, Burhan Asaf Belge, Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu, and M. Şevki Yazman…

What is their goal? They claim to provide a radical interpretation of Kemalism and an original analysis of the Turkish Revolution. Of course, it is difficult to summarize a book here… However, in order to give an idea about the Kadro members' view of the world, the War of Independence, and the Republican Revolution, I will try to convey their views on various subjects in paragraphs from the book.

Although the Kadro members accepted historical materialism as a scientific method in explaining historical development, they argued that Marxist theory was insufficient for understanding national liberation movements.

Since capitalist development causes industry to concentrate in certain countries, class conflict does not intensify in colonies or dependent countries and does not spread to the whole world. For this reason, it is not class conflicts, but national liberation struggles that will lead the way in the struggles of colonies, semi-colonies, or countries that have not yet established their national industry.

According to the Kadro members, the Turkish National War of Independence was a war fought against imperialist powers in both the military and economic fields. The Turkish Revolution is a sacred rebellion against contemporary capitalism, its antithesis, and a reaction to it. For these reasons, the War of Independence and the Turkish Revolution are evaluated not only as a cause for Turkey but for all countries in the same situation.

Şevket Süreyya also examines the objective goals of the national liberation movement by dividing them into four categories:

a) Industrialization of underdeveloped countries.

b) Not leaving the new industry open to the interests of a single class.

c) Collecting the old imperialist profits in the hands of the state for the benefit of the entire nation.

d) Replacing the class struggle with a conflict-free, independent, and advanced national order.

While proposing a third way to developing countries outside of capitalism and socialism, the authors of Kadro magazine point to the necessity for countries engaged in a national liberation struggle to first and foremost develop their own unique worldview.

According to the thoughts of the Kadro members, the main goal of the Turkish Revolution, which represents the Turkish National War of Independence, is "a structure of a nation that is unprivileged, classless, and integrated internally, and politically and economically independent unconditionally against the outside, while maintaining political and economic cooperation with all nations of the world under equal conditions."

According to the Kadro members, the Turkish Revolution is not a class revolution, but draws its source from nationalism. Turkish Nationalism, kneaded and shaped by the Turkish National Liberation Movement, as a natural necessity of the historical conditions that prepared and matured it;

a) Is anti-imperialist against the outside.

b) Is anti-capitalist against the inside.

According to the Kadro members, the name of the social order that fulfills these requirements is "Statism," which is the state order of National Liberation Movements.

In the face of the insufficiency of the results obtained, especially in the field of industrialization, despite the widespread encouragement of private enterprise in the years before the world economic depression, the Kadro members proposed that industry be established by the state.

Every revolution is a struggle to create and establish a new type of state… The Turkish Revolution opened the history of the liquidation of the contradiction between colonialist and colonized nations in the world. Therefore, the State of revolutionary Turkey cannot be a Bourgeois State born of the French Revolution, nor a Proletariat State established by the Communist Revolution. The new Turkish State is the first representative in history of the cause of the liberation of a semi-colonial nation with backward technology, both economically and politically as a nation.

According to the Kadro members, there are three major problems of the world economy after the First World War:

1) Establishing a communist economic system instead of a capitalist economic system. Russia is trying to solve this.

2) Saving the capitalist economic system. The League of Nations is dealing with this.

3) Creating an independent national economy instead of a colonial economy. This falls to the Republic of Turkey.

Mustafa Kemal Atatürk protected the Kadro magazine against various pressures in the first years of its publication life and ensured its continuation. It is not fully known, but it may be that after the statist practices were put on track starting in 1934, the thought that the Kadro members no longer had a function formed in official circles… Moreover, it is among the rumors that their frequent references to Marx caused discomfort… Recep Peker, a powerful name in the CHP, issued a serious warning regarding attempts to build a "revolutionary ideology" outside the Party: "The Party makes the Revolutionary Ideology. You, as experts, should run to the service of the revolution and statism within the state mechanism."

After this statement, the Chairman of the Editorial Board of Kadro magazine, Yakup Kadri Karaosmanoğlu, was appointed as the Ambassador to Tirana, Albania. Other Kadro writers followed this advice and served as technocrats at various levels of the state. It can be said that the Kadro movement ended its 3-year publication life for this reason.

I would like to make a few comments of my own on these excerpts I have taken from my dear friend Serdar Şahinkaya's book.

Turkey is today in a period where the capitulations of the late Ottoman period have resurfaced and it has lost its economic, political, military, and geopolitical independence. It has the appearance of a typical semi-colonial economy. Under the conditions we are in, the economic policies of the Atatürk era and the thoughts of the Kadro members will shed light. This light is not limited to Turkey; it has a universal character.

While drawing inspiration from the views of the Kadro members, I must also state this: In the collapse of the Ottoman Empire, it was not internal class conflicts and strife that existed, but as the Kadro members accurately emphasized, external contradictions (the contradiction between imperialism and the colonized country). In the legacy inherited from the Ottoman Empire, according to the 1915 Industrial Census, there were a total of 288 enterprises, mostly flour mills, and a total of 14,060 workers. It was not possible to speak of a class contradiction. Today, external contradictions continue. In addition, we must also note that there is deep poverty and class contradiction within the country. I also feel the need to remind that in labor unionism, one of the important elements of the struggle of class contradictions, rights-based unionism in Turkey is quite far behind faith-based unionism.

In recent years, the world has entered into a search for a new model of statism against the criticisms caused by the neoliberal order. The model of statism being discussed is not the type of statism proposed by Keynes in the 1930s. Keynes's state intervention is an approach based on the state intervening in the market through taxes and expenditures when capitalism enters a crisis.

Today, 52 well-known economists from many parts of the world, led by 3 editors, have published a comprehensive book under the auspices of the London School of Economics and Political Science (LSE) titled "The London Agreement: Economic Principles for the 21st Century." The new model they put forward in the 17-chapter book is based on the role of the state in the economy and the principles of the Entrepreneurial State.

I would like to say this: Behind China's tremendous development drive is the inspiration it took from Atatürk. Furthermore, economists and sociologists who are looking for a fairer economic order against the neoliberal order today may be drawing inspiration from Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's economic model and statism, and naturally from the Kadro Movement. Or, in these new search efforts, they may have just realized the thoughts of 100 years ago. We need to convey the contributions of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk's development, independence, and statism policies, and the intellectual world of the Kadro Movement, to the world economic literature in much more detail.

(1) Dr. Serdar Şahinkaya has written 11 books, chapters in 29 joint books, 41 congress papers, six of which are international, 98 book review articles, and countless daily newspaper articles, and has managed numerous conferences.