Dans le cadre du séminaire « Recompositions, représentations et usages de l’environnement en Turquie et dans son voisinage »
Mercredi 21 octobre 2015 à 14h30 à l’IFEA
Bengi Akbulut (chercheure indépendante)
« From « iron networks » to cemented dreams: development as in-justice »
« From « iron networks » to cemented dreams: development as in-justice »
Development is perhaps the most controversial theme that marks the debates on contemporary Turkey. And rightly so: not only because discussions on the most effective way to achieve it are heating up once again, but also because development comes with its discontents, from communities whose living spaces are destroyed by energy projects to those bearing the detrimental health impacts of industrial pollution, from residents of entire villages submerged under water with dam constructions to miners killed by the hundreds. The centrality of the idea of development, however, goes further back. Development has always been a powerful notion that has shaped the social and political sphere in the country, where catching up with the “West” and attaining the level of Western civilizations has not only been the long-lasting objective of policy-making, but also dominated the social imaginary like no other.
This talk will critically evaluate the developmental strategy operationalized in the country within the last decade and contextualize it within the history of developmentalism in Turkey. In doing so, it will emphasize how the notion of development was mobilized within state-society relationships in Turkey as well as the ways it has been worked to mark the socio-environmental inequalities it has perpetuated. The talk will also emphasize how alternative visions and critiques of development can be articulated within this context.