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Financial Times (London, England)
December 9, 2004 Thursday
Turkish education breaks out of 'straitjacket': Private funding has
allowed Sabanci University in Istanbul to strike a blow for academic
freedom, writes Vincent Boland
By VINCENT BOLAND
At first glance, the campus of Sabanci University, onthe edge of
Istanbul, looks more like an office park than a seat of learning.
Surrounded by motorway construction and dismal industrial buildings,
its appearance would disappoint those who associate universities with
dreaming spires.
But in the five years since it was founded, the university has
emerged as a new kind of academic institution in Turkey. In that time
it has struck at least one significant blow for academic freedom,
especially in the teaching of history, in a country fond of
historical orthodoxies. And it is one of a handful of institutions
shaping the new Turkey that is now pushing hard to join the European
Union.
"We want our students to question everything, to form their own
opinions," says Tosun Terzioglu, rector of Sabanci University.
This is a relatively novel concept in Turkish universities, which
have been an integral part of the official process of forging the
nation and the citizen since the republic was created in 1923.
Sabanci University, along with Koc University in Istandbul and
Bilkent University in Ankara, have emerged as elite private
educational institutions in a country where the state struggles, both
to educate all its children, and to provide them with jobs.
In addition, their independence has allowed for more diversity of
subject matter and opinion not only within their study halls but
without. Following their lead, state universities are beginning to
broaden their curricula and discuss taboo subjects, breaking free
from the censorship that lingered long after the army crushed
university dissent following a military coup in 1980.
Sabanci University is a private institution, founded with a Dollars
210m (Euros 156m, Pounds 108m) investment from the billionaire
Sabanci family, which owns one of Turkey's two largest conglomerates.
Because it is not part of the state apparatus, the university can
allow its staff complete academic freedom, sometimes to take an
unorthodox or controversial line of thinking on the issues that face
Turkey today.
For decades, the teaching of Turkish history at Turkish universities
has considered the country as unique, without putting it in a global
or regional context.
A guarantee of academic freedom stems from a controversy that erupted
in late 2000, when Halil Berktay, a history professor at Sabanci
University, enraged Turkish nationalists with his revisionist
interpretation of Turkey's "Armenian question" - the historically
unresolved issue of whether Armenians were the victims of genocide in
1915, as the Ottoman empire was disintegrating.
For decades, Turkey has rejected all claims of genocide and has
insisted that, while there may have been crimes committed against the
Armenians in those chaotic days, modern Turkey cannot be held
responsible. Prof Berktay became the first Turkish historian working
at a Turkish university to challenge that view.
In the furore that followed, Sabanci University stood by the
professor. Other universities, especially those that rely on the
state for funding, may have yielded to pressure to dismiss him.
"It didn't even occur to me that I would be abandoned by Sabanci
University when I spoke out," Prof Berktay says. "In most Turkish
state universities there is a stiff, straitjacketed, hierarchical
approach to saying something perceived as being against the national
interest, whatever that is, and in that framework it is virtually
unthinkable to go against the conventional wisdom."
The university's stance has attracted independent-minded staff -
often Turkish professors who once worked abroad.
Like other foundation universities in the country, teaching is done
in English, and students are offered language classes to bring them
up to standard to study in a second language.
It is part of the internationally minded approach that now imbues the
university, which draws students from all over the country to its
three faculties - engineering and natural sciences, management, and
arts and social sciences.
"We're hoping to change perceptions in Turkey," says Alpay
Filiztekin, who teaches economics at the university. "Turkey has many
problems, and it should be possible to contribute to the solutions to
those problems without fear of being fired. This has been a
revolution in Turkey."
December 9, 2004 Thursday
Turkish education breaks out of 'straitjacket': Private funding has
allowed Sabanci University in Istanbul to strike a blow for academic
freedom, writes Vincent Boland
By VINCENT BOLAND
At first glance, the campus of Sabanci University, onthe edge of
Istanbul, looks more like an office park than a seat of learning.
Surrounded by motorway construction and dismal industrial buildings,
its appearance would disappoint those who associate universities with
dreaming spires.
But in the five years since it was founded, the university has
emerged as a new kind of academic institution in Turkey. In that time
it has struck at least one significant blow for academic freedom,
especially in the teaching of history, in a country fond of
historical orthodoxies. And it is one of a handful of institutions
shaping the new Turkey that is now pushing hard to join the European
Union.
"We want our students to question everything, to form their own
opinions," says Tosun Terzioglu, rector of Sabanci University.
This is a relatively novel concept in Turkish universities, which
have been an integral part of the official process of forging the
nation and the citizen since the republic was created in 1923.
Sabanci University, along with Koc University in Istandbul and
Bilkent University in Ankara, have emerged as elite private
educational institutions in a country where the state struggles, both
to educate all its children, and to provide them with jobs.
In addition, their independence has allowed for more diversity of
subject matter and opinion not only within their study halls but
without. Following their lead, state universities are beginning to
broaden their curricula and discuss taboo subjects, breaking free
from the censorship that lingered long after the army crushed
university dissent following a military coup in 1980.
Sabanci University is a private institution, founded with a Dollars
210m (Euros 156m, Pounds 108m) investment from the billionaire
Sabanci family, which owns one of Turkey's two largest conglomerates.
Because it is not part of the state apparatus, the university can
allow its staff complete academic freedom, sometimes to take an
unorthodox or controversial line of thinking on the issues that face
Turkey today.
For decades, the teaching of Turkish history at Turkish universities
has considered the country as unique, without putting it in a global
or regional context.
A guarantee of academic freedom stems from a controversy that erupted
in late 2000, when Halil Berktay, a history professor at Sabanci
University, enraged Turkish nationalists with his revisionist
interpretation of Turkey's "Armenian question" - the historically
unresolved issue of whether Armenians were the victims of genocide in
1915, as the Ottoman empire was disintegrating.
For decades, Turkey has rejected all claims of genocide and has
insisted that, while there may have been crimes committed against the
Armenians in those chaotic days, modern Turkey cannot be held
responsible. Prof Berktay became the first Turkish historian working
at a Turkish university to challenge that view.
In the furore that followed, Sabanci University stood by the
professor. Other universities, especially those that rely on the
state for funding, may have yielded to pressure to dismiss him.
"It didn't even occur to me that I would be abandoned by Sabanci
University when I spoke out," Prof Berktay says. "In most Turkish
state universities there is a stiff, straitjacketed, hierarchical
approach to saying something perceived as being against the national
interest, whatever that is, and in that framework it is virtually
unthinkable to go against the conventional wisdom."
The university's stance has attracted independent-minded staff -
often Turkish professors who once worked abroad.
Like other foundation universities in the country, teaching is done
in English, and students are offered language classes to bring them
up to standard to study in a second language.
It is part of the internationally minded approach that now imbues the
university, which draws students from all over the country to its
three faculties - engineering and natural sciences, management, and
arts and social sciences.
"We're hoping to change perceptions in Turkey," says Alpay
Filiztekin, who teaches economics at the university. "Turkey has many
problems, and it should be possible to contribute to the solutions to
those problems without fear of being fired. This has been a
revolution in Turkey."