AUTHOR=Gülalp Haldun 

TITLE=Secularism as a Project of Free and Equal Citizenship: Reflections on the Turkish Case

JOURNAL=Frontiers in Sociology

VOLUME=7

YEAR=2022

URL=https://www.frontiersin.org/journals/sociology/articles/10.3389/fsoc.2022.902734

DOI=10.3389/fsoc.2022.902734

ISSN=2297-7775

ABSTRACT=<p>This article undertakes a defense of secularism, much maligned by postmodernists and multiculturalists. First, secularism as a normative political principle is conceptually distinguished from the discredited sociological theory of secularization and, second, it is treated as a project of free and equal citizenship. The conceptual discussion is complemented by an assessment of the Turkish case, falsely presented in the literature as a radical form of secularism. The article aims to show that a religious political movement, opposed to secularism, tends to be authoritarian and intolerant of diversity.</p>