Ahmet Özcan
First Publication: Yarın Dergisi – 2005
The first condition for correctly understanding events and phenomena is not to forget that everything is a result. Every event emerges from a chain of events that gave rise to it, and every phenomenon emerges from a process of realization with multiple causes. Behind, beneath, and deep within all existing realities lies a chain of relationships in which multiple factors play a role. A perspective that cannot see the causes of events and phenomena and the connections between those causes cannot correctly grasp reality.
The second condition for correctly understanding reality is to seek causes on the concrete, perceptible, and analyzable ground of the process in which events and phenomena occur. The laws that God has ordained for things and events have an unchanging structure and a perceptible content. The mutable nature and the realm of living beings have certain unchanging laws, and these are entirely within the limits of human reason to comprehend. Correctly grasping reality depends on perceiving events and phenomena within their concrete existence.
For example, ‘morality’, with its unchanging values and standards, has changing forms and expressions. Good and evil, right and wrong, beauty and ugliness are clear; however, their practice in life takes shape depending on the patterns and impositions of the material conditions in which they exist. In this sense, if one speaks of moral maturation or disintegration, one is also speaking of a material foundation of this reality and a chain of analyzable causes. Because behind a variable and dynamic result such as maturation or disintegration, there is necessarily a concrete cause.
In this sense, “moral disintegration” must be considered together with capitalism as its material foundation. Because capitalism, as the fundamental and dominant system of our age and the society we live in, is also the cause of the forms that values and standards take.
Capitalism and Morality
The relationship between capitalism and morality is one-sided. As a mechanism where all of life is reduced to economics, and economics to the pursuit of profit, capitalism’s corrosive effect encompasses all moral boundaries and standards. Established values are either converted into money and reproduced as capitalist morality, or they are eliminated. The capitalist system “…penetrates the capitalist enterprise like a silent spirit… Dominates the entrepreneur himself… forces him to do what is necessary for it…” (1)
This stems from the appealing characteristic of capitalism that addresses the basest yet weakest points of human nature. As a system where selfish and ambitious individuals, within the framework of pragmatism’s efficiency philosophy, transform everything into a marketable commodity and perceive everything humanized in terms of material gain, “Capitalism does not root itself in money, but in the ‘love of money’…” (2)
Karl Marx attributes the domination of “money” over all humanity as a god to Judaism, or rather to the Judaization of people:
“What is the worldly basis of Judaism? Practical needs (necessities) and personal interest. What is the worldly worship of the Jew? Huckstering (or hard bargaining). What is the Jew’s worldly god? Money. The Jew has emancipated himself in a Jewish manner not only by acquiring financial power but also, independently of that, by money becoming a world power and the practical Jewish spirit becoming the practical spirit of Christian nations. The Jews have emancipated themselves to the extent that the Christians have become Judaized.
The new Christian’s idol is now Mammon (the god of wealth), and he worships it not only with his lips but with all the power of his body and soul. The world is nothing but a “stock exchange” for him. The spirit of huckstering has struck him, and the only way for him to find relief is to exchange objects. Money is the jealous god of Israel, before whom no other god can stand; the god of the Jews has been secularized and has become the god of all humanity…” (3)
Capitalism in Türkiye
Due to the absence of objective conditions in our country that would give rise to capitalism, the establishment of this system and its characteristics have been unique to it. The hegemonic character of the “Deep State,” which for centuries monopolized property and viewed trade as the domain of non-Muslims, prevented the development of individualism, a fundamental element of capitalism. The new form that the Ayan System took after the period of Mahmud II turned tax farmers into large landowners; however, the obstruction of urbanization and commercial development by the presence of the “State” made it impossible for these landowners to transform land rent into capital. The ideas and practices of the Young Turks–Committee of Union and Progress line aimed at creating a native bourgeoisie were also insufficient to establish the necessary infrastructure.
Turkish capitalism matured during the Republican period by taking on a character dependent on the state and originating from it through the policies implemented.
Especially the war profiteers who emerged after World War I and World War II, with the support of the state, formed the first bourgeois families of later periods. From after World War II onward, these families led all industrial and commercial investments outside the state monopoly and laid the foundations of today’s monopolistic order. Turkish capitalism, like political parties, ideological movements, culture, art, and literature, was born with the state and took shape as a component, complement, and instrument of its objectives. In this sense, capitalism in Türkiye reproduced the hegemonic character of the deep state as “monopolism” in economic and political life; and these new republican rich, whose wealth was largely distributed through confiscations and population exchanges, spread their own essentially predatory morality to society under the guise of contemporary, secular republicanism.
These characteristics of Turkish capitalism, through connections established with international monopolies during the 1960s and 1970s, gave rise to another feature: “alienation,” causing native and newly formed bourgeois classes to become estranged from the nation, the country, and its values. This late capitalism model, which had an unstable development trend due to its lack of material foundation, displayed a character detached from “values,” indifferent to moral standards, and opportunistic, leading society to rapidly disintegrate and enter a chaotic process. The fact that nearly all monopolistic capital circles, as part of the state, were “Kemalist,” financed the spread of the official ideology, imitated non-Muslims in their daily lives, and emulated Jews in business life are characteristics that sufficiently explain the moral mentality of Turkish capitalism.
‘Religious’ Capital
The process in which Turkish capitalism was born from the state ran parallel to the removal of “religion” from the public sphere. The policy of eliminating all existing values with the ambition of creating a new society and replacing them with a wholesale importation of the capitalist world system under the name of “Westernization-modernity” excluded all indigenous, religious, and moral institutional structures in society.
Particularly until the 1950s, conservative-religious masses who could not find a place in the public sphere had almost no opportunity to sustain their lives in any field. With the emergence of the Democrat Party, these groups were included in the process of taking a share within the system and gradually began to participate in capitalist restoration with their own identity. Particularly between 1950 and 1970, thanks to the political necessities of the Cold War and the anti-communist sentiment, these segments were sometimes deliberately given free rein. A middle-to-lower merchant capital emerged, characterized by a conservative character in the AP (Justice Party), a religious character in the MSP (National Salvation Party), and a nationalist character in the MHP (Nationalist Movement Party).
From the 1970s onward, this segment of capital, growing stronger by taking advantage of the opportunities provided during the periods when these parties came to power, had risen to become an influential factor in the Turkish economy by the mid-1970s.
In the 1980s, Turgut Özal’s policy of promoting Anatolian capital against monopolistic capital to create a balance led this conservative capital to seek participation in political power as well. This group, which gained power particularly within TOBB (The Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Türkiye), followed a path aimed at breaking monopolies by following in the footsteps of monopolies through the international connections it established throughout the 1980s. During the same period, another new bourgeois class emerged, enriched through government credits and incentives as well as through fictitious exports and smuggling methods. Within this new “late bourgeois” type, characterized by their opportunistic, get-rich-quick, and cosmopolitan nature, it was also possible to find Islamist elements.
This group faced three different fates: those who were purged after Özal’s death, those who became entrenched by turning to trade and industry, and those who became involved in organized crime. Among those who turned to trade and industry, the tendency toward religiosity was more widespread. Those eliminated (such as Bezmen, Edes, etc.) were cosmopolitan, while those who became mafia-like consisted of nationalist-idealist elements.
The conservative-native capital that had been developing since the 1950s began to differentiate within itself during the 1980s, and significant divergences emerged between religious and conservative capital. The Islamic dynamism that emerged in the 1990s and was reflected in politics also mirrored this differentiation within capital circles. Religious capital increasingly emphasized its own consciousness and goals, turning toward separate organization (MÜSİAD). MÜSİAD, and this religiously conservative business class which has accumulated significant capital even without being a member, has begun to exert its influence not only on the economic world but also on politics and cultural life, becoming a new factor in Turkish capitalism.
This class, largely composed of rural-origin, merchant-type middle classes, directed its economic activity in the 1990s mainly toward trade with the Balkans, Central Asia, and the Far East. It was also possible to find businessmen who invested, albeit in smaller numbers, in sectors such as industrial services and the production of intermediate goods. However, the main characteristic of religious capital emerged as economic activities based on the trade of basic consumer goods, or more precisely, economic activities aimed at making quick money. This situation was significant in that it reflected the shared characteristics of religious capital with the nation, and as a product of the nation, it also reflected the thousand-year-old aspirations and demands of the locals, the provinces, and Anatolia. The fact that a population with a militaristic character, after a thousand years, acquired the “property” it had been deprived of (and even despised) for a thousand years, and took its place on the periphery of power, also formed the structural characteristics of this capitalist class. The haste of being late, the ambition of the uncultured, the capriciousness of the nouveau riche, the anxiety and timidity of the oppressed, and the chaotic, uncertain, aimless, and ideology-less horizon of an irrational business mentality constituted the common characteristics of religious capital.
Two important background factors can be mentioned in the emergence of these characteristics. The first is that large masses lived without property for many years and, starting from the 1950s, migrated from villages to big cities, establishing a passive relationship with the center as they entered working life. This origin gave religious capital certain naive traits, such as being content with modest ownership and acting timidly in the face of power. The second reason is the mode of capital accumulation of religious capital. The way it relates to economics, money, and the power of money, as well as the methods through which it acquires wealth, are the source of many of its characteristics. Religious capital accumulated wealth through inheritance, land rent, and trade until the 1980s; after the 1980s, it did so through small-scale industry, speculative rent, and international trade. In the first period, it was indebted to the state and right-wing governments; in the second, to Özal’s liberalism and its Muslim identity, receiving support from conservative politicians in converting its wealth into power. This means that, as a model of accumulation, Islamist capital emerged not so much from individual talent and entrepreneurship as from a process of acquiring property shaped by the opportunities of the system. For this reason, religious capital is highly prone to rapid dissolution and abandoning its identity. Because while accumulating capital, it did not rely on its own values, standards, or the motives that form its identity, but instead became wealthy with the help of external factors. Therefore, his relationship with values, and especially his desire and effort to incorporate morality into economic activity, is weak.
The strengthening of religious capital since the 1990s, and particularly its gaining a backbone through MÜSİAD that would form the main body of small and medium-sized enterprises, is important in two respects.
Firstly, the elimination of the monopolistic system where property is concentrated in a few hands and the establishment of a fair market system depend on the effectiveness of these sectors. However, due to their structural dependence on monopolies, they do not appear to make sufficient effort in this regard. Yet just as they depend on monopolies, monopolies also depend on them in terms of expanding across the country and reaching consumers. Therefore, it is possible for religious capital to act more consciously and to use its power to open a space for opposition and alternatives.
Secondly, the spread and strengthening of religious capital is important for the construction of an alternative economic model-one that is indigenous, has roots extending back to the Ahi Evran (Ahilik/Brotherhood) tradition, does not separate economics from other areas of life, and possesses a moral content-in opposition to the immoral and secular capitalism that originated from the state. This, however, is only possible if Islamist capital breaks away from the process that created it and its wealth and turns toward a process rooted in moral foundations.
Since the 2000s, a new process has begun in which religious-conservative capital both feeds and is fed by the AK Party government. This capital, now seeking a new identity that no longer even embraces the label religious-conservative and carefully avoids it, has, thanks to the opportunities of power, made its final move in imitating monopolistic groups and has turned entirely toward growing through state resources. At present, this new class neither maintains an oppositional identity nor strives to be an alternative. On the contrary, as it develops and grows stronger, it appears to be inclined toward reproducing and spreading the economic and immoral content of capitalism under a religious appearance. This situation stems both from the class’s dependence on the system, its timidity, and lack of vision, and from the absence of a political strategy within Islamic social opposition capable of incorporating these groups into a process of social transformation.
As a result, the new ‘religious’ capital, as it develops, grows stronger, and earns more, moves away from religiosity, losing its sense of gratitude, contentment, benevolence, charity, thrift, and communal consciousness.
It increasingly becomes Judaized, with motives such as profit, rent, efficiency, and the desire for greater wealth overtaking its identity. As a result, its tendency toward integration and compromise with the capitalist system comes to the fore, and by breaking away from a communal structure, it acquires a class-based character.
The development of religious capital in a “late-bourgeois” form, its dependence on monopolies, and its spiritual relationship with the state and, more importantly, with the spirit of the “Deep State” through right-wing, status quo-preserving circles, not only prevents it from acquiring an oppositional and alternative identity, but also paves the way for the corruption of the fundamental moral values of Islam. Because economics and economic relations, which have become the infrastructure of capitalist societies, influence, change, or corrupt all the values and standards of society.
Today, concepts such as sustenance, work, labor, property, trade, profit, rights, and law are interpreted within a moral-free capitalist system, and these concepts need to be re-endowed with moral meaning. In contrast, religious capital accepts these concepts with their capitalist content and adopts a hypocritical and double-standard approach in business life. A type of ‘Muslim’ businessman is becoming widespread: capitalist in business, devout at home, arrogant towards some, sycophantic towards others, both denialist and confessor of his ideals and cause, infatuated with his new wealth and surroundings, sincere with his customers, distant from his community, a man of two personalities and a double life. Especially in daily life, a tendency toward “predation” is emerging, along with an artificial, ostentatious consumer behavior. For people whose sole aim in life has become the accumulation of goods and money, the end will be to become Judaized, wasting both their worldly life and the hereafter for the love of wealth.
The moral disintegration of religious capital will gradually spread to society. For there is a danger that masses who, for a thousand years, lacked status, power, authority, and property will envy those who possess them and imitate the new cultural and behavioral patterns they produce. Therefore, the source of moral disintegration must be identified as material relations and worldliness. Moral corruption begins wherever there is extreme poverty or extreme wealth. The result of great wealth is always great poverty. The breakdown of social justice and the emergence of class divisions indicate a clear system of exploitation and theft. In this sense, it is necessary to restrain the greed of religious capital with the sense of “halal and haram”; the lust for power and property with the awareness of death and the day of judgment; the anti-labor stance it adopts in exploitative relations with the principle of justice; and its immoral, hypocritical, and vulgar behavior in daily life with the natural, moral, and religious lives of the poor, the innocent, and the oppressed, thereby taking a clear and decisive stance against those who go astray.
It is a positive development that, after centuries, the nation has begun to own its own property. However, this positive development must not allow the emergence of new oligarchies under a “religious” guise. For this, a comprehensive and deep call and effort for “re-moralization” is required; one that also includes regulating the underlying material relations. This effort will both test the authenticity of Muslims’ faith and reveal how different the demand for social change truly is from the existing system.
“… A person who is excessively attached to wealth cannot attain the level of goodness. For the desire to accumulate wealth prevents them from showing compassion to others, observing justice, and spending where necessary. It drives them toward betrayal, lying, slander, false testimony, neglect of duty, miserliness, chasing trivial matters, and distancing themselves from religion and humanity. Such a person might spend a great deal of wealth seeking praise and fame, without expecting God’s pleasure or His reward. On the contrary, he uses it as a tool and makes it a means of profit. They do not realize that this is an evil that works against them …” (4)
A Muslim is the master of money, not its servant. Religious capital in Türkiye has produced a new type of bourgeoisie with an Islamic tone but a lumpen character. Türkiye’s sociology does not yet possess the tools to regulate religious capital. Therefore, the development of this new class in a way that legitimizes capitalism is a great danger for the future. Because overcoming the capitalist-imperialist system that subjugates humanity is possible through the development of an egalitarian system of justice based on the liberating interpretation of religions, especially Islam. In this context, if Muslims also fail to resist capitalism and to produce and implement alternative models, we will also lose the 21st century, and moreover, after Christians, we too will become Judaized and turn into slaves of the god of wealth. On the other hand, true morality manifests itself in life itself, in the most important aspect of human-to-human relations, in attitudes towards money, goods, and possessions. Those who cannot be moral in these areas will only be deceiving themselves and their nation with their prayers, supplications, and superficial piety. History is full of examples where such hypocrisy and ostentatious religiosity have been punished by divine justice.
‘Muslim rich’ and ‘Muslim’ aspiring rich must always feel the breath of freedom, justice, and a genuine effort for social transformation at their necks.
Because morality is about being a decent human being, and money doesn’t make a person a decent human being.
It only leaves them indebted to God, to society, and to the poor and becomes a means that can lead them astray.
References:
1-Werner Sombart, cited by M. Özel, Kapitalizm ve Din.
2-Alan Mcfarlane, Kapitalizm Kültürü, İstanbul, 1993.
3.Karl Marx, cited by M. Özel, Kapitalizm ve Din.
4-İbn Miskeveyh, Ahlakı Olgunlaştırma, M.E.B. Yayınları
*Source: Davası Olmayan Adam Değildir, Yarın Yayınları, 2009