Organic Intellectuals of Urban Politics? Turkish Urban Professionals as Political Agents, 1960-80.
Thesis:
The Urban masses were politicized in the 1960s and 1970s. Urban architects and planners played a big role as organic intellectuals. What were their counter-hegemonic potential?
Notes:
If the classes are not understood as preceding the domain of struggle but rather as being products of it, the intellectuals’ ‘organicity’ can be defined in relation to hegemonic struggle rather than the classes as pre-given elements of the struggle.5 In other words, organic intellectuals can be defined through their relation to the political struggle rather than the classes themselves
The seeking by urban professionals of a means of maintaining closer ties with the popular classes found an answer in ‘advo- cacy planning’, which is the third influential issue that emerged in the second half of the 1960s. Calling for the planners to become the voices of the disadvantaged social groups (Davidoff, 1965), the idea of advocacy plann- ing was enthusiastically embraced for a short period by the Turkish planners and archi- tects as well.
As the experience of urbanisation in Turkey took place parallel to the introduction of a multiparty regime, the process of squatt- ing had always been marked by electoral concerns. As a result, an important issue in the election campaigns —which was widely used by the right-wing governments exploiting the advantage of being in power—was the promis- ing of title deeds to the squatters
The 1971 intervention brought out two unintentional consequences that disrupted this clientelistic structure and eventually paved the way for the radicalisation of squatters during the 1970s. The first of these was the violence generated by the military regime, which was experienced by the squatters in the form of demolitions. The demolitions became a significant aspect of the military regime determinedto‘restoreorder’inthecities.Yet, they served to increase the politicisation of the violence the squatters faced occasionally and also established a connection between democratic demands and resistance to the demolitions.14 The second outcome was even more incidental. The military administration closed down all the beautification societies together with other civil organisations and including some of the political partie
When the societies were reopened after three years, they were appropriated and politicised by the younger generation of squatters as a means to organise against such mafia groups (Heper, 1982). Hence, the period under the military regime set the stage for the un- foreseen turn of the squatters to the left. This shift occurred in terms of both their voting left in the 1973 elections and the gradual establishment of links between the squatters and the radical left.