Illusory Debates: How the "Sadaka Culture" Discourse Masked the Rise of Social Assistance in Turkey, 2015

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Asian Journal ofSocial Science 43 (2015) 125–150

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Illusory DebatesHow the “Sadaka Culture” DiscourseMaskedthe Rise of Social Assistance in Turkey

Gizem ZencirciProvidence College

Abstract

Emergent social assistance programmes in developing countries are either consid-ered to possibly signal the transition to a post-neoliberal era, or are taken to consti-tute a move towards neoliberal welfare governance. By examining the making of asocial assistance-based welfare regime in Turkey, I argue that the expansion of socialprogrammes are the product of the neoliberalism-plus conjuncture which takes mar-ket inequality as a given. Specifically, this article analyses the similarity of nominallyopposed concepts of welfare in the Turkish debate between conservative Islamistsand secular Kemalists. By examining the “sadaka culture” debate and the constitu-tive rights vs. belief binary, the following analysis illustrates that although these twopolitical groups appear to disagree about welfare governance, in reality this on-goingdebate actually masks the consolidation of social assistance as a welfare norm. I arguethat social assistance operates as a bio-political strategy that transforms state power,restructures welfare governance and generates new understandings of poverty, needand aid in the neoliberalism-plus conjuncture.

Keywords

Turkey – social assistance – neoliberalism – Islamism – poverty – welfare policy

Introduction

Like many other liberalising countries, Turkey is in the midst of a “welfare rev-olution” marked by a debate around social assistance programmes. Accordingto Somers and Block (2005), such revolutions occur when emergent publicdebates construct, transform and normalize market-oriented welfare norms

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Asian Journal of Social Science 43 (2015) 125–150

and poverty truths. This article examines the “sadaka culture” discourse inTurkey and argues that this illusory debatemasks the consolidation of a neolib-eral welfare regime. After coming to power in 2002, the conservative-IslamistJustice and Development Party (jdp) restructured Turkey’s developmentalistwelfare regime and introduced social assistance programmes. In addition tocriticism from leftist groups, the secular-Kemalist Republican People’s Party(rpp) criticised these programmes for creating a sadaka (dependency) cultureamong the Turkish poor and undermining a rights-based approach to welfaregovernance.1 While this polarised public debate may appear to suggest funda-mental divergences about primary welfare principles, I argue that these twopolitical networks only disagree about the design of social assistance policy:determining the eligibility of recipients and distributing benefits. The sadakaculture debate thus actually conceals theon-goingwelfare revolution inTurkey.

My goal in this paper, thus, is not to assess the effectiveness of jdp’s socialassistance programmes or discuss how these programmes could be improved.Rather I offer a critical reading of the partisan debate about “social assistance”in Turkey in order to unpack howwelfare governance has come to be conceptu-alised and governed in a specific way in the neoliberalismplus conjuncture. TheTurkish case allows analysing the intersections of neoliberalism, local politicaldynamics and welfare governance in a non-Western, Asian context. New socialwelfare programmes in various developing countries are argued to possibly sig-nal a post-neoliberal social order, while others argue that these programmesconstitute a move towards neoliberal welfare politics. In this article, I arguethat although neoliberalism involves “social justice increasing mechanisms”,this emergent paradigm is limited in that it consolidates social assistance asa welfare norm, whilst at the same time silencing alternative ways of concep-tualising and governing welfare.

These empirical findings are drawn from a 14-month fieldwork (betweenJune 2009-August 2010), followed by another research trip in April 2012, whereI collected publications, books, brochures and newspaper articles about the“sadaka culture” debate and interviewed awide range of actors from state insti-tutions, ngos andmunicipalities across the secularist-Islamist divide. Througha discourse analysis of these debates and examination of themajor innovationsthat have gone into the design of social assistance policy, I illustrate that these

1 Even though I seek to understand the social assistance debate through the secularism vs.Islamism lens, I do not see Turkish society or politics as divided into secular and Islamicgroups. My purpose is not to reify this dichotomy rather, I see secularism and Islamism asalternative political projects that are remarkably similar in their approach to various social,political and religious issues.

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two political constituencies are constituted by the neoliberalism-plus conjunc-ture. The politicisation of social assistance between these communities devel-oped in the shared context of Turkey’s liberalisation and the emergence of ashared approach to welfare as a bio-political strategy.

Rise of Social Assistance: Neoliberalism, Post-Neoliberalismor Neoliberalism-Plus?

In the past decade, targeted socıal assistance programmes for poverty allevia-tion have been introduced in countries as varied as South Africa, Peru, Azer-baijan and Mexico (Ferguson, 2007; Fan and Habibov, 2008; Lloyd-Sherlock,2008; Barrientos and Santibáñez, 2009; Surender et al., 2010; Inaba, 2011; Leung,2006). Some of these social assistance programmes transformed Social Funds,whichwere created during the 1980s in order to alleviate the destructive effectsof economic liberalisation (Tendler, 2000). Whereas these earlier social trans-fer programmes had a residual character that decreased over time (Barrien-tos et al., 2008: 760), these new social transfer programmes have become keyelements of national welfare policy. Many countries have increased their pub-lic welfare budgets in order to finance conditional and unconditional cashtransfers, and have introduced micro-finance programmes and various skills-training projects.

Scholars have examined this concerted “return to social policy” (Razavi,2007) through two oppositional analytical frameworks. Some have argued thatthese social programmes signal the co-optation of a concern for welfare withina neoliberal logic (Barrientos, 2013; Bradshaw, 2008; Sanchez-Ancochea andMattei, 2011), while others have posited that these new programmes signal thecreation of an alternative to, or perhaps even a transition away from neoliber-alism (Abrahamson, 2010; Jenson, 2010; Kaltwaser, 2011; Grugel and Riggirozzi,2012). Whereas the former claim that these social programmes should not betaken as signalling the transition to a post-neoliberal era, the latter have cau-tiously welcomed such a possibility.

Part of the confusion comes from the lack of a clear consensus distinguishingneoliberalism and post-neoliberalism. Perhaps more importantly, the globalproliferation of “welfare increasing social justice mechanisms” signal that theconventional opposition between neoliberalism and welfare should be ques-tioned. For example, in his analysis of the big Income Grant debates in SouthAfrica, James Ferguson argues that social payments have begun to play a grow-ing role in neoliberal welfare regimes and that they signal the emergence of anew direction in the governance of poverty (Ferguson, 2005: 44). In his subse-

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quentwork, he explains thatmany arguments in favour of the big in neoliberalSouthAfrica have been “both pro-poor andneoliberal” (Ferguson, 2007: 79). Forthis reason, Ferguson suggests that it is better to examine what kind of welfarearrangements emerge in a neoliberal era, instead of trying to expect these newarrangements to conform to certain theoretical expectations about neoliberal-ismorpost-neoliberalism. Indeed, initially FriedrichHayek andothermembersof the Mont Pelerin society had formulated ordo-liberalism in a social justicefriendly fashion, which also envisioned a greater role for the state (Bonefeld,2013; Streit and Wohlgemuth, 2000; Rieter and Schmolz 1993; Sally 1996). Thefact that social welfare extends with the advancement of market capitalism isalso evident whenwe look at the welfare regimes of advanced liberal countriesin Europe, even if many of these welfare regimes have also moved in a neolib-eral direction.

One of the advantages of the concept of “neoliberalism-plus” is that it allowslooking at “actually existing neoliberalisms” (Brenner and Theodore, 2002)without a preconceived notion of what makes up neoliberalism. First, insteadof focusing onwhether or not the emergence of social justice increasingwelfaremechanisms signal the end of neoliberalism, this concept invites us to under-stand thesenewarrangements as both aproduct of and a response toneoliberalforms of governance. Second, it enables us to develop a situated, contextually-bound approach to the study of neoliberalism, instead of using a universalyardstick that can be indiscriminately applied across Asian contexts. Countriesacross Asia have not experienced a simultaneous transition away from neolib-eralism to post-neoliberalism. Nevertheless, despite the variation in historicalbackgrounds—ranging from communism and developmentalism to more lib-eralised environments—many Asian countries are now experimenting withneoliberal forms of governance. In the case of Turkey, the local variant ofneoliberalism is produced in conjunctionwith the rise of the jdp,whichhas ref-erenced an Ottoman-Islamic heritage to justify many of its neoliberal reforms.In order to fully understand this development, following Foucaldian scholars, Iapproach neoliberalism as a form of governmentality in which social policy isdeployed as a bio-political strategy (Cruikshank, 1999;Donzelot, 1980; Foucault,1977, 1988, 1991; Gordon, 1991; Hewitt, 1991; Procacci, 1978). I suggest that, neolib-eral welfare governance constructs, categorises and classifies its subjects—thepoor—and seeks to govern them by introducing new administrative and tech-nical forms of power. Current debates about social assistance in Turkey maskthe ways in which the state (together with non-state organisations) has begunto intervene with varying effects in issues concerning poverty, destitution anddisability. What makes the Turkish case exemplary of “neoliberalism-plus” isthe extent to which these social programmes have actualised new techniques,



practices and knowledge, thereby normalising “social assistance” as a conven-tional welfare norm.

The Justice and Development Party and the Transformation of theTurkishWelfare Regime

Historically, Turkey’s founding ideology, Kemalism, emphasised a statist ap-proach to economic matters and articulated national belonging along prin-ciples of secular Turkish nationalism. However, after the 1980 military coup,theMotherland Party (anap) adopted neoliberal economic reforms and recon-structednational identity along the lines of the “Turkish-Islamic synthesis”. Fur-ther, during the post-1980s period, Kemalist statismwas confronted by a varietyof socio-political movements including those by the Kurdish and Alevi minori-ties and the rise of Islamic political parties. Economic liberalisation broughtthe rise of a conservative group of businessmen—the “Anatolian Tigers”—who challenged the economic and political power of the country’s secularelite and supported the Islamist political movement (Adaş, 2006; Demir et al.,2004; Gümüşcu and Sert, 2009). In order to further the process of liberalisation,Turkey, with the support of the International Monetary Fund (imf) imple-mented a comprehensive disinflation programme with strict austerity targetsin 1999. But, the pressures of integration with global capital markets resultedin a severe economic crisis in 2001 (Cizre and Yeldan, 2005). Thus, when thejdp was elected in 2002, it marked a key shift in Turkish politics. In contrast toprevious Islamist political parties that mobilised around an anti-globalisationrhetoric, the jdp advocated combining free market capitalism with religiousvalues (Atasoy, 2009; Patton, 2009; Tuğal, 2009). jdp’s articulation of “neolib-eral Islam” allowed this political party to consolidate its power vis-à-vis theRepublic’s secular-military elite and enabled the political and economic trans-formation of Turkey.

One of the key domains of reform was the welfare regime. Like other coun-ties that fit the “Southern Europeanmodel”, the Turkish welfare regime is char-acterised by strict distinction between the formal and the informal sectors, alack ofmeans-tested social assistance programmes, and an overreliance on tra-ditional and familial support networks (Buğra and Keyder, 2006; Gough 1996;Grutjen, 2008). Although those who worked in the formal employment sectorreceived benefits, such as pensions and social insurance, the majority of thepopulation who worked in the informal economy were mostly supported byagricultural subsidies (Buğra, 2008; Koray, 2008; Özbek, 2006). Arguing that thisdevelopmentalist welfare regime was no longer economically viable, the jdp,

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with the support of imfand theWorldBank, introduceda series of reformsaim-ing to fix the developmentalist welfare regime (Bakırezer and Demirer, 2009).Although a majority of these reforms curtailed public welfare benefits, theyalso included certain social justice increasing mechanisms. On the one hand,healthcare and social insurance programmes were privatised, certain publicemployment benefitswere curtailed,many agricultural subsidieswere disman-tled and private charitable giving was emphasised (Elveren, 2008; Coşar andYeğenoğlu, 2009; Morvaridi 2013). On the other hand, a newly-created SocialSolidarity and Mutual Assistance General Ministry (Sosyal Yardımlaşma veDayanışma Genel Müdürlüğü, sydgm) was tasked with providing social assis-tance to targeted populations. As Eder (2010) argues, welfare provision throughthis ministry expanded state power in Turkey despite the on-going privatisa-tion of various public programmes, which simultaneously led to state with-drawal.

This general ministry was tasked with supervising and funding a total 973public Social Solidarity and Mutual Assistance (Sosyal Yardımlaşma ve Daya-nışma, syd) vakıfs (foundations), as well as overseeing numerous private sydderneks (associations), such as the Deniz Feneri (Lighthouse), Kimse Yokmu (IsAnybodyThere?), İnsaniYardım (HumanitarianAid) andCansuyu (SoulWater)organisations among others. In the past decade, the budget allocated for pub-lic syd foundations steadily increased from tl 1 Billion in 2004 to tl 10 billionin 2010.2 Between 2003 and 2009, the welfare budget as a percentage of gdpincreased by 85%.3 By 2013, the budget amounted to tl 17 billion.4 The ever-increasing social assistance budget provided a variety of services to targetedpopulations. For example, in 2011, twomillion families received fuel assistance,900,000 families were provided with food, 2.2 million families received educa-tion related assistance and 800,000 families were offered access to freemedicalservices.5 In addition to the expansion of the public social assistance budget,private syd associations were also key players in the distribution of social ser-vices. For example, Lighthouse—which in 2009 was accused of using private

2 “Kamu Kesimi Sosyal Harcama İstatistikleri” (Statistics of Public Social Spending). Avail-able at: http://ekutup.dpt.gov.tr/ekonomi/rip/tr/kamu_kesimi_sosyal_harcama_istatistikleri.pdf (accessed 4 September 2013).

3 Statistics on Conditional Cash Transfers. Available at http://www.sydgm.gov.tr/tr/html/265/Sartli+Nakit+Transferi/ (cited in Yoruk, 2012, p. 518).

4 “Yoksula Bütçeden 17.2 Milyar Lira” (Budget allocates tl 17.2 Billion to the Poor), Sabah, 25October 2012. Available at: http://www.sabah.com.tr/Ekonomi/2012/10/25/yoksula-butceden-172-milyar-lira (accessed 5 October 2014).

5 Available at: http://www2.tbmm.gov.tr/d24/7/7--8441c.pdf (accessed 5 October 2014).

http://ekutup.dpt.gov.tr/ekonomi/rip/tr/kamu_kesimi_sosyal_harcama_istatistikleri.pdf

http://ekutup.dpt.gov.tr/ekonomi/rip/tr/kamu_kesimi_sosyal_harcama_istatistikleri.pdf

http://www.sydgm.gov.tr/tr/html/265/Sartli+Nakit+Transferi/

http://www.sydgm.gov.tr/tr/html/265/Sartli+Nakit+Transferi/

http://www.sabah.com.tr/Ekonomi/2012/10/25/yoksula-butceden-172-milyar-lira

http://www.sabah.com.tr/Ekonomi/2012/10/25/yoksula-butceden-172-milyar-lira

http://www2.tbmm.gov.tr/d24/7/7--8441c.pdf



donations for supporting jdp’s electoral campaigns—provided social assis-tance worth of tl 5 million to 2.5 million individuals between 1999 and 2009.6Like Lighthouse, many of these private syd associations had strong ties withIslamist political parties and social networks. Many members of the Islamistpolitical network were encouraged to provide financial and in-kind assistancetobothpublic andprivate sydorganisations. This hybrid institutional structureblurred theboundaries betweenpublicwelfare andprivate charity, streamlinedthe administration of social assistance and employed both professional staffand volunteers. More importantly, the development of such a welfare appa-ratus involved the introduction of new policy measures. Two of these policydesign issues are particularly significant for understanding the welfare debatein Turkey: (1) targeting, or how to determine who is eligible to receive bene-fits; and (2) distribution, or how to deliver social benefits to those who weredeemed eligible.

Determining Eligibility through Social InvestigationBarrientos et al. (2008: 768) argue that in contrast to universal service provision,one of the distinguishing features of emergent social assistance programmesis that they often have to rely on the “careful selection of beneficiaries forsupport”. This requires, among other things, a mechanism for distinguishingbetweendeserving andundeserving poor. Thepush towards targeted eligibility,thus, is one of the distinguishing features of the transition from a developmen-tal to a neoliberalwelfare regime. In the case of Turkey, both state andnon-stateinstitutions changed how they distinguished between the deserving and theundeserving poor. In this new bio-political strategy, the collection of “truthfulinformation” came to be seen as the best way to knowpoverty. To this end, boththe jdp and government-friendly organisations developed an entire apparatusdedicated to collecting and cataloguing information about the Turkish poor.The collection, analysis and cataloguing of information about the poor beganas soon as a person applied to receive social assistance from state institutionsor government-friendly ngos. In order for his/her application to be consideredas complete, a person had to bring along a number of documents: a cover letter,completed application form, photocopy of one’s national id card, and a povertycertificate issued by themuhtar.7

If case workers were to consider the applicant as a potential recipient, thenthe applicant’s folder would be passed on to the “social investigation” teams—

6 Ankara Şubesi Bülteni, Deniz Feneri Derneği, Ağustos 2009, Ankara, 1.7 Amuhtar is the elected head of a village or neighbourhood.

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ad hoc groups consisting of a mix of volunteers and workers. Social investiga-tion teams were tasked with visiting the homes of prospective recipients. Theimmediate goal of these visits was to determine whether or not the applicant’shousehold situation and composition matched the information in his/her file.The social investigation teams evaluated recipients on a “point system”, whichwas claimed to be a more scientific means of ascertaining eligibility. Decisionsabout whether or not, and if so, what type of social assistance should be pro-videdwas based on the examination of data collected about each applicant. Asa bio-political technique of eligibility, social investigation relied on compilinginformation about the poor. For example, during one ofmy visits to the sydgm,Ali, a civil servant in the Social Assistance Department Office explained tome the various steps of the application process for getting poverty assistance.While we were looking at the computer screen prompted by the entry of mynational id number, Ali explained the ingenuity of such a system of surveil-lance:

Citizens who are in need come to us. I mean, not to us but to a vakıf intheir neighbourhood. But each vakıf has access to this system now. Oncethe applicant provides us with their national id number, we are able topull up almost all of the relevant information about their finances. So,here we can see whether you pay your taxes, whether a social securityinstitution pays you, orwhether or not you ownanyproperty. See, herewecan even see if you get agricultural subsidies from theministry. This givesus all the informationwe need to rightfully assess anyone’s situation. Thisway we give to those who are in real need. This is a right of each citizenand it has to be done in the correct way.

For Ali, such a surveillance systemwas justified because he believed that accessto information enabled distinguishing between the deserving and the unde-serving poor. Nevertheless, there were limits to howmuch (or how accurately)the poor can be adequately known. Many volunteers of Lighthouse, for exam-ple, noted that a key problem was the fact that many women applicants liedabout their marital status. Since being a widow was considered as a sure signof neediness, poor Turkish women were likely to present themselves as wid-owed whenever they sought poverty assistance. One volunteer explained: “Itis a problem, but many of these women send their husbands to their relatives,they send them away, so they are on their ownwhen our team visits.We cannotalways know what is going on.” Another problem was the fact that most vol-unteers were not educated as social workers, and hence lacked the educationconcerning how to adequately understand conditions of poverty. For example,



one volunteer of the IsAnyoneThere [KimseYokMu] organization said: “Wearenot social workers, we do not have the education, but we look into our hearts,and we hope we are being fair to both these poor families and those who havetrusted their donations with us.” Many volunteers and social workers were alsoconcernedwith the possibility that at least some applicantsmight be deceivingthem. “People are known to lie,” said one vakıf manager, and explained:

We cannot possibly check everything everyone says or does. There arethose who buy a house and then register it in their relative’s name. Orthere arewomenwho pretend to not have their husband livingwith themso that they can get social assistance. A lot of these people, also apply tomultiple organisations… Imean how am I to knowwhere else theymightbe getting assistance?

Such concerns eventually lead to the institution of the Social Assistance Infor-mation System (Sosyal Yardım Bilgi Sistemi, soybis). This was a system de-signed to centralise the information available about the applications thatsought social assistance. Presented asmodel thatwould bring “servicewith oneclick,” the soybis systemwas designed tomake sure that applicants would notbe able to falsify their information or collect assistance from a variety of organ-isations without their knowledge. jdp’s social assistance-based welfare regimewas thus motivated by a desire to know the poor and to compile accurateinformation about their conditions of poverty. The collection of informationabout the livelihood, family structure and employment history of applicantswas deemed as the only way to determine eligibility. In addition to these tech-nologies of deservingness, jdp’s welfare regime also introduced new ways ofdistributing social assistance.

The “Social Market”: NewMechanisms for Distributing SocialAssistance

One of the most remarkable inventions for distributing assistance that haveemerged in Turkey in the past two decades is the package system. Since char-itable giving traditionally skyrocketed during the month of Ramadan, manysupermarket chains, in an attempt to benefit from this untappedmarket, beganto offer “Ramadan packages”. These packages generally included imperishablefood items such as grains, pasta, rice and canned goods. These packages couldbepurchased for 25–50 tl (about $10–20): differently pricedpackages includedgoods of a different variety and quality. In addition to individuals, Ramadanpackages were also used by welfare organisations who applied this system topoverty relief. Both during the month of Ramadan and the rest of the year, it

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became common practice for welfare organisations to distribute food assis-tance in the form of a pre-packaged box. Despite its popularity, the packagesystem came under scrutiny because it was argued to deprive recipients ofagency: the recipients had no say in what would be included in the food boxes.As a result, the social market was introduced as a technology of distributioncapable of overcoming the shortcomings of this system. Today, social marketscould be found in both statewelfare offices and government-friendly charitableorganisations.

Regardless of their location, all of these social markets were structured instrikingly similar ways. Often the “social market” was located in a room closelylocated to the main office of the organisation. Clothes, shoes and perishablefood were displayed on shelves. Some social markets also offered rugs, furni-ture and curtains as well. Volunteers carefully organised these various items foreasy perusal. Themain idea, as one volunteer toldme, was tomake it easier forfamilies to “feel like they are in a real market.” Managers saw the social marketas a source of pride. They believed that these socialmarkets exemplified amod-ern, humane and scientific approach to welfare provision. Most of these actorsimagined themselves to be part of a reformist movement that transformed theway in which in-kind assistance was distributed in Turkey. In their minds, thesocialmarketwas the symbolic centre of this transformation.At one level, thesesocial markets are similar to Euro-American charity shops in that both seek toaccomplish a logic of impersonality between the giver and the receiver. Donorsdo not knowwho receives the goods, recipients do not knowwho has providedthem. But similarities cease to exist beyond the logic of impersonality. First, nomonetary exchange takes place in social markets. Second, the absence of mon-etary gain means that no profits are given to a separate charity organisation.Third, recipients are given access to their goods as part of their eligibility sta-tus. Fourth, these goods are usually donated by businesses, and have thus hadnot been previously used.

One of the first examples of such a charitable arrangement can be foundin Jenny White’s (2002: 186–189) analysis of an Islamic foundations’ charitystore in Ümraniye, Istanbul. This was a foundation that had strong informalties with theWelfare Party’s organisational structure and theWelfare-governedmunicipality of Ümraniye. Much like the current social markets of Turkey,this charity store in Ümraniye was at the heart of social services offered bythe municipality. Although there was a lack of emphasis on the provision oflong-term assistance or skills-training programmes, still many needy familieswere assisted by this charity store albeit sporadically. White argues that thesecharity shops revitalised the social welfare functions of Islamic foundations(2002: 192). Indeed, religious sentiments have been an instrumental aspect



of Islamic social service provision. However, what distinguishes the currentsocial markets is their neoliberal-Islamic character in which the social marketis celebrated both due to its resemblance to and difference from commercialsupermarkets. Due to their interior design, recipients could almost feel like“real customers” and have an experience almost as if they were shopping.Yet, the lack of monetary exchange meant that these social markets werealso fundamentally different from ordinary supermarkets. For example, anarticle titled “Food BankingMakes the Poor Happy,” after discussing the recentcreation of a social market at the Van syd Association, explained:

The poor citizens that are registered at this office are able to get the itemsthey need from the food, clothing and cleaning departments of the FoodBank. After they put these items in their shopping carts they use thebarcode scanner located at the counters. In this way, it is possible to givethe holders of rights (hak sahibi) what theywant for themselves, instead ofwhat someoneelse hasdecided for them.Thepeople of this regionadmirethe newmarket system and the rich choices and services that if offers.8

The “market-like” character of the socialmarket was key. The purposeful organ-isation of these spaces as if they were supermarkets, with checkout counters,shelves and barcodes, were all measures taken to ensure this resemblance.Many actors brought up this resemblance during my fieldwork. Some infor-mants emphasised the existence of shelves, others mentioned the use of abarcode scanner and directed my attention to the use of shopping carts. Onevolunteer said: “We want people to feel like shopping. They should be ableto get what they want and need easily.” Social markets were built around analternative principle of exchange based on moral values and were thereby notdriven by a desire for profit-maximisation. For example, the Beyoğlu Munici-pality announced the opening of their social market in 2011 with the followingslogans: “Not those who have money, but those who have the need can buy![This is a market] filled with Goodness not with Money! [Here] Money is notaccepted, [but] goodness is!”9 In this slogan, monetary exchange was juxta-posed to a discourse of goodness, and it was argued that social markets werebetter because they were not organised around a for-profit principle. Many of

8 Dayanışma (Solidarity) 2009. 2: 6, Ankara: Sosyal Yardımlaşma ve Dayanışma Genel Müdür-lüğü Yayınları. p. 37.

9 “Beyoğlu Sosyal Market Açıldı!” (The Beyoglu Municipality Social Market has opened!). Avail-able at: http://www.beyoglusosyalyardim.com/hizmetler/detay.aspx?SectionId=1744(accessed 6 December 2011).

http://www.beyoglusosyalyardim.com/hizmetler/detay.aspx?SectionId=1744

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these charitable spaces combined amarket-based vocabularywith its imaginedmoral alternatives by naming these socialmarkets as the “CompassionMarket”,the “Love Store”, the “Friendly Hands Stop” and the “Heart Connections”.

By allowing recipients to have a “market-like” experience when they col-lected their social assistance, the social market was able to allow recipientsto be “free” and “choose” whatever they needed. As one donor put it: “Thisway, they don’t have to eat what others think they should be eating. They candecide for themselves.” Instead of being given “hand-outs” or “left-overs”, poorpeople could peruse the aisles of the social market and take what they needwithin certain limits. Further, the social market was argued to provide a senseof anonymity, thereby hopefully preventing the likely patronisation of recipi-ents by donors, managers and volunteers.

Despite such idealistic depictions, many social markets faced a variety ofproblems in their day-to-day activities. Social markets were often stocked bystoreowners who were closely tied to jdp’s political network. Donating to asocial market was practical for these business owners who no longer wantedto pay for storing unsold clothing items and wanted to get rid of food itemsthat were about to expire. Such donations gave business firms tax exemptions,a chance to feel good about themselves and more importantly, an opportunityto create new political connections or reinforce already existing ones. Yet,from the perspective of these social markets, such a system presented certainchallenges. Lack of political networks meant that social markets might havea limited supply of resources. As a result, many of these organisations foundthemselves in a position to compete with others. Such problems with supply,in turn, meant that the recipients could not adequately benefit from the socialmarket as if theywere “freely shopping”. For example, during one ofmy visits toa small private syd dernek with a social market attached to it, a manager toldme that despite their market-like set up, they had reverted back to the packagesystem. He said:

Ideally people should be able to pick what they want and then go to thecounter and check out their stuff, just like at the markets. But here wewant to give them the best of everything. That’s why we don’t accept anysecond-hand clothing items. If we did, people just bring what they wouldnot wear themselves, they do not care if it is old or dirty, they just wantto get rid of stuff. As for food, our connections are not so good. Often wedo not have enough. We do not have themeans to do the food banking asit is meant to be. So we end up distributing in packages. Our volunteersmake a bag, fill it up with the same amount of food in two-kilogram bagsand then we give it to the recipients on a certain day of the month. There



are two types of packages. Package a is for a family of 1–2 people. Packageb is for larger families. We distribute clothing to an entire family every sixmonths, but we have to control what they take then too because we donot have enough.

As this account illustrates, supply-related problems entailed that the organisa-tion often had to blend the package system within a market-like set up. How-ever, social markets were no less popular due to these difficulties. Regardlessof whether or not social markets were able to provide recipients with a truemarket-like experience, the shared assumption was that a market-like experi-ence was a better way for distributing social assistance. Ideally, of course, in amarket-like set-up therewasnot to be a “distribution” of social assistanceper se.Yet, even in its absence, the illusion of agency was sufficient to lend legitimacyto the social market arrangement.

jdp’s political network developed a complex apparatus social assistanceprovision via both public and private channels. Detailed information aboutapplicants was collected. Social investigation teams conducted home visits.Information about applicants were examined in order to determine the level ofneed. Once an applicant was deemed as deserving of assistance, a number ofprecautions were taken to give recipients a positive experience so that they donot feel as if they were receiving “hand-outs”. Social markets, for example, wereintroduced in order to fix the shortcomings of the package system. Althoughthe day-to-day operations of the social assistance apparatus did not alwaysmatch such idealistic visions, still, in the minds of many actors, this emergentsystem was perceived as a more humane, scientific and modern approach foraddressing the needs of the Turkish poor. Despite these ideals and innovations,jdp’s social assistance-based welfare regime was criticised by the Kemalistopposition for reinforcing “sadaka culture”.

Secularist Criticisms: Marking Social Assistance as “sadakaCulture”

In April 2010, I went to a local office of Association in Support of ContemporaryLiving (Çağdaş Yaşamı Destekleme Derneği) in Istanbul to meet with Filiz,the manager of the educational philanthropy committee. Like many othervolunteers, Filizwas a retired teacher in her fifties andhadbeen volunteering inthis Kemalist organisation for the past five years. During one of our interviews,she explainedwhy shewas critical of jdp’s approach to social welfare provisionwith the following words:

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The actual problem is that when you give social assistance, you are push-ing people into laziness. It is just like that Chinese proverb, do not give aman a fish, teach him how to fish, that’s exactly what is being done wronghere. It is not right to give money each time a need arises, that’s how youget people accustomed to laziness and put them in a position of desper-ation. This is the problem with the sadaka culture. Aren’t we supposedto be developing? Is this how we are going to get out of backwardness?Where are our rights?

This conversation reveals, how, self-identified Kemalists like Filiz saw jdp’ssocial assistance programmes as form of creating dependency amongst theTurkish poor. For the opposition, the term “sadaka culture” was deployed tocriticise jdp’s welfare regime. In basic terms, sadaka refers to practices ofgiving to the poor encouraged by the Muslim religious doctrine. The practiceof sadaka is ordained by the Quran and advised by the prophet Mohammed.In contrast to fitre and zekat10 that have a more compulsory character, sadakais a voluntary donation that can be given to anyone without any preconditionsand in any amount. Apart from such religious uses, sadaka in everyday life canalso refer to the practice of giving small amounts of money to street beggars.

Why was social assistance by the state understood to be a manifestation of“sadaka culture” by the secularist-Kemalists? From the perspective of Kemal-ists, the term generally implied a religious lifestyle, a submissive and obedientpolitical culture, and a political ideology that supposedly not only resulted in,but also aimed to keep the poor in perpetual poverty. In their minds, givingsocial assistance was like giving sadaka because it lacked long-term plans forempowering the poor.

There were three key elements of the “sadaka culture” criticism. First, theterm was tied to themes of laziness and dependency. Kemalists believed thatproviding the poor with social assistance made the poor dependent and thusless willing to look for jobs. Their arguments were similar to the “culture ofpoverty” arguments in the usa that have claimed that socially-determinedbehavioural orientations are the cause of poverty. In this rhetoric, povertyassistance came to be seen as perpetuating poverty instead of alleviating it(Fraser andGordon, 1994). For example, one volunteer of Contemporary Livingsaid: “There is somuchwrongwith social assistance. jdp’s social grants give thefeeling that this help is without expectation. Such an attitude pushes peopleto open their hands like beggars, they get used to it. This system does not

10 Fitre and zekat are donations compulsory to all Muslims.



support people to build a life for them.”Other actors also claimed that the socialassistance system created perverse incentives. Instead of acquiring skills thatwould make them employable, the poor, Kemalists believed, were more likelyto seek social assistance, thereby becoming dependent to the state.

A second argument equated social assistancewith “religious charity”. Due totheir assumed religious nature, social services were marked as hand-outs thatfocused on bringing short-term relief. Such a culture of generosity was also pre-sented as traditional, backward and lacking a modern perspective on povertygovernance. For example, onemanager of a civil society organisation explainedhow she was initially hesitant for the organisation to begin distributing schol-arships to students from disadvantaged families with the following words:

Initially, I worried; I did not think we could manage this. That’s whatI said when others asked me my opinion because I am a social workexpert, that’s the area I used to work in. I was honest with them. […]You see, we have this social charity tradition, it comes from the Ottomantimes, perhaps from religion, everyone is charitable here, everyone isbenevolent, they do not know how it’s supposed to be done in a modern,scientific way, this lack of awareness reinforces sadaka culture, this is howit’s done by both civil society organisations and the state. We had to do itin a better way.

As seen here, many actors understood jdp’s social assistance programmes asreinvigorating a religiously-informed approach to poverty governance. Reli-gious practices of giving were believed to be impulsive and ineffective. Theseassumptions also shaped the sadaka culture. Social assistance programmeswere argued to fortify a religious logic of relief, instead of focusing on effec-tive, scientific and long-term strategies. Third, many Kemalists believed thatsocial assistance provision perpetuated an authoritarian style of governancethat sought compliance from poor citizens. These actors were concerned thatjdp’s political network provided social services in exchange with electoral sup-port. For example, onemanager of a branch of Contemporary Living in Istanbulsaid:

The job of the state is to diminish poverty, get rid of unemployment. Butinsteadof doing that, they insteadhelp thepoor, they implement a sadakapolitics. Why? So that the society’s education level does not move up, sothat our people do not get enlightened. If everyone were to be educated,then they would not be in power. We do not appeal to emotions like theydo. We do not abuse religious beliefs. We are not doing takiyye. They give

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unbelievable amounts of money to children, to families. But we cannotafford that, because they have a lot more money than we do. Then whathappens, the families, the children act as if they are subjects, servantsto them. Why, because there is the culture of obedience. So people getassistance and they stop questioning. But if you were to be enlightenedthen no one could brainwash you. They are the ones who create subjects,in contrast, we let people think freely.

For Kemalists, the problem with “sadaka culture” was more than just a matterof welfare policy. The opposition argued that the political culture of jdp and itssupporterswas based upon and perpetuated populism, clientelism and author-itarianism. Further, Kemalists claimed that the only reason jdp municipalitiesand state institutions gave social assistancewas so that thosewho received suchsocial assistance would in turn vote for Islamic political parties. The recipientsof social assistance were also criticised for their complicity and obedience, butthe real faultwas attributed to Islamist politicianswhowere argued to purpose-fully keep the people in the dark. The culture of sadaka was thus portrayed aculture of obedience where the poor were subject to the whims of the rich inexchange for sporadic assistance.

Secularist Alternatives: The Family InsuranceModel and theSocial Card

The Turkish opposition did not only criticise the welfare regime, but also pro-posed alternatives. For example, a “Family Insurance Model” was preparedbefore the 2011 General elections. Although this programmewas never put intoeffect due to an unsuccessful electoral campaign, it is still worth a closer lookbecause it provides another lens into the Turkishwelfare debate. This proposedalternativewelfareprogrammewaspresentedas a constitutive elementof rpp’snew economic paradigm: the “social market economy”. If the rpp had won theelections, Turkey was to embark upon this new “market friendly” economicpath, instead of one that was “flattering the market”.11 On the one hand, the“social market economy” hoped to refashion the rpp as a social-democraticand left wing party in tune with the needs of the Turkish poor. On the otherhand, the proposition of such an economicmodel—instead of a return to state

11 Sağlam, Erdal. “Kılıçdaroğlu’nun Hedefinde Sosyal Piyasa Ekonomisi var” (KılıçdaroğluAims for a Social Market Economy), 21 June 2010, Hürriyet. Accessed 5 June 2011.



developmentalism—demonstrates that the rpp was seeking ways to incorpo-rate a concern for societal welfare within a larger commitment to free marketcapitalism. The implication was that the jdp had failed to create such a bal-ancedespite its extensive social assistanceprogrammes.Moreover, during theirelectoral campaign, Kemalists argued that their goal was to replace the “relief-based” welfare regime with a “right-based” approach. But an examination ofthe “Family Insurance Model” and the related “Social Card” technology illus-trates that this supposedly alternative programme differed only slightly fromthat of jdp’s in terms of policy design. One of the tv advertisements for thisprogramme included Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu who spoke over smiling members ofa Turkish family and said:

Food for each family, pride for each father, happiness for each mother,a bright future for every child! That is, [there will be] a honourable lifefor everyone, [this] is a right. Do not forget! With family insurance eachfamily who lives in this country will get a share from the richness of it.Each family will have a break from poverty.

As this advertisement emphasises, the “Family insurance”model was argued toprioritise the “family” over a welfare regime, which was claimed to lack sucha concern and a rights-based approach to welfare provision. This rhetoricalstrategy was accompanied with criticisms of social assistance policy as well.For example, according to the main brochure explaining the Family InsuranceModel, there were problems with the financing, administration, procedures oftargeting, conditionality and the effectiveness of already existing social assis-tance programmes.12 The Family InsuranceModel was presented as a potentialfix to all of these problems. First, social assistance was to be directly given tothe female head of the household. The rpp argued that women were betterequipped to alleviate their family’s poverty and wanted to use women’s caregiving capacity as ameans to diminish economic inequality.13 A second reformaimed to change the way in which social assistance was delivered to benefi-ciaries.14 In order to prevent social assistance from looking like sadaka, theproposed solution included the distribution of “debit cards” to women. Femaleheads of households would use these debit cards for collecting and spending

12 “Aile Sigortası: Güçlü Sosyal Devlete Doğru, 2011” (Family Insurance: Towards a StrongWelfare State), rpp Publications sgc (Science, Governance and Culture) Platform, No: 1,February 2011, Pp. 14–16.

13 Ibid, 19.14 Ibid, 19.

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their cash assistance distributed on a monthly basis. A third feature empha-sised “cash” as the proper form social assistance should take, in contrast to thedistribution of food and other household items. Giving money to the poor wasargued to foster self-sufficiency among recipient families, thereby preventingthe perpetuation of dependency culture. Fourth, the document argued that theexact amount needed to support each household would be calculated througha comparison of the household income of each family vis-à-vis the minimummonthly wage needed to sustain a household: 600tl (~$350).15 Such a calcula-tionwas argued to be amore scientific approach to ascertaining deservingness.This approach was also presented as a natural extension of a “universal” sys-tem of eligibility because even citizens who otherwise would not apply forbenefits themselves would be able to receive social assistance if deemed eli-gible by the government. This new approach also renamed social assistance asa form of “citizen’s income”. In this perspective, social assistance was repack-aged as a minimum level of income that every Turkish citizen would be able toaccess regardless of his or her economic status. This universal systemwas com-pared to jdp’s “selective” approach which was argued to foster favouritism andclientelism. The rpp hoped that all of these reforms would be single-handedlyimplemented by the newly-created Family Insurance Institution (Aile SigortasiKurumu).16

These proposed reformswere presented as if they would change the essenceof Turkey’s welfare regime away from a “logic of relief” to a “logic of rights”:“Social grants will not be given like a favour, but will be provided as citizenrights.”17 This right vs. relief binary masked the fact that the reforms proposedby the Family InsuranceModel were merely concerned with redesigning someelements of the social assistance policy. A critical analysis of why societal wel-fare could only be achieved by social assistance provision was missing. Thecontinued debate about how to select recipients, how to distribute assistanceandwhat form assistance should takemasked the consolidation of social assis-tance as the proper welfare mechanism.

The Social Card as an “Alternative” to the Social Market

A closer look at the “Social Card” programme implemented by the rpp Yen-imahalle Municipality in Ankara is illustrative of how rpp’s proposed welfare

15 Ibid, 24.16 Ibid, 21.17 Ibid, 19.



reformswere limited by neoliberal welfare. After winning the elections in 2009,this rpp municipality began to extensively use this model. The social card wasoften referred to as the “Yeni-Kart” (New Card) or “Citizen’s Card” (VatandaşKartı). From its inception, this card was presented as capable of reinvigorat-ing lost cultural values such as “neighbourhood consciousness” and the “spiritof solidarity”, ending sadaka culture, and reinstituting the fundamental prin-ciples of the welfare state.18 The social card was a debit card that managedcharitable transactions instead of purely financial ones. While designing thesocial card system, themunicipality partnered with amajor national bank anda national supermarket chain and combinedmunicipal services, shopping andsocial assistance distribution under a single system.19 Initially, themunicipalityintended to distribute “social cards” to everyone in their district including theprospective donors and recipients of social assistance. Wealthy residents weregoing to putmoney in their social card and use it as if it were a debit cardwhen-ever they shopped from neighbourhood stores and bought tickets to attendevents organised by the municipality. Wealthy card owners were also told thatthey could use their cards to pay any fees or taxes that they owe to the munic-ipality.20 In contrast, a specific amount of cash assistance was deposited intothe social cards of the poor, and these recipients were able to use these socialcards while shopping at neighbourhood stores without having direct access tothe cash itself.

Thus, the rich and the poor used social cards for completely different ends.A mix between a social responsibility project and a public relations pitch, thesocial card was presented as a way to foster neighbourly solidarity even whenpeople were acting on their own self-interest. As Celal, one of the workers atthe social card office of the municipality explained, this system had built-inbenefits for donors, recipients and the bank, as well as store-owners:

See, we wanted the people of this district to win, for example, let’s say aperson spends 100 liras at a restaurant, if s/he uses the social card, thenthe restaurant provides a 10% discount. This 10 lira is then distributedbetween everyone. Four lira is given as a bonus to the owner of the social

18 “YeniKart’la Yeni Hizmet” (New Service with New Card). Published 19 January 2010. Avail-able at www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikartla-yeni-hizmet (accessed 26 March 2010).

19 “Yeni Kart nedir?” (What is the New Card?). Published 19 January 2010. Available at: www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikart-nedir (accessed 26 March 2010).

20 “YeniKart’ın İşlevleri” (The Functions of the New Card). Published 19 January 2010. Avail-able at: www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikartin-islevleri (accessed 26 March 2010).

http://www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikartla-yeni-hizmet

http://www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikart-nedir

http://www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikart-nedir

http://www.yenimahalle.bel.tr/yenikartin-islevleri

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card, 3 lira is given to the social assistance pool, and the remaining 3 lirais taken by the bank. This is a great way to ensure solidarity.

The social card system thus included incentives for gift giving without anyapparent material loss or personal effort. For neighbourhood store-owners,accepting the debit card entailed (at least theoretically) that more peoplewould be willing to shop at their stores. For the wealthy residents of the neigh-bourhood, using the social cardprovideddiscounts andother benefits. Both thewealthy and the business owners were further able to “feel good” about them-selves by knowing that their economic transactionwould generate a gift (albeitsmall) for the less fortunate residents of their neighbourhood. Above all, thesocial card systemwould lessen the financial burden of themunicipality by col-lecting funds in the “social assistance pool”. Despite the ingenious design of thissocial assistance programme, the municipality quickly realised that expectingthe well-to-do residents to embrace social cards was far too idealistic. Thus,soon after the introduction of the programme, social cards began to be exclu-sively used by poor residents. Celal explained why only one group of residentswere using social cards as:

For now, only the needy people tier of the card isworking,wehaven’t beenable to really implement the second stage yet, first we planned to send afree card to every resident via mail, but then later we decided that it wastoo expensive to do that, because many people were not using it, we didnot want all that money to go waste. Later, we wanted for card users toapply themselves, now if anyone wants to use this card, they apply andwe give it to them, so we do not spend the extra money for printing it.

Even though the systemwas not fully implemented, still the fact that the socialcardswerebeingdistributed topeoplewhowere receiving social assistancewasseen as a step in the right direction. After all, the main purpose of the SocialCard was to improve the distribution of social assistance in the district, andprovide an alternative to the prevalent “sadaka culture” mentality. During aninterview, Fethi Yaşar, themunicipal governor of Yenimahalle and the architectof the Social Card programme explained their primary purpose as:

Here our purpose is to reach out to the people who are at the lowestincome level, and to help themwithout showing off, without hurting theirhonour. We wanted to fulfil the responsibilities of the welfare state with-out being seen, without showing off, without causing people’s neighboursto see that they are in need when an assistance truck comes to their



door. We thought, we live in an age of science, an age of information,this archaic way of helping people should be abandoned. This is what thesocial card accomplishes. But what we really do here is that we give thesefamilies, the female head of their homes, their freedom.We give them theright to buy whatever they want. They get what they need without theirhonour being hurt.We give each family 200 tl, and then the store-ownersgive them a 20% discount, so that makes 240 tl.

The “social card” model was imagined to be a better way of governing poverty.This model was revered because ideally it protected the honour of citizensthrough secrecy, it allowed recipients to freely obtainwhat they needwith theircash allowance, and it undermined the formation of potentially clientelist rela-tionships between municipal governments and suppliers. Just like the socialmarket technology, many other municipalities also copied the social card sys-tem across Turkey. Some of these municipalities used the “social card” in thesame way as the Yenimahalle municipality had designed it (such as the Şişlimunicipality in Istanbul), whereas other municipalities used the social card toonly distribute periodic cash assistance (such as the Çankaya municipality inAnkara). Despite differences in its implementation from one municipality toanother, the social card model became immensely popular among rppmunic-ipalities and charity organisations. The reason for this popularity had todowiththe fact that Kemalists perceived and presented the social card programme asan alternative to jdp’s “sadaka culture.”

Consolidation of Social Assistance as a Governmental Strategy

By deploying the rights vs. relief binary, rpp criticised jdp’s social assistanceprogrammes and presented an ‘alternative’ approach. Often, jdp politiciansand supporters referenced the samebinary to defend their programmes aswell.Thedistinctionbetween relief and rights is not a historical universal that canbeapplied to all welfare regimes, but rather is a form of categorisation producedby a particular technology of government. Examined from this perspective,it is clear that these two political groups did not actually disagree about theprinciples of welfare governance. Rather, they shared a common approach toissues of poverty, need and aid. In this historical moment, modes of selectingeligible recipients and strategies for disbursement becamemeans of exercisingstate power and producing poverty knowledge. The new welfare regime wasdirected towards uncovering the “truth” about destitution. During this process,social assistance became a site of surveillance, as well as a vehicle for the

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alleviation of poverty. Various governmental techniques articulated poverty asa technical issue. Poverty came to be conceived as a problem that can be bestaddressed by effectively distributing social assistance to eligible populations.Both the socialmarket and the social card technologies cultivated “market-like”experiences, seeking to govern individuals by simultaneously upholding andundermining their individual agency.

The idea that poverty is best solved through effective social assistance wasaccompanied by a silence concerning structural causes of poverty and alter-native notions of social well-being. Although various leftist groups questionedthe coupling of capitalism with narrowly delivered social services, neither thejdp, nor the rpp probed the underlying premises of a social assistance-basedwelfare regime. Such neglect was the product of the neoliberalism-plus con-juncturewhich holds that social-justice increasingmechanisms should accom-pany marketisation. Put another way, as a bio-political strategy, social assis-tance constituted poverty and its solution in a manner that is consistent withthe neoliberalism-plus conjuncture. This analysis further illustrates that nei-ther welfare, nor the state is dying in the wake of the market—as conventionalanalyses of neoliberalism would have it. Instead, both technologies of welfaregovernance and forms of state power are being restructured in conjunctionwith shifting global political-economic dynamics.

Concluding Remarks

This paper has contested Turkish secularists’ attempts tomap a specific under-standing of welfare policy—sadaka culture—onto jdp’s welfare regime. In thepast decade, secularists have claimed that jdp’s social assistance policy wasproblematic due to its underlying “logic of relief”. As a corrective, they pro-posed an alternative welfare programme based on a “logic of rights”. Althoughthis on-going debate might appear as if these two political constituencies dis-agree about the fundamentals of welfare governance, this article has arguedotherwise. As I have shown, Kemalist and Islamist technologies of social assis-tance sharemore similarities than differences. Neither the government, nor theopposition in Turkey speaks of a welfare regime that would extend beyond theprovision of targeted social assistance. New forms of social assistance aremoti-vated by a desire to provide relief and perhaps at some level, could be seen asa progressive step towards distributive justice. However, since such a welfareregime is narrowly focused on the provision of social assistance without ques-tioning the underlying causes of market inequality, it is difficult to considersuch developments as signalling a transition to a post-neoliberal era. Never-



theless, these limited efforts to introduce social justice increasingmechanismsillustrate that the neoliberalism plus conjuncture governs poverty in a newfashion even if it does so by manufacturing an illusory debate.

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