Is there a "golden age" of the university in Turkey?

A significant part of the discourse on the university rests on an assumption of science, truth and objectivity that is as ideal as possible. The sum of these assumptions strangely sets going a jargon of authenticity about the university. The strangeness is that, after a while, this expectation of authenticity begins to form a burden upon every kind of development of the university.

Especially the view that the university's new openings, its physical and institutional development, and the steps it takes in the name of keeping pace with new developments constitute a deviation from this authentic or ideal university has always been the source of the complaints that have accompanied the history of the university. Yet the university, like all other social institutions, is a human institution, and those who live in it and those who receive its service know this perfectly well, but they do not refrain from these expectations. We need to examine well the psychology behind lamenting an ideal of a "lost university" almost right after today's increased number of universities, rate of universitization, and numbers of scientific publications, research, graduates and scientists.

Of course, in doing so we are not saying that the universities in Turkey today have no problems. On the contrary, whenever the subject is opened we also touch on the other problems that have always accompanied the rapid universitization in Turkey. But the existence of a crowded segment that turns up its nose at every development in the field of the university, and, starting from the most negative examples, speaks of the university going backward, inevitably makes one ask this question: "Was there a past in which the universities were better, and did we fail to see it?" We ended our last piece with this question.

Truly, even if we wait for those who say that universities are going backward today to set out with concrete examples and figures in which field this going backward lies, it would be in vain, because since their attitude does not stem from knowledge, it is not likely to change with the information put forward. But let us nevertheless ask our question and go on giving its answer concretely:

Is there a longed-for golden age of the university in Turkey? What happened in this golden age, such that moving away from it spoiled the nature of the university or deflected it from its ideal?

In the numerical field, or in autonomy at the university, or in scientific freedom? Is this period, for example, the early period of the Republic? We can start from there, then move on to other periods too and look for the university's "golden age," if you like.

When the Republic of Turkey was founded there was a functioning university, and its real institutionalization, dating from its first attempts in 1869, took place in 1900 in the time of Abdülhamid II. In the 1923-24 academic year, since the country had emerged from war, the number of students, much reduced compared with earlier years, was 2292, and this number would rise only to 3558 in 1933, the year it was to be transformed into Istanbul University, that is, 10 years later. In these years the Darülfünun had 7 faculties and higher schools.

The reform made in 1933 made no serious contribution either to the number or to the volume of the university. The existing university was closed, and at Istanbul University, opened in its place, the number of professors fell from 114 to 78. The difference is not the difference of the instructors dismissed. Because new instructors also took up their posts, that is, the great majority (about 100) of the old instructors, among whom were people educated in Europe, specialized, members of international academic bodies, prizewinners, authors, and founders of research institutions, had been dismissed.

The closing of the Darülfünun was based on the report of Professor Albert Malche, brought from Switzerland, in which grounds were put forward such as that there were no serious and original scientific works at the university, that original works were almost nonexistent and some of those published were copies of one another, that there was an education based on rote learning, that the library was poor and the sources a student could consult were limited, that the laboratories were inadequate, and that in the hiring of staff personal relations and cliques, rather than competence, played a role. Of course, I think there is no need to say that there is no sign whatsoever that these inadequacies were remedied in the university established afterwards. We can see that the university has always been the subject of this kind of criticism. The real reason was above all that the Darülfünun professors had remained indifferent to, even criticized, some "revolutions" that came onto the agenda in those days.

It is known that the Darülfünun professors did not at all welcome the alphabet revolution and expressed some reservations. But there is no serious sign that they opposed it very openly, since there was in any case no climate of freedom in which they could express their views. The real anger against the Darülfünun was the lack of interest or indifference it showed toward the Turkish history and language theses undertaken from 1930. In December 1930, during Mustafa Kemal's visit to the Darülfünun, he practically examined some professors on the origins of the words "Ankara, Ege, Aka, Eti, ata, arkeos, amiral, kaptan," but when he did not get the positive answers he expected from them, he, so to speak, graded the professors and counted them as failures.

At the Turkish History Congress, the fact that some professors such as Mehmet Ali Ayni and Zeki Velidi Togan opposed Mustafa Kemal's theses, which would later be considered entirely unscientific and abandoned, would lead to the ending of the Darülfünun journey that had begun in 1869.

Frankly, with the Istanbul University and DTCF opened after this event, the university's mission too would already have been determined: From the outset the university was conceived as an ideological apparatus of the state. The mission loaded on it was, in the crudest form, an official ideological mission, and the fate of the closed Darülfünun served as the best lesson about what would befall it should it step outside this mission.

On the eve of this step, the words of Reşit Galib, the Minister of Education of the time, describing the state of the universities, reflect this mission most clearly:

"The Istanbul Darülfünun failed to attain the reform and progress awaited by Turkey's intelligentsia. Great political and social revolutions took place in the country. The Darülfünun remained a neutral observer toward them.. Fundamental movements took place in the economic field. The Darülfünun appeared unaware of them. Radical changes took place in law. The Darülfünun was content merely to take the new laws into its teaching program. The alphabet revolution took place, the pure-language movement began. The Darülfünun did not even stir..."

Reşit Galip's speech is an instructive text that complains in heavy language that the Istanbul Darülfünun took its role as a university more seriously than necessary. The university professors were content with remaining merely "like a neutral observer" toward the great ideological breakthroughs the country needed, such as the sun language theory and a new thesis of history, whereas what was expected of them was to support these ideological discourses with enthusiasm.

It is clear that such an approach can in no measure or scale constitute a "golden age" for the university. So, was this golden age caught in later years? When, for example?