The Right of Nations to Self-Determination and the Kurds
Let us first outline a few points regarding the concept and conceptualization of the nation. In the ongoing historical society, we observe that masses, which enable the formation of sociality, periodically cluster around different figures to acquire an identity or coalesce around an identity. This process manifests itself during the period of nation-building as well. One of the spaces where communalism was reshaped by transcending clans, tribes, and kinship structures was religion. This process emerged initially as the ummah (religious community) during the Theocratic Age and later as ethnic-national (kavim) identity. "In the Middle Ages, ethnic nationalism (kavimcilik) developed. Religions played a significant role in this. For example, Islam was simultaneously a consciousness and glorification of Arab identity. Judaism is synonymous with Jewishness."[1]
From Babylon to the Egyptian Kingdom, the efforts of Jews to determine their own destiny are frequently recounted in historical records. Their insistence on remaining a Hebrew people spans thousands of years. For this reason, they were exiled from Egypt and subjected to massacres, genocides, expulsions, and plunder in Europe.[2] "Christianity, in its early period, represented a crucial ethnic identity for Armenians, Syriacs, and Greeks who Christianized early. They mutually nourished each other.
Another critical function of monotheistic religions is to transcend tribal and clan identities. Though not to the extent of national consciousness, ethnic-national consciousness in the Middle Ages was a sociological formation significantly influenced by the development of monotheistic religions in the Middle East. When linked to ethnic nationalism, it is possible to describe religions as proto-nationalism. Religion is a crucial identity tool for Turks. Without Islam, the ethnic formation of Turks and Arabs in the Middle East would likely have been far less pronounced. For instance, this reality can be observed in the cases of the Jewish Hazara Turks and Christian Arabs. Religion has played varying roles for different peoples and ethnic groups."[3] We see that the concept of the nation emerged most distinctly when the social, economic, and cultural maturation of religious-ethnic formation was completed.
Thus, after the ethnic phase, the concept of the nation came to be defined as "a social phenomenon or totality of relations developing around clan consciousness + religious consciousness + shared political authority + a common market."[4] The notion of the nation, rooted in clan, lineage, and tribal consciousness as well as the imperial era, coincides with the period when feudalism and theocratic states in Western Europe began to collapse. This period also marks the establishment of capitalist nation-states by the bourgeoisie and the demarcation of their geographies. In Western Europe, the Magna Carta (1215) was one of the first documents resembling a charter of autonomy, though not fully embodying the right to self-determination. This document restricted the powers of the British monarch and granted certain rights to feudal lords. While it did not explicitly mention the nation, this decentralization of authority was a precursor to revolutionary processes in Western Europe.
However, the conceptualization of the nation, though developing with the Dutch declaration of independence from Spain in 1581,[6] did not concretize until the latter half of the 18th century, with the American Declaration of Independence (1776) and the French Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen (1789).[7] After the English and Italian revolutions, the German principalities’ establishment of their nation-states in 1871 solidified the concept. Yet, this was less about the nation as an idea and more about the nation-state as a political entity. During this period, while oppressed peoples awaited liberation from colonial regimes, the bourgeoisie sought to fragment feudal and theocratic boundaries to create markets for capital. This led to dozens of wars in Western Europe, birthing a violent process of homogenizing nation-states that imposed hegemony over diverse peoples, religions, and capitalist markets. Thus, the self-determination of nations was framed as a project led by a "progressive" class.
For both colonialist capitalists aspiring to global power and national bourgeoisies, this became a useful tool. Revolts by oppressed peoples in Eastern Europe and Asia were incited and often led by these forces. However, when these peoples overthrew dictatorships to determine their destinies, they faced counter-revolutionary threats, leading to what history terms "revolutions devouring their own children."
Similar dynamics unfolded in the Middle East and Asia. Chronologically, uprisings erupted in Russia (1905), Iran (1906), Ottoman Turkey (1908), China (1911), and Egypt (1922).[8] In these regions, where industry was underdeveloped and the bourgeoisie weak, the uprisings spanned prolonged periods. Eventually, nation-states emerged: colonial powers appointed rulers in Egypt, Syria, and Iraq, while Russia (1917), Turkey (1923), and China (1949) underwent revolutions. Iran experienced a theocratic Islamic Revolution in 1979. The result was the collapse of empires and the rise of new regimes. Here, the term "revolution" requires clarification: if equated with state-building, these events qualify as revolutions. However, they did not grant nations genuine self-determination but instead consolidated state and market power.
The Right of Nations to Self-Determination (RNSD)
As a theory, RNSD was first articulated by Lenin. In his article The Right of Nations to Self-Determination (1914), he defined it as "the right to political independence, the right to freely separate from the oppressor nation."[9] Lenin mobilized this principle against the Russian Empire’s colonial oppression, urging soldiers from Central Asia and the Caucasus (who constituted much of the Tsarist army) to desert. Promising oppressed peoples the right to form independent states, the Bolsheviks secured support, leading to the creation of the USSR. Post-revolution, Soviet republics and autonomous regions were established under a federal system.
Simultaneously, U.S. President Woodrow Wilson, after World War I, outlined principles for a new world order based on national self-determination. However, Wilson limited this right to peoples within defeated empires (e.g., Austro-Hungarian, Ottoman). The League of Nations later codified RNSD into international law, emphasizing decolonization and the political, economic, and cultural rights of peoples.[10] Yet, in practice, the League and its successor, the United Nations, often ignored violations, particularly against stateless nations like the Kurds.
The Kurdish Struggle for Self-Determination
The Kurdish people, with a millennia-old history in the Middle East, have endured partition and oppression since the Treaty of Zuhab (1639) divided Kurdistan between the Ottomans and Safavids. Post-WWI, the Treaty of Lausanne (1923) further fragmented Kurdistan into Turkey, Iran, Iraq, and Syria. Each state pursued assimilationist policies, denying Kurdish identity and rights.
In Turkey, despite initial promises of autonomy in the 1921 Constitution and rhetoric from Mustafa Kemal Atatürk about Turkish-Kurdish brotherhood, the 1924 Constitution enshrined a unitary nation-state, declaring Turkey "indivisible" with Turkish as the sole language. Kurdish uprisings (e.g., Koçgiri, Sheikh Said, Dersim) were brutally suppressed. The League of Nations, while facilitating Jewish statehood in Palestine, ignored Kurdish pleas.
The Kurdistan Workers' Party (PKK), founded in 1978, initially sought an independent Marxist-Leninist Kurdistan. However, facing NATO-backed Turkish counterinsurgency, it shifted strategy. PKK leader Abdullah Öcalan proposed "Democratic Confederalism"—a non-state model emphasizing grassroots democracy, gender equality, and multiculturalism. Rejecting nation-states as "earthly gods," Öcalan advocated a "democratic nation" uniting diverse ethnicities under human rights.[15]
In the 2010s, Kurdish movements in Turkey declared autonomous zones, leading to devastating urban warfare. Despite submitting evidence of war crimes to international bodies, the UN remained passive, reflecting geopolitical biases.
Conclusion
The right to self-determination has historically served dual purposes: dismantling feudalism for capitalist nation-states and legitimizing anti-colonial struggles. However, nation-states often replicate oppression, as seen in the Middle East. The Kurdish struggle epitomizes this paradox, caught between state violence and international indifference.
Öcalan’s "Democratic Nation" model, advocating decentralized, pluralistic governance, offers a third way beyond nation-states. If realized, it could resolve structural crises in the Middle East by empowering not only Kurds but all marginalized groups. The Kurdish fight for self-determination thus transcends their own liberation, heralding a broader regional transformation rooted in democracy and coexistence.
[1], [2], [3], [4], [5], [6], [7], [8], [9], [10], [11], [12], [13], [14], [15], [16]
Citations refer to original Turkish sources, preserved here as placeholders. For a formal translation, full references would be required.
BIBLIOGRAPHY
[1] Fırat, Ali. Kapitalist Uygarlık (Capitalist Civilization). Aram Yayınevi, p. 161.
[2] Historical records note that this tragedy, which persisted in the Middle East until 512 BCE, extended into the Middle Ages in Europe due to the plague and nationalist motives. The burning of millions of Jews in ovens and gas chambers, as well as their adoption of the name Sephardic, emerged from this context.
[3] Fırat, Ali. Kapitalist Uygarlık (Capitalist Civilization). Aram Yayınevi, p. 161.
[4] Ibid., p. 161.
[5] The Magna Carta (or Magna Carta Libertatum), signed in 1215, is an English document regarded as the first written constitution in history and a landmark step toward global freedom. It marked King John of England’s relinquishment of absolute power and recognition of the supremacy of law over monarchical will, altering the course of history.
[6] Peace of Westphalia, 1648.
[7] Moynihan, Daniel P. Pandaemonium: Ethnicity in International Politics. Oxford, 1993, p. 69; Wilson, op. cit., p. 55.
[8] Hür, Ayşe. “1952: ‘Black Saturday’ in Cairo.” Radikal Newspaper, July 7, 2013.
[9] Lenin, V. I. “The Right of Nations to Self-Determination.” Prosveşçeniye (Enlightenment) Journal, April–June 1914.
[10] United Nations Charter. Official Text. Available at: https://www.ombudsman.gov.tr/contents/files/6535501-Birlesmis-Milletler-Antlasmasi.pdf.
[11] Treaty of Zuhab (Kasr-ı Şirin, 1639): The peace agreement that ended the Ottoman-Safavid War (1623–1639) and established the modern Turkey-Iran border.
[12] Society for the Rise of Kurdistan (Kürdistan Teali Cemiyeti): Founded on November 19, 1918. Key founders included Seyyid Abdulkadir Efendi, Hüseyin Şükrü (Baban) Bey, Dr. Mehmed Şükrü (Sekban) Bey, Muhiddin Nâmi Bey, Babanzâde Hikmet Bey, Kâmran Ali Bedirhan, Necmeddin Hüseyin, Reşid Ağa, Kadızâde M. Şevki, Arvasizâde Mehmet Şefik, Mehmet Mihrî, Emin Feyzi, Vanlı M. Selim Begi, Berzencizâde Abdülvâhid, Dr. Hamid Şakir, Lâv Reşid, Dr. F. Berho, Hakkarili Abdurrahim Rahmi, Yemlekizâde Aziz, and Hetzanîzâde Kemal Fevzi.
[13] Yalman, Mehmet Emin. Vatan Gazetesi (Vatan Newspaper). Founder and Editor-in-Chief. “Izmit, January 17–17, 1923.” [Note: Date range likely contains a typo.]
[14] Hür, Ayşe. “Once Again, the Kurdish Issue.” Bianet. Available at: https://m.bianet.org/bianet/siyaset/122984-bir-kez-daha-kurt-meselesi.
[15] Öcalan, Abdullah. Demokratik Konfederalizm (Democratic Confederalism). Abdullah Öcalan Social Sciences Academy Publications, p. 26.
[16] The Punic Wars (264–146 BCE): A series of conflicts between Rome and Carthage, culminating in Carthage’s total destruction.
