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This volume hit the bookstore shelves when the film Salk[i, no dot]m Han[i, no dot]m's Necklace sparked a great deal of controversy in the Turkish press and drew criticism from ultra-nationalist circles. The film was about the tragedy of the Capital Levy, the most drastic Turkification policy implemented during World War II. It was thanks to the film that younger generations of Turks learned about these events. The debate was further inflamed when the film was shown on state television.
The Capital Levy was enacted in the Turkish Parliament in November 1942. Its declared purpose was to tax huge profits made through war-time profiteering, as well as to combat inflation. However, the Capital Levy also turned out to be an excellent measure for expropriating the non-Muslim minorities and weakening their hold on the economic life of the country. Aktar's work brings together a series of essays previously published in Turkish journals. It offers the most detailed and by far the best documented history available on the Turkification policies of Republican Turkey and the discriminatory policies directed against minorities in all spheres of life.
Turkification did not occur in a void. The main motive was the wish to create a new economic class assisted by the state. In this context, an important stage in the establishment of the national economy was the exchange of minority populations between Turkey and Greece. The first chapter of the book...