This innovative study challenges accounts of Turkey 's politics as driven by 'Islamist vs. secularist' competition, offering a new understanding which centres coalitions for and against pluralism. Utilising rich primary and secondary data, Nora Fisher-Onar introduces an analytical framework for capturing causal complexity in political contestation.

Nora Fisher-Onar is Associate Professor of International Studies at the University of San Francisco. Her research combines tools from comparative politics, international relations, and area studies to re-think the relationship between religion, politics, and pluralism, challenging Orientalism in how we read Muslim-majority states and societies. Previous publications include, as lead editor, Istanbul: Living with Difference in a Global City (2018).

By Way of Introduction: Capturing Complexity, Contesting Pluralism; Part I. Theory: 1. Hard Binaries and their discontents; 2. Pluralizers and anti-pluralists-an alternative key to Politics in Turkey and beyond; Part II. History: 3. Long Nineteenth Century-from Ottoman Universalism to Turkish nationalism; 4. Short Twentieth Century-between embedded liberalism and ethno (-religious) nationalism; Part III. Twenty-First Century: 5. EU-niversalism, the Islamo-liberal moment, and nationalist backlash; 6. Neo-Ottomanism-from pluralizing promise to religious populism; 7. Turkey turns-of clashing Islamists, contesting kurds, and a coup attempt; 8. Turkish-Islamist synthesis 2.0 and the new pluralizers; Conclusion: Learning from Turkey's transformation-lessons for (comparative) area studies, politics, and International relations; Index.