Transnational Political Mobilization Through Religion: Evidence from Turkish Organizations in France and Germany

The different particularly ethnic and religious components not only followed different fashions throughout the migration history of Turkey, but also generated a unique form of mobilization by/for parties within the diaspora that is directly linked to the diasporic identity of these distinct groups. The pro-Kurdish HDP’s foreign branches, unlike the other Turkish parties’ branches abroad, was shaped mainly by the political refugee diaspora that are mostly gathered under the organizations called the Kurdish cultural/community centers, starting from the 1970’s, independent from the establishment of the pro-Kurdish political parties in Turkey yet by and large showed their support to each pro-Kurdish party have been founded in Turkey. However, despite unlike in-country there is a monopoly of the Kurdish movement stance in the diaspora, support that the HDP got throughout the election did not only come from organizations with Kurdish affiliation. Looking at the specific case of non-Kurdish associations in Germany and France, that supported HDP, I show how and why these groups use this party to become part of the Turkish electoral process from their host countries despite having no open support for the previous pro-Kurdish parties. The paper is largely based on the data collected through the participant observation and in-depth interviews that were carried out with the AABF and FUAF members who have engaged with the HDP mobilization through local Alevi community centers respectively in Germany and France at different scales. The fieldwork took place between 2015 and 2018, in the state of North Rhine-Westphalia, Germany; and 2016-2018 in Strasbourg and Paris, France.