The ‘New Homeland’ and Turkish Cypriot Opposition in the 1974-1981 Period

Abstract

The state of exception has been discussed and widely analyzed in academic research, as a space where the dominant force develops its practices through the suspension of the norm. A very large part of research on this topic highlights the ways in which a space can be excluded, surrounded, isolated or converted into a state of exception, as a result of the action of the dominant power. However, the violence or the combination of forms of violence with consent constituting a state of exception produces simultaneously new,  unpredictable dynamics. Building on the above theoretical framework, this article seeks to consider the production of ‘unforeseen dynamics’ which appear against the exceptional spaces. In this article, the epicentre is the Turkish Cypriot community and its relations with Turkey during the 1974-1981 period. It attempts to identify the way in which a colonial type strategy enables exceptional means to transform a space of war into a normal space. At the same time, the article attempts to define the oppositional dynamics generated in the Turkish Cypriot community against the normalization of Cyprus’ state of exception.