Seeing for the state: Kemalist long-distance nationalism in Australia BANU S ¸ ENAY School of Social and Political Sciences, Discipline of Anthropology, University of Melbourne, Victoria, Australia ABSTRACT. The recent literature on Muslim organisations in the Turkish diaspora context is voluminous as is analysis of Kurdish and Alevi grassroots politics against the Turkish state. Yet nothing has been written on those whose political orientation is in line with the secularist-nationalist ideology of the Turkish Republic, that is, of Kemal- ists. As a contribution to this endeavour, this paper explores Kemalist actors’ mobili- sation in Australia. The paper argues that their current activism is related to a threatened economic privilege, a loss of cultural capital and a waning political domi- nance in the ongoing social life of Turkey. KEYWORDS: diaspora, Kemalism, long-distance nationalism, transnationalism, Turkish migrants, Australia There is now an impressive range of studies on the political activities of diaspora groups, illuminating various dimensions of both the country of origin and that of settlement or refuge (Cohen 1996; Esman 2009; Sheffer 2003). This multifaceted body of literature has explored a myriad of topics, including migrants’ support for home-town organisations, membership in political parties in two different countries, participation in electoral processes, advo- cacy and lobbying activities to influence change in the country of origin and remittance sending. Another key strand of research has focused on migrants’ long-distance nationalism, connected often enough to violent conflict in the home nation-state (Anderson 1992; Glick Schiller 2005; Skrbiš 1999). Some researchers have focused on those diaspora groups with an ethno-centric and militant orientation (Biswas 2004), while others discussed the peace-building contributions of transnational migrants (Horst 2008). For Turkey, these issues have been mainly examined in relation to three groups: Kurds, Alevis and political Muslims (on Kurds, see Wahlbeck 1999; on Alevis, see Sökefeld 2008; on political Muslims, see Schiffauer 1999). Although the political agendas of such counter-hegemonic movements differ, intrinsic to each is an attempt to challenge the power of Kemalism – the official ideology of the Turkish Republic founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk in 1923 (Özyürek 2006; Parla and Davison 2004) – while raising the issue of human rights and democratic reform in Turkey. By contrast, this article deals with EN AS JOURNAL OF THE ASSOCIATION FOR THE STUDY OF ETHNICITY AND NATIONALISM NATIONS AND NATIONALISM Nations and Nationalism •• (••), 2013, 1–19. DOI: 10.1111/j.1469-8129.2012.00561.x © The author(s) 2013. Nations and Nationalism © ASEN/Blackwell Publishing Ltd 2013