In the name of the state. The Nationalist Action Party (MHP) and the genesis of political violence during the 1970s

This article examines the political structure of political violence in Turkey in the 1970s, focusing on the internal structures of the Nationalist Movement. The paper argues that the Movement was able to draw on its high degree of coordination and centralisation to organise violent actions. The first section analyses how the Nationalist Movement was structured. The second section analyses a determined effort by the Movement to promote the model of a disciplined militant. The third section analyses how the Movement mobilised these organisational and militant resources in the violence it employed to entrench its position up until the 1980 coup.