Dr. Djene Rhys Bajalan is Associate Professor of History at Missouri State University and a distinguished historian of the modern Middle East. His research focuses on the rise of nationalism, the evolution of the Kurdish question, and the development of Kurdish political activism during the final decades of the Ottoman Empire. He holds a DPhil in Oriental Studies from the University of Oxford, as well as degrees from SOAS University of London, the London School of Economics, and Istanbul Bilgi University. Dr. Bajalan is the author of Jön Kürtler: Birinci Dünya Savaşı’ndan Önce Kürt Hareketi, 1898–1914, co-editor of Studies in Kurdish History: Empire, Ethnicity and Identity, and a contributing author to The Cambridge History of the Kurds. Having taught in Britain, Turkey, the United States, and the Kurdistan Region of Iraq, he brings exceptional historical depth and international perspective to the study of Kurdish nationalism and Middle Eastern history.

Theme One: The Historical Emergence of Kurdish Nationalism

Gulan: Dr. Bajalan, your research examines the emergence of Kurdish political activism during the late Ottoman period. What intellectual, cultural, and political developments contributed most significantly to the formation of modern Kurdish national consciousness?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: I would begin by stressing that modern Kurdish nationalism did not suddenly appear in the late nineteenth or early twentieth century. Kurdish society possessed much older forms of collective identity, literary culture, and political organisation, including traditions associated with the Kurdish emirates, tribal structures, religious networks, and writers such as Ehmedê Xanî. What changed in the nineteenth century was the political and social environment in which these older identities operated. Ottoman centralisation dismantled many of the autonomous Kurdish principalities and profoundly altered the relationship between Kurdish elites and the state. At the same time, the expansion of modern education, print culture, communications, and bureaucratic institutions produced a new generation of Kurdish intellectuals, journalists, officers, and civil servants. They increasingly encountered European ideas about nationalism while also participating in broader Ottoman debates about constitutionalism, Islam, and citizenship. Newspapers such as Kurdistan, first published in 1898, and the Kurdish associations established after the Young Turk Revolution of 1908 created new spaces in which the Kurds could be imagined as a modern political community rather than as a collection of tribes. Importantly, however, this consciousness did not initially produce a single separatist programme. Many Kurdish intellectuals remained committed Ottomanists who sought cultural recognition and political reform within the empire, while others increasingly moved towards demands for autonomy or even independence.

Gulan: As the Ottoman Empire collapsed and new states were established across the Middle East, how did the division of Kurdish inhabited territories influence the direction and character of the Kurdish national movement?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: The collapse of the Ottoman Empire was decisive because it transformed what had largely been an imperial Kurdish question into several separate national questions. Kurdish-inhabited territories were divided principally between Turkey, Iraq, Syria, and Iran, each of which developed different political institutions, state ideologies, and policies towards its Kurdish population. This fragmentation made the emergence of a unified Kurdish national movement extraordinarily difficult. Kurdish activists were now forced to operate within different political systems and respond to different forms of repression, accommodation, or incorporation. In Turkey, for example, the creation of a highly centralised nation-state and the denial of Kurdish national distinctiveness encouraged recurrent rebellion and later generated powerful movements challenging the Turkish state's conception of national identity. In Iraq, by contrast, Kurdish political mobilisation increasingly centred upon demands for autonomy and eventually federalism, producing the institutional framework that ultimately became the Kurdistan Region. At the same time, the existence of Kurds across several states ensured that Kurdish nationalism always retained a transnational dimension. Events in one part of Kurdistan could influence developments elsewhere. The result has been a Kurdish nationalism characterised by a tension between the ideal of a broader Kurdish national community and the practical realities of political movements that have developed primarily within the borders of individual states. We all understand this even as we often try to ignore it. We say Bashuri, Bakuri, Rojhalati, and Rojavayi to try and reject the division of the Kurdish nation. However, we all know that these words just mean Iraqi, Turkish, Iranian, and Syrian.

Theme Two: The Evolution of the Kurdish National Movement

Gulan: The Kurdish national movement has passed through different stages, including cultural revival, political organization, armed struggle, and participation in formal political institutions. How have these experiences transformed the objectives and character of Kurdish nationalism?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: One of the most important features of Kurdish nationalism is its capacity to adapt to very different political circumstances. In its early stages, much Kurdish activism centred upon cultural revival such the publication of newspapers, the development of Kurdish-language literature, and attempts to define Kurdish history and identity. During the twentieth century, however, the failure of states to accommodate Kurdish political demands frequently pushed Kurdish movements towards armed struggle. In Iraq, the long conflict between Kurdish forces and successive governments in Baghdad transformed nationalism into a mass political movement organised around political parties, peshmerga forces, and demands for territorial autonomy. Yet the establishment of autonomous institutions after 1991, and particularly the constitutional recognition of the Kurdistan Region after 2003, fundamentally changed the situation. Kurdish nationalism was no longer simply an oppositional movement struggling against the state; Kurdish political parties now had to govern, provide services, manage an economy, construct institutions, and participate in the politics of Iraq as a whole. This creates a different set of priorities. Questions of sovereignty and national rights remain important, but nationalism is increasingly judged by its ability to deliver effective government, economic opportunity, accountable institutions, and political stability. In that sense, Kurdish nationalism in Iraq has moved from the politics of resistance towards the much more complicated politics of governance.

Gulan: Kurdish newspapers, literature, education, and intellectual networks have played an important role in maintaining national consciousness. How have these cultural institutions contributed to the development of Kurdish identity, particularly in Iraqi Kurdistan?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: Cultural institutions have been indispensable because Kurdish national identity developed in circumstances in which Kurds frequently lacked their own state institutions. Newspapers, poetry, historical writing, schools, and literary societies therefore became alternative institutions through which a sense of national community could be maintained and reproduced. This was particularly important because Kurdish society has always been linguistically, religiously, and geographically diverse. Print culture allowed intellectuals to communicate across these divisions and to construct a shared vocabulary of Kurdish history and national identity. Iraqi Kurdistan played an especially important role because, at various moments during the twentieth century, it provided greater opportunities for Kurdish-language education and publishing than existed elsewhere. Kurdish poets, journalists, historians, and educators helped transform Kurdish from primarily local and regional literary traditions into languages of mass education, administration, and political communication. Since the establishment of the Kurdistan Region, universities, television, publishing houses, and schools have dramatically expanded this process. At the same time, cultural development remains complicated by linguistic differences, particularly between Sorani and Kurmanji, as well as by political divisions. Nevertheless, culture remains one of the principal mechanisms through which people from very different social and regional backgrounds are encouraged to understand themselves as members of a broader Kurdish community.

Theme Three: Kurdish Nationalism and the Kurdistan Region

Gulan: The establishment of the Kurdistan Region introduced a new stage in Kurdish political history, in which a national movement also assumed responsibility for governance and institution building. How has this transition changed the meaning and priorities of Kurdish nationalism?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: The emergence of the Kurdistan Region represents one of the most important transformations in modern Kurdish history because it forced Kurdish nationalism to confront the responsibilities of political power. National movements can often define themselves primarily through opposition. What I mean is that they identify injustices and they mobilise populations, and demand recognition or even sovereignty. Governments cannot operate in the same way. They must create functioning institutions, provide education and healthcare, manage public finances, encourage economic development, guarantee security, and respond to the everyday expectations of citizens. Consequently, the legitimacy of Kurdish nationalism in Iraqi not anymore dependent upon historical sacrifice or the defence of Kurdish rights. Today,  what matters is day to day politics, by which I mean the quality of governance in the Kurdistan Region. This does not mean that the national question has disappeared, but it does mean it is more abstract than it was when Saddam was in charge. They big issue today is not that the Iraqi government is oppressing the Kurdish people but rather issues like the constitutional relationship with Baghdad, the status of disputed territories, and control over natural resources. At the same time, the existence of Kurdish institutions means that nationalism must increasingly answer a very practical question i.e. what kind of society is being built? For younger generations especially, national achievement cannot simply mean possessing a flag, parliament, or armed forces. It must also mean accountable government, functioning institutions, employment opportunities, educational development, and confidence in the future.

Gulan: To what extent have internal political divisions, party competition, and regional loyalties affected the development of a shared Kurdish national identity within the Kurdistan Region? What historical factors help explain the persistence of these divisions?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: Political and regional divisions are not something external to Kurdish nationalism. There also aren’t unique to the Kurdish people. Every national movement in the world has divisions.In fact, nationalism can be seen as the process of unifying from diversity as so divides have been part of its historical development. Kurdistan has never been politically homogeneous. Geography encouraged the emergence of powerful local dynasties, tribal confederations, religious networks, and regional centres of authority long before the emergence of modern nationalism. The destruction of the Kurdish emirates during the nineteenth century did not eliminate these local structures, and modern political parties frequently developed through existing networks of regional, familial, and tribal influence. In Iraqi Kurdistan, competition between the KDP and PUK eventually produced distinct political and administrative spheres, and the civil conflict of the 1990s left institutional problems that remain visible today. These divisions have undoubtedly weakened the ability of Kurdish leaders to present a unified political strategy, particularly in negotiations with Baghdad and neighbouring states. Yet it is important to say  that political fragmentation doesn’t mean Kurdish national consciousness is “weak”. People can possess a powerful shared national identity while simultaneously disagreeing over parties, leaders, and ideology. The challenge for the Kurdistan Region is therefore not to eliminate political disagreement, which is neither possible nor desirable, but to ensure that competition takes place within common institutions whose authority stands above individual parties.

Theme Four: Historical Memory, Identity, and Political Aspirations

Gulan: How have historical experiences, including repression, forced assimilation, displacement, armed conflict, and the struggle for political recognition, shaped contemporary Kurdish identity and collective memory in the Kurdistan Region?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: Historical memory occupies an unusually powerful position within contemporary Kurdish identity because the twentieth century exposed Kurdish communities to repeated experiences of repression, displacement, and even genocide. In Iraq, events such as the destruction of villages, forced Arabisation, the Anfal campaigns, and the chemical attack on Halabja remain part of the lived memory of families and communities. Such experiences strengthened the perception that political power and institutional protection are necessary for the physical and cultural security of Kurdish society. Similar memories of linguistic repression, deportation, rebellion, and state violence developed in other parts of Kurdistan. However, historical memory can perform different political functions. It can strengthen social solidarity and ensure that victims are remembered, but it can also encourage politics to remain permanently focused upon past trauma in order to destract from present political failure. Think about it. What do politicians want to talk about? The glorious fight against Saddam or the current corruption scandal?

Gulan: Finally, given the political transformations taking place across Iraq and the wider Middle East, how can the Kurdistan Region preserve Kurdish national identity while developing stronger institutions, maintaining its constitutional position within Iraq, and presenting a coherent political vision for future generations?

Dr. Djene R. Bajalan: I think the central challenge for the Kurdistan Region is to recognise that preserving Kurdish national identity and building stronger political institutions are not competing objectives. The greatest guarantee for Kurdish political achievements is not strong parties or military forces. The best way to protect Kurdish rights is to build legitimate, durable institutions capable of surviving changes in leadership and regional circumstances. That means strengthening parliament, the judiciary, public administration, education, and the rule of law, while reducing the extent to which state institutions are identified with particular political parties. At the same time, Kurdish leaders need a coherent strategy towards Baghdad based upon the federal principles established in the Iraqi constitution and a realistic understanding that the Kurdistan Region's security and prosperity are connected to developments in Iraq as a whole. Kurdish identity should also remain culturally confident and outward-looking. Protecting Kurdish language, history, and cultural institutions is essential, but so is ensuring that minorities living within the Kurdistan Region feel that they are full participants in its political community. Ultimately, future generations are unlikely to judge Kurdish nationalism solely by what it resisted or what earlier generations sacrificed. They will also judge it by whether the political system created in the Kurdistan Region gave them security, opportunity, democratic participation, and a reason to believe that their future could be built there.

By Kobin Ferhad