Through Nationalism, Atat rk gave his own people a national identity and the Turkish Nation reached the final victory by orientation to the national objectives and common interests. The nation is not a race, but a togetherness of spirits and a moral medium moulded by history. The spirit of nationality, or simply nationalism, appears as a deep-rooted psychological affinity to and respect for the national history and successes and miseries in the past. This spirit does not solely consist of an appreciation of the past and of the things which occurred in the past. The principle of Populism symbolizes the contemporary concept of democracy, and the rational nationalism that can develop and flourish only in free and democratic countries.
Populism is a cornerstone of the state and is a form of the consciousness of national sovereignty.
The nation shall be governed by persons elected by the people. Their duty is to defend the country's independence both at domestic and international levels. Parallel to the essence of this principle it has been guaranteed, in the Turkish laws that each Turkish citizen possesses equal rights regardless of race, sex, creed etc. Statism Statism was admitted into the political life of Turkey in 1936 as one of the basic characteristics of the Turkish State by a constitutional amendment. The statism adopted by Turkey, retains individual initiative as the basic factor while it commits the state particularly in the field of economics in order to raise the country to a high level of welfare taking into account the general and high interests of the nation.