@article{2018,title={Immigrations from the Balkans to the Motherland and Their Effects on Turkey (1912-1925)},abstractNode={The Ottoman Empire faced a massive immigration movement from the Balkans after the defeats that took place during her last century. This situation put an end to Ottoman Empire’s policy of Balkanization and her existence in the Balkans. Muslim Turks, who immigrated to Anatolia after the Balkan Wars and the First World War, homogenized the population of Turkey and contributed to the process of nation building. Thus, the new situation of Anatolian population that emerged with immigrations largely affected the social, cultural and economic structure. Immigrants (muhacir), who were carrying the change, formed the infrastructure of Turkey. With this new entity, which placed itself as modern Turkey in the world, multi-national empire transformed into a single nation and finally a nation state. In this study, how immigrations from the Balkans to Anatolia affected the Turkish Republic in political, social and economic domains is analyzed. The policy pursued towards the Balkan immigrants, social and economic policies applied and troubles faced are examined in detail. Economic activities of immigrants in Ottoman territories and their social life styles as well as their role or impact on Turkish modernization is handled from different perspectives. By examining how these immigrants who were expert on trade, art and handcraft changed the social, economic and cultural structure of Anatolia, this paper questions the impact or contribution of this population to nation building process. The new homogeneous population structure of post-immigrations Anatolia resulted in the redefinition of westernization and modernization. By examining this new definition, the political, social and economic repercussions and consequences of the nationalism which came into prominence in the Republican Turkey have been tried to explain.},author={Yaşar BAYTAL},year={2018},journal={Journal of Turkish Studies}}