Demographically, Dersim is a region overwhelmingly populated by Kurdish Alevis (a minority religious group). Due to this ethnic makeup, the people of Dersim have traditionally been perceived as “the other” by central governments with Islamic or nationalist leanings. The Ottoman Empire’s attempts to eradicate the autonomy of the Dersim region through centralization escalated during the Abdulhamid II period (1876-1908). Following the foundation of the Turkish Republic (1923), the state began to deny the existence of Kurds, whether Sunni or Alevi, as a distinct ethnonational group in Turkey. Nevertheless, the overall political situation did not permit the government to carry out a project of “civilizing” Dersim until the mid-1930s (the official Turkish discourse on dismantling Dersim’s political and cultural autonomy relied on the idea of importing civilization to the supposedly “backwards” people of the region). But throughout the 1930s, the Republican People’s Party (RPP)’s authoritarian, one-party rule was consolidated, and the party and state pursued increasingly Turkish nationalist policies, which helped to make the project possible.

The RPP’s “civilizing” program was to be completed in two phases. First, the government created the political and judicial framework necessary to consolidate state power in the Dersim region. An administration of inspectorates-general was established in 1935 that granted extra-judicial and executive powers to a commander-in-chief, Abdullah Alpdogan. This literally meant the introduction of martial law in Dersim. Second, after attempts at negotiations with local tribal leaders failed, the Turkish army began a military campaign against the Dersim region in 1937 to eliminate a supposed insurgency. Thousands of people were killed in the course of the first military operation, while tribal and religious leader Seyid Riza was captured and executed. Another military operation, backed by military aircraft, was carried out between December 1937 and August 1938, killing an estimated 30-60,000 people. The remaining population of Dersim was forced to migrate to the western parts of Anatolia, and the name of the region was changed to Tunceli. Three years later, after the state had established a security infrastructure in Dersim, the deported population was permitted to return. However, the Turkish state has since pursued ongoing assimilation policies targeting Alevi Kurds.

In a speech in 2011, Turkish Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan revealed the contents of some state documents on the Dersim massacre, and also apologized to the people of Dersim for RPP policies in the 1930s. Some considered this an attempt to discredit Erdogan’s opponents in today’s RPP party rather than a sincere attempt to come to terms with this historical human rights violation. Nevertheless, this was the first public apology ever made by a Turkish leader for a past atrocity committed by Turkish state authorities.