Yön


Yön was a weekly Turkish political magazine published between 1961 and 1967. It was a Kemalist and leftist magazine.

History and profile

Yön started publication in Ankara on 20 December 1961. The founders included Doğan Avcıoğlu, Mümtaz Soysal, İlhan Selçuk and İlhami Soysal. Its editor was Doğan Avcıoğlu.
Yön was an organ of Doğan Avcıoğlu's movement, direction-revolution movement, which is one of the most influential leftist movements between 1961 and 1971 in Turkey. In line with this function the magazine had a social democratic and Kemalist stance. The magazine supported antifeudalism and Third Worldist approach. It attempted to establish a national front to achieve national democracy in Turkey.
In addition to political writings, Yön also covered artistic work, including a poem of Nazım Hikmet whose works had not been published in the country for a long time.
Immediately after its foundation Yön enjoyed a circulation level of 30,000 copies. However it decreased to between 4,000 and 5,000 copies in 1965. The magazine ceased publication in 1967 and the last issue was published on 30 June 1967. The closure of the magazine, in fact, reflected a significant change in the ideology of the direction-revolution movement.
Yön was followed by Ant and Türk Solu, two political magazines.