Banning the Fez. One of the hottest issues in contemporary Turkish politics involves the question of whether Islamic dress (in particular, women's head scarves) should be allowed to be worn in public buildings. It seems a bit strange that something as apparently personal as a head covering would be causing such an uproar in a western-styled democracy. But headgear figures prominently in modern Turkish history and national identity -- witness the Turkish government's own account of the matter, a bracing read entitled "Hat Reform and the Revolution in Dress".