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Book Chapters by Mehmet Baki Deniz
Türkiye'nin Büyük Dönüşümü Ayşe Buğra'ya Armağan, 2018
Kentsel dönüşüm sürecinde yaşanan barınma hakkı ihlalleri ya da ormanlık alanları yok eden mega a... more Kentsel dönüşüm sürecinde yaşanan barınma hakkı ihlalleri ya da ormanlık alanları yok eden mega altyapı projeleri geniş halk kitlelerini iktidara karşı örgütlenmeye sürükleyebilir mi? Türkiye’de 2002 sonrası Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi
(AKP) hükümetleri döneminde yükselen kentsel dönüşüm projeleri ve mega altyapı projeleri sonucu artan ekolojik tahribata bakan araştırmacılar ve eylemciler, sıklıkla arka planda bu soruyu sordular. Bu makalede de böyle bir motivasyonla 2000’lerin sonunda Türkiye’de gecekondu dönüşüm projelerine karşı gerçekleşen iki militan mahalle direnişini, Ankara Dikmen Vadisi mahallesi ve İstanbul Başıbüyük mahallesi direnişlerini inceleyeceğim. İkisi de siyasal İslam’ın güçlü olduğu mahallelerken; nasıl oldu da Dikmen vadisi sol gruplarla birlikte hak temelli bir kent mücadelesini ördü, Başıbüyük’te tam tersi bir şekilde mülkiyet hakkını ve bireysel kazancı önceleyen bir mücadele gelişti ve Başıbüyüklüler diğer kentsel hareketlerle bütünleşmekten uzak durdular? Bu farklılığın oluşmasındaki sebepler bu makalenin tartışma çerçevesini belirlemektedir. Aynı zamanda bu tartışma üzerinden makale, 2000’li yıllarda hem Türkiye’de hem de dünyada yükselen kent hakkı talebinin neoliberal kentleşmeye karşı protestoları örgütleme potansiyeliyle ilgili literatüre de katkı sunmayı hedeflemektedir. Makalede Prof. Dr. Ayşe Buğra danışmanlığında Haziran 2008-Ocak 2009 arasında iki mahallede yürüttüğüm saha araştırması temelinde bir tartışma yürüteceğim. Bunun yanında eylemci kimliğimle, 2008-11 arasında IMECE Toplumun Şehircilik Hareketi ve 2015 sonrasında Kuzey Ormanları Savunması içinde edindiğim gözlemler de bu makalede geçen argümanların inşasına katkı sağladılar.
Papers by Mehmet Baki Deniz
Romani Studies, 2017
This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in Turkey, w... more This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in Turkey, which manifests itself in the stigmatized space of Roma neighborhood. In our analysis, we do not depict 'Roma' distinctively as an ethnic category but as a 'low status' in the society that is embedded in the stigmatized places. We argue that those from a Roma neighborhood hold a common "stigmatized spatial identity", regardless of their ethnicity, which determines the processes of poverty and social exclusion in different spheres of life. In order to unfold the process of social exclusion that we refer to as the "Romanization of poverty", our study provides analysis under the analytical category of spatial stigmatization intertwined with insecure livelihood.
Romani Studies, 2017
This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in Turkey, w... more This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in
Turkey, which manifests itself in the stigmatized space of Roma neighborhood. In our
analysis, we do not depict ‘Roma’ distinctively as an ethnic category but as a ‘low status’
in the society that is embedded in the stigmatized places. We argue that those from a
Roma neighborhood hold a common “stigmatized spatial identity”, regardless of their
ethnicity, which determines the processes of poverty and social exclusion in different
spheres of life. In order to unfold the process of social exclusion that we refer to as the
“Romanization of poverty”, our study provides analysis under the analytical category of
spatial stigmatization intertwined with insecure livelihood.
JOURNAL OF WORLD-SYSTEMS RESEARCH, 2019
Can world-systems analysis illuminate politics? Can it help explain why illiberal regimes, outsid... more Can world-systems analysis illuminate politics? Can it help explain why illiberal regimes, outsider parties, and anti-immigrant rhetoric seem to be on the rise? Can it help explain any such national changes that seem destined to shift how nations relate to world markets? Leading surveys of historical sociology seem to say no. We disagree. While there are problems with Wallerstein's early mode of analyzing politics in the capitalist world-system from the outside-in, historical sociologists have been too quick to dismiss world-systems analysis. We propose an alternative inside-out approach anchored in a methodology for selecting what to study: those national political transformations which constitute puzzling instances within a given world-historical political process. We recommend promising theoretical lineages to guide empirical research on the selected puzzle: those that specify the elite social bases of politics. We thereby turn world-systems analysis inside-out. Our inside-out approach advances the project of world-systems analysis as a methodology, rather than a theoretical prescription in several ways. First, it addresses an important but largely overlooked question: how to select what to study. Second, it devises a methodology that can, but does not have to, pair with the methodology of incorporated comparisons. Third, it offers a methodology that stimulates, rather than forecloses, theoretical flexibility and fresh interpretations of politics and the world-economy. We illustrate the strengths of this new approach with three books, two of which won the best book award from ASA's Political Economy of the World System (PEWS) Section.
Book Reviews by Mehmet Baki Deniz
Journal of world-Systems Research, 2015
Architects of Austerity is a well-researched, clearly written, and convincingly argued book on th... more Architects of Austerity is a well-researched, clearly written, and convincingly argued book on the political history of international finance regulation of the post-WWII period. I don't think I exaggerate when I say that, with this book, Aaron Major establishes himself as a leading voice among analysts who, over the past decade or so, have done some serious rethinking of the common wisdom surrounding our understanding of this crucial period.
Thesis Chapters by Mehmet Baki Deniz
Abstract How do populists consolidate an authoritarian regime in previously liberal democratic so... more Abstract
How do populists consolidate an authoritarian regime in previously liberal democratic societies? How do such authoritarian populists overcome institutional opposition to their rule? I examine one instance of a new generation of authoritarian populists- anti-establishment/anti-elite leaders who dismantle liberal democratic institutions and usher in authoritarian politics. I examine the authoritarian turn of R. Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party-AKP in Turkey. Turkey’s authoritarianism under Erdoğan poses a puzzle for the personal politics based accounts of authoritarian populism. Erdoğan’s authoritarianism came in the post-2008 period, five years after November 2002 when he came to power. Before 2008, his party, the AKP, mostly pursued a conservative agenda within the liberal democratic framework. However, AKP came into conflict with the existing political elites lodged in the justice and the military parts of the bureaucracy between 2006 and 2008. AKP’s triumph over these dissenting bureaucrats constituted a critical juncture. They paved the way for later populist authoritarianization. Instead of taking Erdoğan’s defeat of the opposing bureaucrats as the cause for later authoritarianism as many have, I ask: How did the AKP manage to defeat the bureaucratic opposition? 22 Interviews with former AKP ministers, business leaders, bureaucrats, and a systematic review of newspaper reporting on state-business relations, I establish that a surprising segment of Turkey’s economic elite supported AKP at this juncture and explain why they did. AKP had the support of the EU-US oriented neoliberal businesses represented by two business associations: TUSIAD and TOBB.
This contradicts the widely held view that the so-called ‘Muslim businesses’ were crucial for AKP and Erdoğan to institute an authoritarian regime in Turkey. Without the critical support of TUSIAD and TOBB, nevertheless, AKP and Erdoğan would have ceased to exist in Turkish politics after 2008. Two issues explain TUSIAD and TOBB’s decision to support AKP and Erdoğan before 2008. First, they trusted that Erdoğan would follow their favored political-economic projects in the post-2008 period because a) TOBB and especially TUSIAD won all 16 policy battles identified in newspapers and business association annual reports against the will of the rest of the business community and b) TUSIAD gained the most as a result of AKP’s political economic policy decisions and rent distribution according to my review of Turkish contractors in top global construction companies, privatization bids and Turkey’s top 100 manufacturing firms lists. Second, TUSIAD and TOBB supported AKP because they feared losing their hard-earned hegemony over Turkish politics. My review of business association reports between 1987 and 2002 reveals why. They feared a return to the 1990s when working class militancy and the neoliberal project split elites between competing projects and destabilized politics. TUSIAD and TOBB had reconsolidated their hegemony with AKP’s rise in 2002. They turned against the military-justice bureaucrats to defend their hegemony.
Türkiye'nin Büyük Dönüşümü Ayşe Buğra'ya Armağan, 2018
Kentsel dönüşüm sürecinde yaşanan barınma hakkı ihlalleri ya da ormanlık alanları yok eden mega a... more Kentsel dönüşüm sürecinde yaşanan barınma hakkı ihlalleri ya da ormanlık alanları yok eden mega altyapı projeleri geniş halk kitlelerini iktidara karşı örgütlenmeye sürükleyebilir mi? Türkiye’de 2002 sonrası Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi
(AKP) hükümetleri döneminde yükselen kentsel dönüşüm projeleri ve mega altyapı projeleri sonucu artan ekolojik tahribata bakan araştırmacılar ve eylemciler, sıklıkla arka planda bu soruyu sordular. Bu makalede de böyle bir motivasyonla 2000’lerin sonunda Türkiye’de gecekondu dönüşüm projelerine karşı gerçekleşen iki militan mahalle direnişini, Ankara Dikmen Vadisi mahallesi ve İstanbul Başıbüyük mahallesi direnişlerini inceleyeceğim. İkisi de siyasal İslam’ın güçlü olduğu mahallelerken; nasıl oldu da Dikmen vadisi sol gruplarla birlikte hak temelli bir kent mücadelesini ördü, Başıbüyük’te tam tersi bir şekilde mülkiyet hakkını ve bireysel kazancı önceleyen bir mücadele gelişti ve Başıbüyüklüler diğer kentsel hareketlerle bütünleşmekten uzak durdular? Bu farklılığın oluşmasındaki sebepler bu makalenin tartışma çerçevesini belirlemektedir. Aynı zamanda bu tartışma üzerinden makale, 2000’li yıllarda hem Türkiye’de hem de dünyada yükselen kent hakkı talebinin neoliberal kentleşmeye karşı protestoları örgütleme potansiyeliyle ilgili literatüre de katkı sunmayı hedeflemektedir. Makalede Prof. Dr. Ayşe Buğra danışmanlığında Haziran 2008-Ocak 2009 arasında iki mahallede yürüttüğüm saha araştırması temelinde bir tartışma yürüteceğim. Bunun yanında eylemci kimliğimle, 2008-11 arasında IMECE Toplumun Şehircilik Hareketi ve 2015 sonrasında Kuzey Ormanları Savunması içinde edindiğim gözlemler de bu makalede geçen argümanların inşasına katkı sağladılar.
Romani Studies, 2017
This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in Turkey, w... more This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in Turkey, which manifests itself in the stigmatized space of Roma neighborhood. In our analysis, we do not depict 'Roma' distinctively as an ethnic category but as a 'low status' in the society that is embedded in the stigmatized places. We argue that those from a Roma neighborhood hold a common "stigmatized spatial identity", regardless of their ethnicity, which determines the processes of poverty and social exclusion in different spheres of life. In order to unfold the process of social exclusion that we refer to as the "Romanization of poverty", our study provides analysis under the analytical category of spatial stigmatization intertwined with insecure livelihood.
Romani Studies, 2017
This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in Turkey, w... more This article aims to reveal the multidimensional aspects of social exclusion of Roma in
Turkey, which manifests itself in the stigmatized space of Roma neighborhood. In our
analysis, we do not depict ‘Roma’ distinctively as an ethnic category but as a ‘low status’
in the society that is embedded in the stigmatized places. We argue that those from a
Roma neighborhood hold a common “stigmatized spatial identity”, regardless of their
ethnicity, which determines the processes of poverty and social exclusion in different
spheres of life. In order to unfold the process of social exclusion that we refer to as the
“Romanization of poverty”, our study provides analysis under the analytical category of
spatial stigmatization intertwined with insecure livelihood.
JOURNAL OF WORLD-SYSTEMS RESEARCH, 2019
Can world-systems analysis illuminate politics? Can it help explain why illiberal regimes, outsid... more Can world-systems analysis illuminate politics? Can it help explain why illiberal regimes, outsider parties, and anti-immigrant rhetoric seem to be on the rise? Can it help explain any such national changes that seem destined to shift how nations relate to world markets? Leading surveys of historical sociology seem to say no. We disagree. While there are problems with Wallerstein's early mode of analyzing politics in the capitalist world-system from the outside-in, historical sociologists have been too quick to dismiss world-systems analysis. We propose an alternative inside-out approach anchored in a methodology for selecting what to study: those national political transformations which constitute puzzling instances within a given world-historical political process. We recommend promising theoretical lineages to guide empirical research on the selected puzzle: those that specify the elite social bases of politics. We thereby turn world-systems analysis inside-out. Our inside-out approach advances the project of world-systems analysis as a methodology, rather than a theoretical prescription in several ways. First, it addresses an important but largely overlooked question: how to select what to study. Second, it devises a methodology that can, but does not have to, pair with the methodology of incorporated comparisons. Third, it offers a methodology that stimulates, rather than forecloses, theoretical flexibility and fresh interpretations of politics and the world-economy. We illustrate the strengths of this new approach with three books, two of which won the best book award from ASA's Political Economy of the World System (PEWS) Section.
Journal of world-Systems Research, 2015
Architects of Austerity is a well-researched, clearly written, and convincingly argued book on th... more Architects of Austerity is a well-researched, clearly written, and convincingly argued book on the political history of international finance regulation of the post-WWII period. I don't think I exaggerate when I say that, with this book, Aaron Major establishes himself as a leading voice among analysts who, over the past decade or so, have done some serious rethinking of the common wisdom surrounding our understanding of this crucial period.
Abstract How do populists consolidate an authoritarian regime in previously liberal democratic so... more Abstract
How do populists consolidate an authoritarian regime in previously liberal democratic societies? How do such authoritarian populists overcome institutional opposition to their rule? I examine one instance of a new generation of authoritarian populists- anti-establishment/anti-elite leaders who dismantle liberal democratic institutions and usher in authoritarian politics. I examine the authoritarian turn of R. Tayyip Erdogan’s Justice and Development Party-AKP in Turkey. Turkey’s authoritarianism under Erdoğan poses a puzzle for the personal politics based accounts of authoritarian populism. Erdoğan’s authoritarianism came in the post-2008 period, five years after November 2002 when he came to power. Before 2008, his party, the AKP, mostly pursued a conservative agenda within the liberal democratic framework. However, AKP came into conflict with the existing political elites lodged in the justice and the military parts of the bureaucracy between 2006 and 2008. AKP’s triumph over these dissenting bureaucrats constituted a critical juncture. They paved the way for later populist authoritarianization. Instead of taking Erdoğan’s defeat of the opposing bureaucrats as the cause for later authoritarianism as many have, I ask: How did the AKP manage to defeat the bureaucratic opposition? 22 Interviews with former AKP ministers, business leaders, bureaucrats, and a systematic review of newspaper reporting on state-business relations, I establish that a surprising segment of Turkey’s economic elite supported AKP at this juncture and explain why they did. AKP had the support of the EU-US oriented neoliberal businesses represented by two business associations: TUSIAD and TOBB.
This contradicts the widely held view that the so-called ‘Muslim businesses’ were crucial for AKP and Erdoğan to institute an authoritarian regime in Turkey. Without the critical support of TUSIAD and TOBB, nevertheless, AKP and Erdoğan would have ceased to exist in Turkish politics after 2008. Two issues explain TUSIAD and TOBB’s decision to support AKP and Erdoğan before 2008. First, they trusted that Erdoğan would follow their favored political-economic projects in the post-2008 period because a) TOBB and especially TUSIAD won all 16 policy battles identified in newspapers and business association annual reports against the will of the rest of the business community and b) TUSIAD gained the most as a result of AKP’s political economic policy decisions and rent distribution according to my review of Turkish contractors in top global construction companies, privatization bids and Turkey’s top 100 manufacturing firms lists. Second, TUSIAD and TOBB supported AKP because they feared losing their hard-earned hegemony over Turkish politics. My review of business association reports between 1987 and 2002 reveals why. They feared a return to the 1990s when working class militancy and the neoliberal project split elites between competing projects and destabilized politics. TUSIAD and TOBB had reconsolidated their hegemony with AKP’s rise in 2002. They turned against the military-justice bureaucrats to defend their hegemony.