Nikos Christofis (ed.), Erdoğan’s ‘New’ Turkey, Routledge, 2020 (original) (raw)
Related papers
Two years after the event, the collection Turkey’s July 15 Coup: What Happened and Why, edited by M. Hakan Yavuz and Bayram Balci, brings together contributors to unpack the historical, political, religious and ideological dimensions of the 2016 coup attempt in Turkey. The volume offers insightful historical insight into the deteriorating relationship between AKP leader and President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and the Gülen movement and its ultimate impact on the events of 15 July 2016, writes Serhun Al.
The Republic of Turkey has been undergoing a thorough transformation since 2002 under the rule of the Justice and Development Party (AKP). On the ideological level this transformation entered a decisive stage after the coup of 15 July 2016 which was thwarted by the government’s supporters. The coup is treated as a modern political myth that has been employed by the government to build a comprehensive story of a Turkey it governs, and to define the fundamental values and identity of the state. Turkey is becoming an even more difficult partner for the West after the failed coup. Inherent in its founding myth is a strong anti-Western and anti-liberal trend based on a political system strongly relying on one leader. However, this does not mean that a Turkey with a government model of this kind will automatically become a close ally of other anti-Western countries (such as Russia and Iran) and build a camp with them that would be in competition with the West. In this context, Turkey above all emphasises its own sovereignty. Furthermore, it is not looking for points of reference in other countries because it is a model for itself.
Turkey: The Oscillation Between «State» and «Regime» (1/3
This three part series of articles -- based on extensive fieldwork research in Turkey since 2010, and which appeared in Almasry Alyoum in July 2016 following the Turkish attempted coup -- analyze why the attempt itself was predictable, based on detected politicization and agitation of the mid-rank level within the Turkish Armed Forces, due to subjective promotions and loyalism under Erdogan's regime. The articles also explain why the failure of the attempt was also equally foreseen, given that the mutiny within the army, against the political leadership was not a broad-base societally-supported move, due to a public weary of a history of military interventions. In the end, the articles argue, the Turkey is currently undergoing a transformation from a State to a Regime, and the prediction is an eventual ousting of the Erodgan Regime at the 2023/24-25 juncture.
Marek Matusiak: The great leap. Turkey under Erdogan. OSW Point of View, No 51, May 2015
Since the AKP took power in 2002, Turkey has seen a replacement of the state’s elites, a real change of the political system and a redefinition of the state identity. All this has been accompanied by economic development and rapid social transformation. The pro-democratic reforms and improved prosperity in the first decade of the AKP’s rule created the opportunity for Turkey to become part of the West in terms of legal and political standards, while maintaining its cultural distinctness. However, from the point of view of Recep Tayyip Erdogan, the leader of a new Turkey, the political reforms turned out not to be a goal per se but a means to the end of achieving a monopoly on power. Once this goal was achieved, Erdogan began leading Turkey towards the status of an autocratic state focused on the Middle East and resentful towards the West. This trend is unlikely to be reversed under Erdogan’s rule. However, even if the government were to change, there would be no return to the Turkey from before the AKP era. In turn, the Turkish public will have to answer the questions regarding its civilisational identity and the vision of the political and social order.
The past couple of days have been some of the most tumultuous moments in Turkey’s modern history. Last week’s failed military coup, which sought to oust Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his supporters from government, took many observers by surprise, while the timing and planning of the attempted coup still begs a myriad of questions. As more information has come to light concerning the coup’s instigators and participants, the purported role that U.S.-based Islamic cleric Fethullah Gulen’s sympathizers played in orchestrating the coup has been widely discussed in the media. Furthermore, over the past several days, many media outlets have reported that Justice and Development Party (hereafter, AKP as it is known in Turkey) has initiated a massive purge of suspected Gulenists within Turkey’s bureaucracy. Moreover, the AKP’s struggle to clean the Gulen “virus” from all of Turkey’s state institutions has a chance to greatly alter the trajectory of Turkey’s current regime and the underpinning of Turkish Republic itself.
Coup in Turkey 10.2016 Revised
Everybody knows her, but nonetheless, it's embarrassing to meet her in the street. The truth is like the town whore. -Borchert Our paper, it will particularly focus on the AKP government's discourse on national consensus, and the restructuring of the military and the field of security. In order to examine this conflict within by examining both the domestic and international spheres, this paper will, firstly, briefly discuss civil-military relations in Turkey in accordance with its theoretical framework drawn from Marxism. Secondly, it will briefly discuss the relationship between the AKP (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi -Justice and Development Party) government and the Gulen movement since the coup plotters were allegedly disciples and allies of the Gulen movement (Gulenists) according to their own confessions. Thirdly, it will discuss the aftermath of the failed coup attempt in relation to the hegemonic project of neoliberal-Islamism. Finally, it will conclude that the secular and democratic Republican regime with the rule of law should be defended, and that the class antagonisms and ill-doings of capitalism should be collectively voiced. However, the failed coup revealed the fierce and prolonged conflict within the state apparatus which can be dated back to the Ergenekon (named after a Turkish saga of re-birth) and Balyoz (Sledgehammer) trials. On 15 July 2016, Turkey saw a failed coup attempt, which was undertaken by certain factions of the military, and which saw more than three-hundred killed, more than a thousand wounded, and thousands detained.
History and Memory: TRT World in the Face of the July 15 [2016] Coup [in Turkey], Edited by HALİL BERKTAY, 2017
It almost did so in 2016. Despite appearances, though, it was not quite the same thing. Whether hierarchical or factional, all previous coups in Turkey had been carried out within the penumbra of Kemalism -- under the aegis of the military-bureaucratic establishment’s civilizing self-perception and tutelage (or guardianship) ideology. This created a pattern, a habitus of army takeovers in the name of saving the country. It also conditioned the West, too, into seeing Turkey purely in terms of this army-vs-Islamism dichotomy. If there was some kind of coup brewing in Turkey, once more it had to be the staunch Kemalist old guard trying to defend the ramparts of civilization against Islamic reaction (now represented by the AK Party). This was (and is) much too simplistic; it fails to understand that it was/is a case of “new wine in old bottles”; it overlooks nothing less than the Gülenist factor in Turkish politics and society. By its own historic attitude and behavior, the army set itself up as a target, an instrument to be usurped, a bastion to be conquered from the inside, and as the rest of this book amply explains, that is precisely what the Gülenist movement attempted. But at the same time, they could not do explicitly on their own ideological terms. ABOUT THE AUTHOR: Berktay was born into an intellectual Turkish Communist family. His father, Erdogan Berktay, was a member of the old clandestine Communist Party of Turkey. As a result of this influence, Halil Berktay remained a Maoist for two decades, before becoming "an independent left-intellectual". After graduating from Robert College in 1964, Berktay studied economics at Yale University receiving his Bachelor of Arts in 1968 and Master of Arts in 1969.[1] He went on to earn a Ph.D. from Birmingham University in 1990.[1] He worked as a lecturer at Ankara University between 1969–1971 and 1978–1983.[1] He took part in the founding of the Yale chapter of the Students for a Democratic Society.[3] Between 1992–1997, he taught at both the Middle East Technical University and Boğaziçi University. He was a visiting scholar at Harvard University in 1997 and taught at Sabancı University before returning to Harvard in 2006. Berktay's research areas are the history and historiography of Turkish nationalism in the 20th century. He studies social and economic history (including that of Europe, and especially medieval history) from a comparative perspective. He has also written on the construction of Turkish national memory. In September 2005, Berktay and fellow historians, including Murat Belge, Edhem Eldem, Selim Deringil, convened at an academic conference to discuss the fall of the Ottoman Empire. As a supporter of open dialogue in Turkey regarding the Armenian Genocide and Turkey's denial, Berktay has received threats in his country.