This book examines the period of political violence in Turkey between 12 March 1971 and 12 September 1980. It sets out a close analysis of the tactics used by the various protagonists in the conflict, showing how they took over public institutions, the first of which was the police. This book challenges the myth of a 'strong' Turkish state viewed as authoritative and autonomous from society, instead reflecting a state that was unable to contain the political mobilisation actually taking place. In the book, Benjamin Gourisse analyses the structure, mobilisation, and strategies of antagonistic radical political groups caught up in this dynamic of violence, including the far-left organisations and the Nationalist Movement, comprising the Nationalist Movement Party and its satellite organisations. Gourisse demonstrates that from 1975 to 1980, the state was never “out of play”. Quite the contrary, in fact, for its institutions, together with the practices, beliefs, and representations of their members and users, were central to the processes constituting the crisis.
A powerful graphic novel that traces Turkey's descent into political violence in the 1970s through the experiences of four students on opposing sides of the conflict Turkish Kaleidoscope tells the stories of four unforgettable protagonists as they navigate a society torn apart by violent political factions. It is 1975 and Turkey is on the verge of civil war. Faruk and Orhan are from conservative shopkeeping families in eastern Anatolia that share a sense of new possibilities. Nuray is the daughter of villagers who have migrated to the provincial city where Yunus, the son of an imprisoned teacher, was raised in genteel poverty. While attending medical school in Ankara, Faruk draws a reluctant Orhan into a right-wing nationalist group while Nuray and Yunus join the left. Against a backdrop of escalating violence, the four students fall in love, have their hearts broken, get married, raise families, and struggle to get on with their lives. But the consequences of their decisions will follow them through their lives as their children begin the story anew, skewed through the kaleidoscope of historical events. Inspired by Jenny White's own experiences as a student in Turkey during this tumultuous period as well as original oral histories of Turks who lived through it, Turkish Kaleidoscope reveals how violent factionalism has its own emotional and cultural logic that defies ideological explanations.
This book examines the period of political violence in Turkey between 12 March 1971 and 12 September 1980. It sets out a close analysis of the tactics used by the various protagonists in the conflict, showing how they took over public institutions, the first of which was the police. This book challenges the myth of a 'strong' Turkish state viewed as authoritative and autonomous from society, instead reflecting a state that was unable to contain the political mobilisation actually taking place. In the book, Benjamin Gourisse analyses the structure, mobilisation, and strategies of antagonistic radical political groups caught up in this dynamic of violence, including the far-left organisations and the Nationalist Movement, comprising the Nationalist Movement Party and its satellite organisations. Gourisse demonstrates that from 1975 to 1980, the state was never “out of play”. Quite the contrary, in fact, for its institutions, together with the practices, beliefs, and representations of their members and users, were central to the processes constituting the crisis.
The Kurds constitute the largest stateless nation in the world. Their position in Turkey attracts attention both within the country and internationally, particularly focusing on the demand for Kurdish independence. Yet since the 1990s, new Kurdish parties have formed within Turkey who have a variety of ideologies and demands that go beyond, and differ in opinion on, the question of independence. Much of the present literature on the topic looks at the Kurds of Turkey as a homogenous group with unified political demands, which over-simplifies their position within the political backdrop of Turkey. This book seeks to provide nuance and depth to the current debate on Kurdish political agency and presence in Turkey. Presently, the Kurds' political demands can be classified into four categories; democratic autonomy, their cultural rights to be granted, federalism (territorial autonomies) and independence (creation of a Kurdish nation-state). In a broad sense, these models can also be ordered into two categories; territorial political models (federalism and independence) and non-territorial political models (democratic autonomy and cultural rights). Considering the diversity within the Kurdish community - intertwinement of tribal, ethnic and national identity - and differences in their language, religion and ideology, there are several contributing factors for the emergence of the current varied political demands of Kurds. By explaining variation among the Kurds' political demands through close analysis of existing at emerging parties, this study challenges a deterministic approach to the Kurds which currently dominates the discourse.
Where does Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s resilience derive from? Why did he, and the AKP, win the double May 2023 elections again? How did the opposition perform? What were the opposition’s mistakes? How will domestic and foreign policy issues unfold after the elections? These are just a few of the questions the present collection tries to answer. Demonstrating how Turkey’s politics have developed the present volume brings together approaches from politics, sociology, and history, and sheds much-needed light on these crucial questions. They offer scholars and non-specialists alike a comprehensive overview of the implications of the recent elections in almost every aspect of Turkish society. Finally, the chapters that are hosted here provide informed deliberations about Turkey’s future. "This collective volume sheds new light on the durability of the Erdoğan regime despite the heavy crises Turkey is going through, and more importantly, shows the limits of an opposition that is unable to propose a democratic transformation of the country, to become a credible alternative to it." - Prof. Hamit Bozarslan, EHESS, Paris This timely collection features some of the sharpest voices in and on Turkey today, packaged in short, digestible chapters. Coverage includes the role of ideology, incumbent and opposition alliances, the economy, devastating earthquakes, minorities, youth, and relations with external actors like Greece and the European Union. The book will help students and experts alike to make sense of the multi-faceted causes and consequences of a milestone in Turkey's trajectory: 2023 elections and their implications for the country, its region, and the world. - Assoc. Prof. Nora Fisher Onar, University of San Francisco, San Francisco. CONTENTS Preface HOW TO MISREAD TURKISH FASCISM... Cengiz Aktar BEFORE AND AFTER THE 2023 (DOUBLE) MAY ELECTIONS: QUO VADIS TURKEY?. Nikos Christofis TWO FACES OF ERDOĞANISM: RADICAL CONSERVATISM AND VINDICTIVE NATIONALISM... Ahmet İnsel GRAPE FRUIT COCKTAIL FOR SWEET FRUIT ADDICTS: THE STRATEGY OF NATION ALLIANCE.. Ayşe Çavdar THE FANTASY OF OPPOSITION COORDINATION AND DEMOCRACY WITHOUT DEMOCRATS 2.0: TURKEY AFTER THE ELECTIONS. Kerem Öktem THE OPPOSITION ALLIANCE IN TURKEY’S 2023 ELECTIONS. Berk Esen THE 2023 TURKISH ELECTIONS AND THE KURDS. Murat Issi VICTORY, EVEN IN DEFEAT: ÜMIT ÖZDAĞ, SINAN OĞAN, AND THE ENDURING INFLUENCE OF THE TURKISH FAR-RIGHT.. Reuben Silverman THE LEFT IN TURKEY: SURVIVAL AND RESISTANCE UNDER AUTHORITARIANISM... Sevgi Adak YOUTH POLITICS AND ACTIVISM IN TURKEY.. Bahar Baser TURKEY’S ECONOMIC GROWTH AND ENVIRONMENTAL DEGRADATION AFTER THE 2023 ELECTIONS: IS THE WORST YET TO COME?. Aslı Sen Taşbaşı LAISSEZ-FAIRE LAISSEZ-MOURIR: EARTHQUAKE ON 6 FEBRUARY 2023 AND CAPITALISM THAT DISCARDS AND DISASSOCIATES CITIZENS IN ERDOGAN’S TURKEY.. Kumru Toktamış DISASTER AND GENDER INEQUALITY KILLS, NOT EARTHQUAKES Özgür Kaymak THE 2023 ELECTIONS IN TURKEY AND THE TURKISH-GREEK RELATIONS: FACTS, POSSIBILITIES AND CONCLUSIONS. Anthony Deriziotis EU-TURKEY RELATIONS IN A “DANGEROUS WORLD”: PROSPECTS AND CHALLENGES AFTER THE 2023 ELECTIONS IN TURKEY.. Seda Gürkan Oscillating Between Securitization and Transactionalism: The Everlasting DRAMA OF TURKEY-WEST RELATIONS. Alper Kaliber
The study of politics in Turkey : new horizons and perennial pitfalls / Güneş Murat Tezcür -- Democratization theories and Turkey / Ekrem Karakoç -- Ruling ideologies in modern Turkey / Kerem Öktem -- Constitutionalism in Turkey / Aslı Ü. Bâli -- Civil-military relations and the demise of Turkish democracy / Nil S. Satana and Burak Bilgehan Özpek -- Capturing secularism in Turkey : the ease of comparison / Murat Akan -- The political economy of Turkey since the end of World War II / Şevket Pamuk -- Neoliberal politics in Turkey / Sinan Erensü and Yahya M. Madra -- The politics of welfare in Turkey / Erdem Yörük -- The political economy of environmental policymaking in Turkey : a vicious cycle / Fikret Adaman, Bengi Akbulut, and Murat Arsel -- The politics of energy in Turkey : running engines on geopolitical, discursive, and coercive power / Begüm Özkaynak, Ethemcan Turhan, and Cem İskender Aydın -- The contemporary politics of health in Turkey : diverse actors, competing frames, and uneven policies / Volkan Yılmaz -- Populism in Turkey : historical and contemporary patterns / Yüksel Taşkın -- Old and new polarizations and failed democratizations in Turkey / Murat Somer -- Economic voting during the AKP era in Turkey / S. Erdem Aytaç -- Party organizations in Turkey and their consequences for democracy / Melis G. Laebens -- The evolution of conventional political participation in Turkey / Ersin Kalaycıoğlu -- Symbolic politics and contention in the Turkish Republic / Senem Aslan -- Islamist activism in Turkey / Menderes Çınar -- The Kurdish movement in Turkey : understanding everyday perceptions and experiences / Dilan Okcuoglu -- The Transnational Mobilization of the Alevis of Turkey : from invisibility to the struggle for equality / Ceren Lord -- Politics of asylum seekers and refugees in Turkey : limits and prospects of populism / Fatih Resul Kılınç and Şule Toktaş -- A theoretical account of Turkish foreign policy under the AKP / Tarık Oğuzlu -- US-Turkey relations since WWII : from alliance to transactionalism / Serhat Güvenç and Soli Özel -- Turkey and Europe : historical asynchronicities and perceptual asymmetries / Hakan Yılmaz -- Turkey's foreign policy in the Middle East : an identity perspective / Lisel Hintz -- Turkey and Russia : historical patterns and contemporary trends in bilateral relations / Evren Balta and Mitat Çelikpala -- Citizenship and protest behavior in Turkey / Ayhan Kaya -- Gender politics and the struggle for equality in Turkey / Zehra F. Kabasakal Arat -- Human rights organizations in Turkey / Başak Çalı -- Truth, justice, and commemoration initiatives in Turkey / Onur Bakiner -- The politics of media in Turkey : chronicle of a stillborn media system / Sarphan Uzunoğlu -- The AKP's rhetoric of rule in Turkey : political melodramas of conspiracy from "ergenekon" to "mastermind" / Erdağ Göknar -- The transformation of political cinema in Turkey since the 1960s : a change of discourse / Zeynep Çetin-Erus and M. Elif Demoğlu -- Political music in Turkey : the birth and diversification of dissident and conformist music (1920-2000) / Mustafa Avcı.
The 'neoliberal' economic policy of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan's AKP Party, which has delivered extraordinary growth in Turkish GDP over the last decade, has been one of the foundations of the party's popular appeal. Here, a group of experts on Turkish political economy show how these policies have also had a detrimental impact on the environment, sustainability and the long-term health of the Turkish economy. Taking the two main sectors of growth during the past decade-energy and construction-as its primary focus, the book engages broadly with the political economy of inequality and sustainability in contemporary Turkey. Ultimately, the authors argue that 'environmental conflicts' in Turkey are not merely about the environment but intersect with contemporary politics of religion, ethnicity, gender, and class within the context of top-down, modernising economic development. Neoliberal Turkey and its Discontents marks an important contribution to debates around the economic growth of Turkey and the future of the AKP's long-term economic plan.
The Mobilization of Political Islam in Turkey explains why political Islam, which has been part of Turkish politics since the 1970s but on the rise only since the 1990s, has now achieved governing power. Drawing on social movement theory, the book focuses on the dominant form of Islamist activism in Turkey by analyzing the increasing electoral strength of four successive Islamist political parties: the Welfare Party; its successor, the Virtue Party; and the successors of the Virtue Party: the Felicity Party and the Justice and Development Party. This book, which is based on extensive primary and secondary sources as well as in-depth interviews, provides the most comprehensive analysis currently available of the Islamist political mobilization in Turkey.
Challenging existing political analyses of the state of emergency in Turkey, this volume argues that such states are not merely predetermined by policy and legislation but are produced, regulated, distributed and contested through the built environment in both embodied and symbolic ways. Contributors use empirical critical-spatial research carried out in Turkey over the past decade, exploring heritage, displacement and catastrophes. Contributing to the broader literature on the related concepts of exception, risk, crisis and uncertainty, the book discusses the ways in which these phenomena shape and are shaped by the built environment, and provides context-specific empirical substance to it by focusing on contemporary Turkey. In so doing, it offers nuanced insight into the debate around emergency as well as into recent urban-architectural affairs in Turkey.
