Oral Çalışlar in Radikal writes that it is highly likely that various coalition formulas are going to be discussed after November 1, just as was the case after June 7, and that the AKP is once again going to be at the center of these. [HDP co-chair] Demirtaş has made the assessment that "the AKP needs to change itself." It is a fact that this assessment points toward an interesting potential. Whatever happens, Turkey is ultimately going to return to the solution process [of the Kurdish issue]. The discussions about disarmament and about democratization projects are going to resume…  For that to happen, and for the discussions to continue once they have started, AKP and HDP, as in the past, are going to have to put in work hours together. If the AKP does not get a majority, there is inevitably a coalition on the horizon.  It is useful to be open to new experiences, to new searches and to be courageous.

Saturday, 03 October 2015 00:00

Selvi: majority is within AKP's reach

Abdülkadir Selvi in Yeni Şafak writes that support for the AKP seems to be around 44 percent at the start of the election campaign. That means an increase of three percentage points compared to the result on June 7. There are three main reasons for the AKP’s increase. First, the governmental vacuum that has reigned since June 7 has made those who care about stability to turn to the AKP. Second, one to two percentage points are made up of returning voters from the MHP, in reaction to the intransigency of MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli after the election, when he refused to consider a coalition [with the AKP] and stayed out of the [caretaker] government when the fight against PKK had started. The third factor is those who voted for the [Islamist] Felicity Party and The Party of Grand Unity (BBP) on June 7, and who are now concluding that “Our votes did not have any effect on the political equation. Let’s now make sure that we get a majority government.”

By Nick Danforth

September 23rd, 2015, The Turkey Analyst

Turkey’s democratic and authoritarian legacies have been thoroughly intertwined from the outset. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s authoritarian instincts have been both motivated and enabled by the authoritarian behavior of his predecessors. Yet Erdoğan is also restrained by institutional forces that remain in place because military and civilian leaders before him proved willing to step down and compromise. And he is moreover restrained by the instincts of voters and some within his own party who value Turkey’s democratic tradition.

erd-rabia 

Published in Articles

Mümtazer Türköne in Zaman writes that both PKK and Erdoğan seem determined to finish off the HDP. After November 1, the HDP is not going to be in parliament. Erdoğan is going to repair the damages and will continue to build his autocracy; the PKK meanwhile, will have gotten the conditions it wanted so that it can escalate its “revolutionary people’s war” against a state that has lost its legitimacy and that is increasingly resorting to violence. The violence of the PKK is going to continue and intensify up until the November 1 election. The HDP is going to protest against the curfews and the practice of security zones as being expressions of “the oppression of the voters” and is going to boycott the election. The result: the AKP is going to get the majority with at least 300 deputies in parliament. The palace will get its undivided power back. And then, a bloodbath that will make us long for the present days will ensue. To use Demirtaş' expression, the violence is going to spread all the way to Bodrum (on the west coast.) The palace will maintain control for yet another period. But in the end, both – palace and PKK – are going to be the losers.

Friday, 18 September 2015 00:00

Mahçupyan: AKP between the new and the old

Etyen Mahçupyan in Akşam writes that AKP’s historical mission, simply put, was to bring those who had been excluded to power. This meant democratization, and the reconstruction of the center by the periphery. It is clear that the Kurdish issue and the solution process had a crucial function. What solution means is that what is “new” advances one more step, that one more strike is dealt at the resistance of the “old.” Lack of a solution, meanwhile, will be the harbinger of the failure of what is “new,” a sign that it is about to surrender to the “old.”  For the AKP, making the advance toward a solution required distancing itself from the statist, “Turkish” nationalism, and the AKP’s understanding of religiosity supplied a suitable social and ideological basis for the new orientation. The best way of derailing the AKP’s reformism is to end the solution process. What will be the choice of the AKP in a situation when everyone else either wants to have the “old” back or – as in the case of HDP – has no influence left? Hang on to the “old?”  Or carry the “new” itself?

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Joint Center Publications

Op-ed Halil Karaveli "The Rise and Rise of the Turkish Right", The New York Times, April 8, 2019

Analysis Halil Karaveli "The Myth of Erdogan's Power"Foreign Policy, August 29, 2018

Analysis Svante E. Cornell, A Road to Understanding in Syria? The U.S. and TurkeyThe American Interest, June 2018

Op-ed Halil Karaveli "Erdogan Wins Reelection"Foreign Affairs, June 25, 2018

Article Halil Karaveli "Will the Kurdish Question Secure Erdogan's Re-election?", Turkey Analyst, June 18, 2018

Research Article Svante E. Cornell "Erbakan, Kisakürek, and the Mainstreaming of Extremism in Turkey", Current Trends in Islamist Ideology, June 2018

Analysis Svante E. Cornell "The U.S. and Turkey: Past the Point of No Return?"The American Interest, February 1, 2018

Op-ed Svante E. Cornell "Erdogan's Turkey: the Role of a Little Known Islamic Poet", Breaking Defense, January 2, 2018

Research Article Halil Karaveli "Turkey's Authoritarian Legacy"Cairo Review of Global Affairs, January 2, 2018

 

The Turkey Analyst is a publication of the Central Asia-Caucasus Institute & Silk Road Studies Joint Center, designed to bring authoritative analysis and news on the rapidly developing domestic and foreign policy issues in Turkey. It includes topical analysis, as well as a summary of the Turkish media debate.

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