Like many I was disappointed by Erdogan’s re-election , but found this New Yorker article a very thought provoking and challenging explanation of his appeal. There’s a pay wall, so I’ve made the article into a PDF you can download from:-
Erdogan relies on the votes of the poorly educated and
avid Muslims. There was an interview I heard on the BBC World Service with a Turkish woman who said that she was voting for him because he was for women wearing the Islamic headscarf.
His actions on imprisoning University lecturers, teachers and journalists showed just how he was going to run his campaigns and appeal to the sections of the Turkish population who would vote for him, never mind the appalling state of the economy, the lack of support for the victims of the earthquake and his support for Russia.
Of course, controlling state tv and denying the opposition air time helped too.
The actions of yet another man who refuses to give up power.
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Don’t disagree with anything above, apart from the phrase ‘avid Muslims’ because I think ‘more conservative’ is a fairer description of the bulk of his electorate.
I made several academic visits to Turkey during the first half of Erdogan’s presidency, so was very aware of the changes, I was also fairly up to speed on Attaturk, I’d visited his rather OTT memorial in Ankara and read the chapter on it in the hilarious book, The Tombs of the Great Leaders (it’s on the cover below). However, I’d always viewed his secularisation of Turkey as a naturally good thing and because I was moving in liberal academic circles, wasn’t really exposed to any other point of view.
For me, the NYT article was a useful corrective. On my second visit to Istanbul’s Fatih University, I remarked to a faculty member that there seemed to be aa sizeable number of female students wearing head scarves. “Oh, it’s just the new fashion.” he explained, adding “They’re not really very religious.” At the time I bought his explanation, but the NYT article made me reflect that in many ways some of Erdogan’s proscriptions mirror those of Attaturk’s secularisation of Turkey.
And of course the latter resemble aspects of France’s la laïcité…
I do hope that does not indicate a backlash in the near future, the less we are governed by religion the better we are imo.
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its not available anymore unfortunately
Sorry, didn’t realise it had been (automatically?) deleted from my Dropbox; I no longer have a subscription to The New Yorker, so unfortunately can’t retrieve it for you.
There is a backlash coming, and already partly arrived, against the post-modernist views of society where there are no absolutes and only ‘your truths’.
Understood. Thanks for your answer. I am going to travel to Turkey in three weeks, that’s why curious to read all the infos I can find. Also interested if someone used https://visaturquia.es/ t open a visa there? How was your experience? How long did it take you to get it?
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Any relation to Schrödinger’s cat?
Suppose not.
Presumably the article still exists on The New Yorker’s website, but beyond that I cannot answer - ‘Whereof one cannot speak, thereof one must be silent.’ (Wittgenstein’s final statement in his Tractatus).
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