Have reports of Turkish westernisation been greatly exaggerated?
It appears that an Islamist Party is now in the hot seat following yesterday’s election.
Looks like various plans in various War Rooms may now have to be hastily redrawn.
|
|||||
|
We are developing the social individualist meta-context for the future. From the very serious to the extremely frivolous... lets see what is on the mind of the Samizdata people. Samizdata, derived from Samizdat /n. - a system of clandestine publication of banned literature in the USSR [Russ.,= self-publishing house] Authors
Arts, Tech & CultureCivil LibertiesCommentary
EconomicsSamizdatistas |
7 comments to Tilting towards Mecca |
Who Are We?The Samizdata people are a bunch of sinister and heavily armed globalist illuminati who seek to infect the entire world with the values of personal liberty and several property. Amongst our many crimes is a sense of humour and the intermittent use of British spelling. We are also a varied group made up of social individualists, classical liberals, whigs, libertarians, extropians, futurists, ‘Porcupines’, Karl Popper fetishists, recovering neo-conservatives, crazed Ayn Rand worshipers, over-caffeinated Virginia Postrel devotees, witty Frédéric Bastiat wannabes, cypherpunks, minarchists, kritarchists and wild-eyed anarcho-capitalists from Britain, North America, Australia and Europe. CategoriesArchivesFeed This PageLink Icons   |
|||
All content on this website (including text, photographs, audio files, and any other original works), unless otherwise noted, is licensed under a Creative Commons License. |
|||||
I saw a report about this on the Newshour a few nights ago. It seems as though one of the chief causes of this is anger over the fact that it’s illegal to wear islamic shawls into government buildings. It’s actually illegal to mention any kind of religion in political discourse. With this kind of oppression, I’m not surprised that the more radical elements of the society are gaining sway.
Some key facts left out:
The Islamists have reformed their position away from their previous extremism and towards a position more in line with conventional politics.
Most analysis of the election blame their increased success on the fact that all the other parties are tainted by histories of scandal and corruption.
I’m no expert on Turkish politics, but it seems to me that this post was written in a rather scaremongering manner…
It does amount to a ‘political revolution’ as an entire political class have been swept away due to corruption and, more understandably, the worst economic crisis that Turkey has had to endure for a generation.
It’s too early to tell what the effects are although Turkey has moved into a two party system of government, based on a 10% threshold for entering their parliament.
Given the army’s role, I would say that the current strategic links with Israel and the US remain intact, for now.
However, a new insecure government may play the nationalist card over Cyprus to shore up its lack of experience and insult the EU a lot. It will be interesting to see if the EU opens accession talks with Turkey at the December conference, as has been indicated.
I wouldn’t get too excited about it. The Turks have elected Islamic parties in the past (I think the last time was in the early 1990s) and then the army comes along and shuts it down.
Patrick,
No arguments with that, sir. However, if the only thing stopping Turkey from becoming Iran is the glint of a bayonet then it is hardly a model of stability
I agree with the post about the Army. The Turks and the Algerians have a long tradition of the (and the Koreans) Army creating regime change when the government wanders too far off course.
Although, the Army may just be pissed enough at the EU… the Turks really, really wanted their membership (the “we are all white folks here” card). Now, they’re still a second rate power and the snub is really seen as a ethnic insult. Quite true, given the economic and political statuses of some of the successful candidates.
There is a pretty reasonable article by Brendan O’Neill at spiked-online.com (“Has Turkey turned?”) explaining why this was 1) Not a vote for Islamic rule but a concerted effort to remove a thoroughly corrupt government; and 2) not likely to make a jot of difference to Turkey’s position vis-a-vis the West and the war on terror, since the party has come a long way from its roots in the mosques and “street”.