The political success of the Turkish president Recep Tayyab Urdugan is part of a larger global trend

The political success of the Turkish president Recep Tayyab Urdugan is part of a larger global trenda

Zindan Media Presents The political success of the Turkish president Recep Tayyab Urdugan is part of a larger global trend

Turkey’s President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has won another election in his country. Although official results will only be known by July 5, Turkish government news agency Anadolu has said that Erdogan has secured around 53% of the presidential vote. Simultaneously, Erdogan’s AK Party seems poised to retain its dominance in the Turkish parliament and hold on to a majority with its alliance partner the Nationalist Movement Party. But what makes these elections truly significant is that the Turkish government will now begin the process of implementing a raft of constitutional amendments approved in a referendum last year.

Those amendments give Turkey an executive presidency. Under the new arrangement, Erdogan can stand for a third presidential term when his current tenure finishes in 2023. The office of the Prime Minister will be abolished and executive powers transferred to the President. The President will now get to appoint vice-presidents, ministers, judges and bureaucrats. He will also make the national budget, have the power to dissolve parliament, issue executive decrees and impose emergency. In short, most important powers will be concentrated in the Erdogan presidency.

This centralisation of power in Turkish politics has alarmed opposition political parties, human rights groups and Turkey’s western allies. But Erdogan remains hugely popular among large sections of the Turkish electorate, especially with the new middle class who have experienced meteoric economic growth over the last decade and a half. Indeed, Erdogan’s mix of religious assertion and economic growth has created a substantial Turkish constituency in his favour. However, this has also been accompanied by rising authoritarianism with dissenters being silenced, opposition leaders being jailed and journalists being targeted. Things took an even more autocratic turn after the failed coup attempt against the Erdogan regime in 2016 which was blamed on supporters of Turkish cleric Fethullah Gulen, who lives in self-imposed exile in the US. A state of emergency was proclaimed and tens of thousands were arrested and purged by the government.

In the run up to the latest election, Erdogan’s message was continuity. He asked the Turkish people for their vote so that he could enhance stability and continue the economic growth that had made so many Turks prosperous. And the majority of Turkey’s people seem to have bought into his promise. But what is happening in Turkey today is part of a larger global trend where the western democratic model is losing its sheen and the authoritarian-yet-economically-successful model is gaining currency. And at the heart of this battle are individual freedoms and liberal values. Questions are being asked as to how much of these do we really need in lieu of order, stability and economic growth. And given the rise of right-wing populism in the US and Europe itself, authoritarian dispensations appear to be gaining an upper hand.

Turkey under Erdogan is a classic example of this. But why have things come to this pass? And it’s here that we come to the realisation that western nations, despite being champions of liberal values, created an international system that essentially downgraded those countries that weren’t beholden to them politically, economically or militarily. So in this scheme of things, dictators and autocrats could get western support as long as they were subservient to western powers. However, if a country wanted to operate on an independent, alternative system, it would be downgraded and hectored by the western order.

This somewhat hypocritical approach is the reason that countries like Turkey are turning their backs on the western order and forging their own path. Remember, Turkey has long wanted to be a part of the European Union. But accession talks have come to a standstill with the EU now saying that Ankara is moving further away from the bloc. The lesson here is this: There’s nothing wrong with liberal values – we indeed need them – but a western international system created to control other nations in the garb of liberal values will eventually implode if those nations close the economic gap and start asserting themselves for a different arrangement. That’s precisely what we are witnessing in the world today. And western right-wing populism is only aiding this process of de-construction.