Where is Turkey going? (1)

Denion Meidani*

History, as important as it is alarming, is happening in Turkey.

At the center of it all is the fate of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, who has presided over the Turkish political scene for over a decade. As head of state, he has considerably changed both the country and the whole region. But increasingly, the question must be asked: is his increasingly authoritarian rule nearing an end?

This is still unclear but after concentrating power, Erdoğan has put nearly every branch of the Turkish state under his influence and command. Until recently, many observers, including Erdoğan himself, thought that nothing would stop him from accumulating as much power as he wanted. Increasingly, Erdoğan reminds this observer of Phaethon, the character from Greek mythology who thought he could ride Apollo's chariot with the sun inside it. Instead, this reckless boy of the sun caused chaos down on earth -- sometimes fires or floods, other times ice storms -- until eventually Zeus grew tired of him and knocked him out of the sky with a thunderclap.

A mega-scandal of corruption

Since Dec. 17, 2013, stories of government corruption have become commonplace in the Turkish media. These stories have reshaped the political scene in the country. Initially, high-level ministers within Erdoğan's Justice and Development Party (AKP) were implicated in a vast corruption scheme involving their families. As more news has come out, the prime minister and his son have been implicated, too.

As appalling as the charges leveled against the government were, Erdoğan's arrogant response has been even more disturbing. In trying to prevent the investigation from proceeding, he resorted to authoritarian tactics that threaten the essence of Turkish democracy. His moves have directly impacted the balance of power within the Turkish state. Despite large domestic protests and loud international criticism, Erdoğan seems intent on weakening some of Turkey's democratic institutions until they perish. Turkey, which could have once served as a model for democratic values in the region, is at risk of lapsing into the kind of state ruled by a lone strong man, and dispensing with any pretenses of democracy.

Meanwhile, in a great irony, the government is labeling the calls for democracy and rule of law -- many of which emanate from so-called Gülenists -- a coup d'état. They argue that their autocratic reforms are justified in eliminating the Gülenist network (of Fethullah Gülen) that is, according to the Erdoğanists, embedded in every cell of the state.

Some coercive anti-democratic measures

In response to the corruption revelations, the government has taken extraordinary measures to avoid letting a full investigation take place. Ministers were replaced in Erdoğan's cabinet. Over 1,000 policemen involved in the investigation were fired; so were the public prosecutor and the assistant prosecutors involved in the case -- including the prosecutor who issued an arrest warrant for Erdoğan's son. Thousands more policemen and government officials -- from İstanbul and Ankara to İzmir -- have been “reassigned.”

But Erdoğan wasn't even finished with the extreme measures: he dissolved the corruption investigation unit at the Treasury and began a witch hunt within the AKP, purging anyone who dared to criticize him or asked for transparency.

Despite the general consensus, Erdoğan has actually been against the sharing of power since he ascended to the Prime Ministry. He routinely interfered in private business to gain greater influence and, even before the Dec. 17 investigation, had moved to limit judicial autonomy, especially when its judgments went against his personal and political interests -- be it about the privatization of state business or the new constitutional measures. Since the scandal broke, he has doubled down on consolidating his power, putting enormous pressure on Turkey's president, Abdullah Gül, to follow his example. The prime minister has drawn up legislation that expands the executive branch's power, re-organized the National Intelligence Organization (MİT) to place it under his command and drawn the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors (HSYK) under executive control.

Furthermore, Erdoğan's government has approved drastic measures that restrict the information that can be gathered in this mega-scandal's investigation. With a special directive, the information from the İstanbul Police Department is utterly closed to journalists and everyone who asks for information. Also, every single policeman is obliged to inform officials in Ankara before a felony investigation starts -- a real absurdity for every banana republic! And all of this has been undertaken in the name of “reforms”!

They've used other measures, too. They've dramatically increased Internet censorship and phone calls reveal that the prime minister has personally influenced how major news groups report the news. The government pressures and threatens journalists who criticize these anti-democratic steps. For the second year in a row, Turkey has the highest number of imprisoned journalists according to the Committee to Protect Journalists (CPJ), surpassing Russia, China and Ukraine -- even Syria and Iran! These actions have failed the Turkish people's aspirations for integration into the EU.

It's ironic, because in the first years of Erdoğan's rule, his government strived more than any previous government to encourage Turkey's membership into the EU, culminating in 2005's opening of accession negotiations. Back then, he strongly supported this process, even using it as a justification to finally marginalize the military on the political scene. But since then, the relationship with the EU has grown worse and worse, especially after the constitutional referendum of 2010, which helped Erdoğan consolidate power.

After years and years of aggressive authoritarianism, during May of 2013, Turkey's citizens were fed up. The resulting Gezi Park protests shook the country to its core. Yet despite this, the government only cracked down even more, leading many columnists to speculate that Erdoğan was never serious about EU membership. They've argued that his actual design was far more Orwellian -- the construction of a new empire to rival China and the US. This became even more evident when the prime minister asked Vladimir Putin to let Turkey be a member of the Shanghai Cooperation Organization (SCO).

Turkey is far from being a model in the region

The US and EU have tried for a long time to create the idea of Turkey as being a success story in the Middle East, meaning it would be a model for the whole region. This was supposed to show that a Western-style democracy with a separation of power and balance of control could prosper and act as a stabilizing force for the region's other countries. Actually, these "wishes" had already gone pale, including the hope that Turkey could be an example for countries post-Arab Spring or for developing countries in central Asia and the Caucasus. Nowadays, Turkey is more like the Egypt of Hosni Mubarak than a country aspiring to enter the EU. Erdoğan's Turkey is against a broad, well-educated middle class; it has repeatedly cracked down on businesses it deemed too liberal. More disturbingly, it supported Mohammed Morsi in 2013 and helped arm the rebel fundamentalist groups in Syria.

Seen from this point of view, the international role of Turkey is now on the verge of collapse. Despite domestic displeasure and strong international condemnation, there still isn't a well organized opposition in Turkey that is capable of combating Erdoğan's autocratic power; this favors him and disfavors Turkey. Even last summer's massive protests didn't manage to form a clear political direction. Neither the Kemalists of the Republican People's Party (CHP) nor the pro-Kurdish Peace and Democracy Party (BDP) were able to utilize the broad displeasure to form a united coalition. They couldn't even arrange a simple gentleman's agreement before the recent elections. Furthermore, there's no sign that any new political opposition will be created anytime soon. The best hope, at this point, seems to be that an opposition front within the AKP separates and helps the other opposition parties consolidate. Unfortunately, when looking at Turkey's modern political history, there are few examples of politicians or parties displaying the necessary courage to create such a compromise party.

Is Turkey really a story of success, economically speaking?

Compared to many other countries during the global crisis, Turkey could be considered a success story. Actually, since Erdoğan came into power, gross domestic product (GDP) has grown, on average, by 5 percent a year. Foreign direct investments (FDI) rose distinctly. Inflation was low and the banking sector was consolidated. Turkey's middle-class saw unprecedented growth. The support program instituted by the US Federal Reserve to supply international markets with billions of US dollars every month made it possible for the Turkish economy -- US-dollar based -- to experience a new era of development. Short-term investments, supported by this program, made it possible for GDP to grow 9 percent during 2010–2011 before it decreased to 2.2 percent growth in 2012 and 3 percent growth in 2013.

What was the reason for this decline? In fact, the scandals, conflicts and undemocratic laws severely affected the economy and the Turkish lira. Furthermore, if the next logical step happens, big investors will move away and with their investments suspended, there's a real risk the country will fall into a recession.

According to the Brookings Institute, what the investigations have revealed is that companies close to Erdoğan have benefited from the huge development projects, leaving little room for others, not to mention fair competition. In addition, the signals for the deterioration in the economy relate also to the perception on the actual changes that eliminate the separation of powers and are touching rights and freedom in the country, and violating the climate of business in Turkey. Such a climate is not fertile for investment.

Furthermore, such problems have come at the worst time for the Turkish economy -- just when the Federal Reserve decided to withdraw its support program and greatly reduce the number of bonds purchased, considering the measure is no longer necessary for the recovered American economy. This decision, among other things, will cause the growth of the US dollar and bank interests in the US, attracting more investors and investments there. Its effects are expected to be visibly felt in Turkey, where this program had many beneficiaries -- especially now, when the Turkish economy is more vulnerable and depends mostly on foreign loans. With the closure of this program, the capital circulating in Turkey will "dry up," leaving behind an economy that depends on free loans and a deficit of more than $60 billion. Those businesses and consumers that have foreign currency loans will find themselves in front of a mountain of debts.

Also, by the end of 2013, the volume of bank loans had surpassed $450 billion (a 100 percent growth since 2010); meanwhile, savings are at their lowest level in the last 30 years. Much of the income from this period of growth fell into the wrong hands or was mischievously consumed (i.e., massive infrastructure projects), infringing on the basic rules of the market.

Another blow to the economy is that over the last 10 years, structural reforms in support of the economy are way behind and have somewhat failed. Even the growing population of Turkey, which has traditionally been an economic advantage, is no longer; on the contrary, 25-year-olds in Turkey have only been educated for an average of six-and-a-half years, according to the Human Development Index (HDI) for 2013. Another disadvantage is the low percentage of women participating in the labor force.

In 2011, the IMF warned that without reforms in education and the workplace, without more investments in technology and without fair and equal gender balance in the workplace, Turkey would struggle to grow its GDP by more than 3 percent per year. A similar concern was articulated by Chairman of the Turkish Chamber of Commerce M. Yılmaz. According to him, Turkey has entered dangerous waters. He thinks the law is not as absolute and independent as before; furthermore, the mechanisms of justice have ceased to act according to European standards while the independence of regulatory institutions has been severely damaged. He also raised his voice against political pressure on businesses and media, the penalties and punishments instituted by the police and financial authorities, the sudden changes in the procedures of public procurement, etc. According to him, such a business climate is unacceptable, especially for foreign investments. But, unfortunately, such concerns were called a “betrayal” by Erdoğan. Actually, as we can see today, the Erdonomics' success cycle is failing and Turkey will pay the price without immediate structural reforms on both the business and democratic fronts.

*Denion Meidani is a journalist based in Tirana. This article was published in the MAPO newspaper on March 15, 2014 in Albania and translated and published on fgulen.com on April 4.

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