Etiket arşivi: Turkey’s election campaign

Turkey’s “More Than Municipal” Election

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March 18, 2019

At the end of March Turkey will hold municipal elections. However, the ongoing campaign is not about our failed city planning, repairing broken sidewalks and potholed streets.

For the JDP this is an exercise to further consolidate its power. It is running its campaign on a nationalistic platform claiming that the election is about Turkey’s survival. The JDP has won every single election since 2002 and the prospect of losing the popular vote and/or the mayorships of major cities has now become its worst nightmare. President Erdoğan is crisscrossing the country from one end to the other leading his Party’s campaign. This is a novelty of our new “presidential system” approved in the April 2017 constitutional referendum with a very slim margin (51.41 % – 48.59%). In that referendum the JDP lost in all major cities. The Party, as before, relies heavily on religious themes. Its rhetoric is at times threatening and almost always polarizing. Okumaya devam et →

Turkey’s Election Campaign: Clashing Manifestos

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Co-authored with Yusuf Buluç (*)

May 31, 2018

With the publication of political parties’ election declarations Turkey’s election campaign has gathered steam.

In Turkey, political parties’ election declarations/manifestos are much longer than those of Western parties. For example, UK’s Conservative and Unionist Party Manifesto 2017 and Labor Party Manifesto 2017 were 84 and 123 pages respectively. US Democratic and Republican party platforms were even shorter, only 51 and 58 pages.

JDP’s Election Declaration is 360 pages long and those of the Republican People’s Party (RPP) and the Good Party (GP) are 226 and 134 pages respectively. They are so voluminous as to discourage even keen followers from perusing these texts in their entirety. At best, they may serve as speaking notes for campaigning party candidates. Okumaya devam et →