Svante E. Cornell
Halil Magnus Karaveli
SILK ROAD PAPER October 2008
Turkey in 2023: the Republic at 100
Scenario Three: Return of Military Stewardship
In a third scenario, the tensions between Islamic conservatism and secularism had finally become impossible to contain. The AKP government was emboldened by its ability to defeat the challenge to its power in 2008, and did not bother to take the seculars’ sensibilities into due consideration. A new constitution was tailored, curtailing the power of the Constitutional court and with a redefinition of secularism to imply a greater public role for religion. Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and president Abdullah Gül miscalculated when they assumed that the military would not be able to challenge them; the AKP government was overthrown by the military in 2011, in an intervention reminiscent of the March 9, 1971, memorandum and the February 27, 1997, “postmodern coup” – but with a more pointed threat of a full-scale coup. The Chief of the General staff, Gen. Işık Koşaner, who had struck a staunchly secularist and die-hard nationalist chord in his inauguration speech as new army chief in 2008, had in fact been forced to take pre-emptive action as a coup outside the chain of command threatened.
The conditions in 2011 were markedly different to those of 2007-2008, when the hands of the military had been tied by external and internal factors. The global economic crisis of 2008-2010 had effectively undermined the power of the AKP government, which was no longer seen as being able to offer economic stability and growth. The AKP had also lost much of its international backing. Although the EU had remained supportive of the Turkish Islamic conservatives, it no longer seemed to offer any prospect of membership to Turkey. Thus, for the secular, pro-European voters, therationale for supporting the AKP had disappeared. These were instead increasingly attracted by the neo-nationalism of the opposition Republican People’s party, the CHP. Most importantly, the AKP had lost its backing in the U.S, when it failed to deliver support when the incoming U.S. Administration decided to take action against Iranian nuclear facilities. Indeed, the U.S.-Israeli attack on Iran in 2010 changed the map of the Middle East. With the replacement of the Iranian theocracy by a secular regime in an ensuing popular uprising, the perception of Turkish secularism in the U.S. had changed as well. By then, it had become apparent that “moderate” Islamism did not serve America’s interests, leading to a re-evaluation in the U.S. of the secular alternative for the Middle East.
The extended transitional regime brought in by the military took decisive measures to counter-act the effects of decades of Islamicization. Significantly, the education system was overhauled. Notably, the expansion of the imam schools was checked, and secular alternatives to the attractive schools run by the religious fraternities were created. However, the suspension of democracy exacerbated ethnic tensions. The Kurdish population was increasingly tempted by separatism. Gen. Koşaner, who as new army chief in 2008 had called for giving priority to a military solution to separatism, responded by the use of force, leading to an intensification of conflict that further damaged Turkey’s international standing and tested the unity of the country to its limits, as in the early 1990s. Furthermore, military authoritarianism had the effect of radicalizing the Islamic movement.
