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The Rise of Islamo-Fascism in Turkey
By Taylan Tosun
Source: teleSUR English
January 21, 2015
We have been witnessing the rise of Islamo-Fascism in Turkey in the last few years. Indeed the official ideology of both Turkish state and the governing party AKP is called “Turkish-Islamic synthesis”, which means the exclusion of ethnically non-Turks and religiously non-Sunnite minorities from the public sphere by suppressing the public expression of their identities. In this particular conjuncture in which we live, the so-called “Islamic” aspect of this kind of fascism has gained prominence. And this not without reason: since about 2009-10, Turkey-European Union (EU) relations increasingly deteriorated, Turkey begun to look for new partners in Mideast and soon established strong relations with the dictatorial Gulf States (especially Qatar).
Then it began to sponsor with its new partners the jihadist organizations like Al-Nusra or IS (Islamic State) in the hope of overthrowing Bashar al-Assad regime and thus planned to turn the vast Sunnite regions in Iraq and Syria into its backyard. So these Sunnite regions in Iraq and Syria would be leverage for geopolitical as well as economic power for Turkey.
The second main reason of the rise of Islamo-Fascism in recent years had to do with domestic politics: the ruling party AKP endeavored to consolidate its electoral base and succeeded in this policy. Indeed this is a classic in Turkish politics: when right wing-conservative parties create networks for the distribution of wealth and rent from which only a narrow group of businessmen and followers benefit and large segments of the population can’t take any share, the best way to get out of this impasse is to polarize the society around nationalistic (i.e., Turkish) and religious (Sunnite-Muslim) “values” and “claims”. As the majority of Turkey’s population is Turkish and Sunnite Muslim, this tactic has almost worked mainly due to the lack of a comprehensive popular opposition movement which organizes to improve the life conditions of the poor Turkish and Sunnite people.
Of course there were revolutionary movements, especially during 70’s, which endeavored to make connections with the workers and poors, succeeded to a certain extent and then crushed mercilessly by the 1980 military coup.
Then it began to sponsor with its new partners the jihadist organizations like Al-Nusra or IS (Islamic State) in the hope of overthrowing Bashar al-Assad regime and thus planned to turn the vast Sunnite regions in Iraq and Syria into its backyard. So these Sunnite regions in Iraq and Syria would be leverage for geopolitical as well as economic power for Turkey.
The second main reason of the rise of Islamo-Fascism in recent years had to do with domestic politics: the ruling party AKP endeavored to consolidate its electoral base and succeeded in this policy. Indeed this is a classic in Turkish politics: when right wing-conservative parties create networks for the distribution of wealth and rent from which only a narrow group of businessmen and followers benefit and large segments of the population can’t take any share, the best way to get out of this impasse is to polarize the society around nationalistic (i.e., Turkish) and religious (Sunnite-Muslim) “values” and “claims”. As the majority of Turkey’s population is Turkish and Sunnite Muslim, this tactic has almost worked mainly due to the lack of a comprehensive popular opposition movement which organizes to improve the life conditions of the poor Turkish and Sunnite people.
Of course there were revolutionary movements, especially during 70’s, which endeavored to make connections with the workers and poors, succeeded to a certain extent and then crushed mercilessly by the 1980 military coup.
Full article: https://zcomm.org/znetarticle/the-rise-of-islamo-fascism-in-turkey/