On October 14, more than a dozen scholars of Turkish politics came together at Rice University’s Baker Institute in Houston to discuss issues ranging from identity expression, to political representation, to religious and state authority in contemporary Turkey. In the wake of the July 15 coup attempt, these diverse analyses offer crucial insight into a state that, until recently, was held up as a model of democracy and stability in the region. The authors in this collection contextualize current events with deep roots in Turkish history, complicate the often referenced secular/ religious polarity, and provide much needed nuance to the discourse on the AKP and Erdoğan.
Memos will be posted individually here and collectively as an issue in our POMEPS Studies series.
Good Things Don’t Last Forever: Arab Uprisings and the Turkish Model, Ekrem Karakoc, Department of Political Science Binghamton University (SUNY)
The many faces of Kurdish political representation in Turkey, Sabri Çiftçi, Michael W. Suleiman Chair in Arab and Arab-American Studies, Kansas State University
Foreign fighters from Turkey, Güneş Murat Tezcür, Jalal Talabani Endowed Chair of Kurdish Political Studies, University of Central Florida
The Clash of Islamists: The crisis of the Turkish state and democracy, Sebnem Gumuscu, Middlebury College
AKP’s foreign policy and its party identity, Esen Kirdiş, Rhodes College
Piety, intimacy, and emotions: Political symbolism of the AKP government, Senem Aslan, Bates College
Politics of confinement: Curfews and civilian control in Turkish counterinsurgency, Aysegul Aydin & Cem Emrence, University of Colorado-Boulder, Leiden University
Towards Erdogan and the East: Conspiracies and public perception in post-coup Turkey, Kimberly Guiler, The University of Texas at Austin
Opportunity Missed: Identity Alignment and Turkey’s Kurdish Question, Lisel Hintz, Barnard College
Why did the PKK declare Revolutionary People’s War in July 2015? Şener Aktürk, Koç University, Istanbul
Counting the Uncounted: Measuring the politicization of Kurdish identity in Turkey, Avital Livny, University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign
Women’s representation across national and local office in Turkey, Abdullah Aydogan, Melissa Marschall, and Marwa Shalaby, Rice University’s Baker Institute