What I Got Wrong, 2013 Edition
December 30, 2013 § 4 Comments
As it’s the end of the year, it’s time to revisit my 12 months of screw-ups (last year’s mea culpa is here). There don’t seem to be as many big ones this year as last year, but that is not a function of my improving analysis and is rather a function of my increasingly neglectful blogging habits; last year I wrote 276 posts, this year only 65. Thankfully for all of you though, there’s still plenty of material for you to use in heaping scorn upon my head. Here are some of the lowlights.
Israeli-Palestinian peace talks: On February 13, I wrote a post entitled “The Prospects For Real Peace Talks” in which I downplayed the idea that Israel would enter into substantive talks with the Palestinians. I didn’t think the makeup of what I expected to be the new Israeli coalition government would allow for real negotiations to take place, and I wrote, “even if Tzipi Livni brings Hatnua into the government nobody should be getting their hopes up too high for a big diplomatic push on the horizon.” We can debate whether the current talks are going to lead anywhere real, but certainly the process is taking place and there have been enough signs that the talks have been substantive and are going well that this call was wrong on my part.
Erdoğan’s relative reasonableness: This seems destined to become a permanently recurring theme, as a similar prediction made this list last year too. Last year it was about Erdoğan realizing that his interests should override his harsh rhetoric on Israel, and this year it was about Erdoğan realizing that his interests should override his harsh stance toward the Gezi protestors. In trying to figure out how Gezi was going to resolve itself, I wrote on June 7, “Erdoğan does not want to back down, but my instincts tell me that as he is reminded of just how much his popularity depends on the economy and as he faces the prospect of losing the bid for the 2020 Turkish Olympics, he will try to come up with some sort of solution to end the chaos in the streets without having to go so far as to issue a formal full-blown apology. The fact that there is no opposition party poised to take advantage of the situation makes backing down slightly easier for him to do, and even Erdoğan understands just how crucial it is for his and his party’s longterm political future to make sure the Turkish economy keeps humming along. Only the prospect of serious economic damage will get him to back down, since giving in to the protestors in any way is completely anathema to his general philosophy and outlook. How long it will take for him to get to this point is way beyond my prognostication skills, but I’d be surprised if he doesn’t get there at one point or another.”
Oops. Erdoğan did not ease up on his rhetoric in any measurable way, and he in fact actually became increasingly harsher and waited for the protests’ momentum to peter out over time, which it did. Eleven days after my prediction, I was forced to write another post dealing with Erdoğan’s even more over-the-top responses to Gezi, as the prospect of economic losses clearly had not moved him. It’s worth remembering now as the corruption scandal is raging around him, since unlike last year, this time I really have learned my lesson. The only way Erdoğan is backing down this time, economic crisis be damned, is if his party forces him to do so by default in replacing him.
Bibi’s position in Likud: I don’t know why I am so insistent on this point, but every few months I seem to write a post predicting trouble on the horizon for Netanyahu within Likud to the point that he will be split the party or be ousted. While I am going to stubbornly insist that events will at some point vindicate my point of view, they haven’t yet. On June 27 in a post called “The Likud Bell Is Tolling For Bibi” I ran through some of Netanyahu’s recent troubles and then denigrated an op-ed my Mati Tuchfeld in which he predicted that Netanyahu could retake the party pretty much any time he wanted. I wrote, “I think this is a bad misreading of the situation that does not take into account just how much things have changed. Likud members used to venerate their prime minister, but at last year’s Likud convention, Netanyahu was being disparaged left and right in a way that had never occurred before. In addition, much like the younger generation of Congressional Republicans here, folks like Danon have little desire to stand on tradition and do not venerate Netanyahu, and are not going to “fall at his feet” just because he wishes it….There is a new coterie of deputy ministers and up and coming backbenchers who not only do not like or trust Netanyahu, they don’t feel as if they owe him anything. He did not mentor them and they got to where they are now via the Likud primary, which Netanyahu now wants to get rid of, and so they are not going to back him just because he asks. And unlike a year ago, they are no longer revolutionaries and they speak for a larger percentage of the party.”
While my assessment of the dynamic was correct, my assessment of Netanyahu’s grip on the party and power to influence outcomes was not. Earlier this month, three proposed Likud constitutional amendments whose aim was to weaken Netanyahu were withdrawn under pressure before they could even be brought up for a vote. It seems clear that the new deputy ministers do not like or trust Netanyahu a great deal, but it seems equally clear that Netanyahu is still very much in control of the party and is not going anywhere.
I’m sure there is more, and please feel free to point out any other things that I got egregiously or embarrassingly wrong this year. Here’s hoping to a great 2014.
Turkey’s House of Cards Tumbles Down
June 12, 2013 § 6 Comments
The AKP was elected in 2002, and in the decade that it has been in power under the direction of Prime Minister Erdoğan, it has risen to enormous heights. The AKP has received credit for the Turkish economy taking off, Turkey has been viewed by many (whether appropriately or not, and I am on record as voting for not) as a model for Arab countries, and Erdoğan and Foreign Minister Davutoğlu have been frequently and repeatedly lauded as brilliant and innovative thinkers. Whether any of this was correct or accurate at the time is beside the point; what mattered was the perception that Turkey under Erdoğan and his acolytes was, as Foreign Policy put it in 2011, “a regional powerhouse” with “a level of influence in the Middle East it hasn’t had since the collapse of the Ottoman Empire.” Particularly when it came to the Arab Spring, Turkey was seen as the clear regional winner, having avoided any upheaval while touting its version of electoral democracy and pushing an image of itself as an indispensable bridge between Europe and the Middle East and the lynchpin of stability in the region. All the while, Turkey attracted billions of dollars in foreign capital and talked of making Istanbul a global financial center on par with New York and London, opened embassies and consulates all over Africa, massively increased trade with Arab countries, and became America’s go-to regional partner. All of this took a decade, and in the span of just ten days Erdoğan has destroyed an image that took ten years to painstakingly build.
Last month the Center for Strategic Research, which is a think tank affiliated with the Turkish Foreign Ministry, published what it called a conceptual map of Turkish foreign policy under the AKP. It is a 35 page attempt to define what it sees as important foreign policy concepts and terms used by the AKP, and it is simply stunning in its complete lack of self-awareness. In fact, if I didn’t know any better, I would swear that it was not a real report but rather a parody. To take one of my favorite entries, “rhythmic diplomacy” is defined thusly: “Although it has not found an exact conceptual equivalence in international relations theory, rhythmic diplomacy is a specific style of foreign policy practiced in Turkey. It is a tactical activity that envisages simultaneously and harmoniously using diplomacy in different fields.” In case you are still confused, there is a quote from Davutoğlu purporting to explain it. “What is meant by rhythm is the co-existence of mobility and harmony. If there is mobility but not harmony it might lead to chaos. Unnecessary leaps might bring along unnecessary risks. However, if you have rhythm but no mobility than you will not make any progress. There needs to be mobility as well. Yet, if you desire for the perfect harmony and wait for it there will be no mobility.” Confused? You should be, although this combination of arrogant assertiveness and meaningless pablum is what Davutoğlu has ridden to widespread international acclaim and a reputation for unparalleled brilliance.
Other gems include lines like, “Being an order-building actor has been said to be one of the methodological macro-level objectives of foreign policy in the AK Party era.” Or asserting that Turkey has successfully pursued a win-win strategy when it comes to Cyprus. Or describing Turkey as a “wise country” which “is listened to on global matters, who predicts incidents in advance, takes precautions against these, and produces solutions for them.” Or the fact that despite the sheer volume of self-serving nonsense contained in its pages, the very first term defined in the paper is self-perception. A couple of weeks ago, some good friends – who are all veteran Turkey analysts – and I got a good chuckle out of mocking the report, but just stop for a moment and reflect upon how even more insane this stuff sounds in light of what is going on in Taksim, John F. Kennedy Avenue in Ankara, and other places around Turkey where the police are wreaking havoc on protestors and civilians of all stripes. Once Christiane Amanpour and Richard Engel are reporting live from Istanbul in gas masks while the world watches the Turkish police storm Taksim Square on the orders of the government – and after promising not to touch any of the protestors in Gezi Park, no less – your claim to be some sort of exceptionally wise country and model state is pretty much destroyed.
Perception matters a great deal in world politics, but in Turkey’s case perception has been even more important, as it fueled Turkey as a figurative growth stock all the while masking some very serious problems. As should now be clear to everyone, Turkish democracy is not nearly as robust as the government wanted the world to believe. Turkey under Erdoğan has had a real problem with creeping authoritarianism that is looking a lot less creeping every day. And yes, the problem is authoritarianism and not Islamism. This has been a recurring theme for me, as lots of people have a hair trigger when it comes to any action on the part of the AKP that has a whiff of Islamist rationale behind it while glossing over the much larger issue, which is garden variety autocratic and illiberal behavior.
On a related note, Michael Rubin somehow accused Aaron Stein and me of “dismiss[ing] the erosion of liberty in order to stay on the correct side of political correctness” because we interpret Erdoğan’s alcohol bill as more a problem of authoritarian instincts than a problem of Islamism, and says that since the protests have started – which Rubin implies are being driven primarily by the alcohol bill – “there has not been subsequent introspection about why they were so anxious to dismiss a repression which so many Turks so clearly felt and which so many now protest against.” First, if Rubin genuinely believes that the protestors in the streets are primarily motivated by an alleged Islamist turn by Erdoğan and the AKP, then I have serious doubts about whether he has actually spoken with anyone in Turkey over the last two weeks. The alcohol bill is certainly a factor in these protests, but it is one factor of many, and anger over a majoritarian theory of governing, mistreatment of minorities, crony capitalism, rampant over-development in Istanbul, and most importantly police cracking heads in the service of clearing environmental protestors out of Gezi Park have absolutely nothing to do with backlash against Islamism. I’d urge Rubin to read today’s post from Zeynep Tufekci, who has spent days interviewing Gezi protestors and has catalogued their complaints, which have nothing to do with religion or Islamism. Second, if Rubin thinks I have dismissed Turkish repression, it is glaringly obvious that he has never read a thing I have written. He might want to try this or this or this, or perhaps he might want to check out “subsequent introspection” such as this widely read piece. *Deep breath* And now back to your regularly scheduled programming.
Turkish economic growth has been driven by foreign borrowing and increasing reliance on energy imports from Russia and Iran, which have led to an over-leveraged economy and a structural current account deficit, neither of which have any prospect of abating in the near future. There is a civil war taking place right across Turkey’s southern border, and not only is it not going to end any time soon, the Turkish military is in such a sorry state as to be unable to respond to the downing of its aircraft or to stop the Syrian military from shooting across to the Turkish side. These are all problems that have existed in one form or another for some time, but now that Erdoğan has decided to go postal on his own citizens, it is going to be a lot more difficult for Turkey to paper them over.
Turkey is about to see its foreign financing disappear as the perception of Turkey as an island of stability goes up in a cloud of tear gas smoke. The enormous building projects designed to attract the 2020 Olympics are now going to be used solely by Istanbul residents, since not only will Turkey not get the Olympics but regular tourists are going to stay away in droves. Erdoğan and Davutoğlu can also forget about hosting various foreign conferences, as Western countries are going to elect to forego the optics of meeting in a country where protestors are being dubbed as marginal terrorists. The next time that Davutoğlu insists that Turkey isn’t a model for anyone while actually implying that Turkey is indeed a regional exemplar for Arab states to emulate, who is going to take him seriously? The next time Erdoğan crows about how the European economy needs Turkey more than Turkey needs Europe, who isn’t going to dismiss him out of hand? What Turkish diplomats are going to have the gall to seriously talk about Turkish democracy as a genuine success story? All of those issues that Turkey was able to largely keep under wraps by painting a portrait of a country on the rise, a country with a vibrant economy and a vibrant democracy and a vibrant diplomacy, are now about to be exposed to the world.
I wrote last week that Erdoğan isn’t going anywhere and that these protests are not going to dislodge him, and I am confident that is still the case. When this is all over, Turkey is still going to be stuck with its prime minister, for better or worse. But that does not mean that what is taking place is inconsequential; indeed, the long run consequences of the last few days are potentially devastating. Erdoğan has taken the conscious decision to pursue a strategy of solidifying his base and pitting it against everyone else in an us-versus-them rhetorical battle. He has dismissed the people in the streets as marginals, hoodlums, foreign agents, international provocateurs, parasitic financiers, and any other derogatory term that he can come up with. He is quite clearly trying to mobilize his supporters by acting as if his opponents are attempting to carry out a civilian coup, and by repeatedly refusing to stand down and instead upping the ante with tear gas, truncheons, water cannons, and endless tone deaf insults, he is beginning to tear the country apart. There are numerous cleavages in Turkish society that run along fault lines of religious-secular, rural-urban, conservative-liberal, rich-poor, and Sunni-Alevi-Kurdish, to name just a few. Some of these have been more under wraps than others, but this brings them all to the surface in a way that will be difficult to undo. After the government’s over the top and appalling response to the protests, the AKP won’t be able to command half of the votes anymore come the next election, and neither will it be able to run on the economy after what I think is about to happen. What this means is more of an appeal to people’s base instincts, more nationalist rhetoric, more pitting one group against another. I think we are in for a return to a distinct past flavor of Turkish politics, and not one that has ever ended well. Turkey’s house of cards has fallen down, and everyone can now see what Erdoğan has been holding.
When An Immovable Object Meets An Unstoppable Force
June 7, 2013 § 8 Comments
Prime Minister Erdoğan returned home yesterday from his trip to North Africa and immediately erased any hope that might have existed that he has been chastened by the protests rocking Turkey. He was met at the airport by a few hundred (or a few thousand, depending on who is doing the counting) supporters whom the AKP had bussed in to greet his plane (along with others who got there via metro and tram lines that were mysteriously kept open after hours), and the PM was not in a particularly conciliatory mood. In a fiery speech, he called for the protests to end immediately, blamed shadowy foreign interests and international bankers for stirring up trouble, and said that the stock market dip was caused by speculators and the “interest rate lobby” while his supporters chanted that they were going to “crush” Taksim Square. This stands in stark contrast to President Gül, who continues to send signals indicating his displeasure with the government’s response to the Gezi protests. It seems that Erdoğan, however, is beginning a campaign to mobilize his supporters to start showing up in the streets, and has no intention of backing down, admitting real errors were made, or apologizing for the police response to the protests. He is rather gearing up for a showdown and counting on the fact that the AKP still has enormous support, so much so that it would almost certainly be reelected for a fourth term were elections held today.
None of this should be surprising. Erdoğan is supremely confident, not prone to self-reflection or course correction, and has surrounded himself with a coterie of yes men who either cannot or will not stand up to him. He never admits mistakes and seems to be genuinely offended and incensed that protestors are committing what he views as illegitimate criticism and illegal acts against the government, and there is nothing in his nature or his track record to suggest that he is suddenly going to become more diplomatic and less Manichean in his outlook. To Erdoğan, the government is unqualifiedly in the right and the protestors are unqualifiedly in the wrong, and the fact that he has begun resorting to nationalist rhetoric about foreign powers and speculative bankers and keeping up his lines about terrorists in the streets show that he is purposely appealing to polarizing cleavages in order to strengthen his base of support and that he is also continuing to misread what is actually driving the protests. Expecting him to back down given this mindset is bound to lead to extremely frustrated expectations. Erdoğan is convinced of his cause, and almost nothing is going to change his mind.
On the other side though, there are some serious structural economic conditions that are soon going to make Erdoğan’s stance more difficult to maintain. Erdoğan’s bombast has been very bad, to say the least, for the Turkish economy. During his press conference in Tunisia yesterday, the Turkish stock market dropped 4.5% and bond yields rose 60 basis points literally while Erdoğan was speaking – which this graphic does a better job of illustrating visually than any numbers will do – and overall Turkey’s benchmark index is down 15% since the end of May. Bond yields are now at 8%, and by some estimates $1 billion in capital outflows left the country in the last week. This is not at crisis level yet, but the government is playing a dangerous game given how heavily it relies on foreign capital. The Turkish economy relies on outside short-term loans comprising 25% of GDP and the Turkish economic miracle has been driven by hot money. In addition, Turkey’s current account deficit is driven by energy imports, which is not bound to change anytime soon, and the only good way of even making a dent in the deficit is by increasing exports, which will be far more difficult if the unrest continues as it contributes to a credit crunch and the drying up of foreign financing. The only reasons the current account deficit has not been a bigger problem is because of Turkey’s sustained economic growth, which had already slowed down in 2012 and 2013, and certainly what is taking place right now is not going to help matters. If foreign investors become too spooked, Turkey will potentially face a fiscal crisis that will erase many of the economic gains made under the AKP.
This is important for deeper political reasons as well. Despite all the talk of the AKP as an Islamist party that appeals to a socially conservative populace, it is important to remember that the AKP ran in 2002 on an economic platform of which the primary plank was joining the EU. Many of those socially conservative Anatolian voters cast reelection votes for the AKP in 2007 and 2011 because the Turkish economy has taken off under this government, and while the values aspect of the AKP is appealing to them, it is the economic growth and improved living standards that are most important. The reason for the AKP’s unprecedented vote totals – and remember that the AKP has gained an additional 15% of the vote from 2002 to 2011 – is because more people are more well off, and those social conservatives have been joined by a fair share of more liberal and more secular voters who vote for the AKP on economics alone. Erdoğan is counting on the 50% of the country who, as he repeatedly reminds everyone, voted for him less than two years ago to keep on supporting him as he takes a hardline against the people in the streets, but if he thinks that all of these voters are solidly in the AKP camp come economic hell or high water, he is in for a shock. Nationalist rhetoric will only take him so far in this situation, and as Erdoğan raises the stakes of confrontation while the economy begins to teeter, he is creating a potentially explosive situation.
It is tough to see which side is going to give here. Erdoğan does not want to back down, but my instincts tell me that as he is reminded of just how much his popularity depends on the economy and as he faces the prospect of losing the bid for the 2020 Turkish Olympics, he will try to come up with some sort of solution to end the chaos in the streets without having to go so far as to issue a formal full-blown apology. The fact that there is no opposition party poised to take advantage of the situation makes backing down slightly easier for him to do, and even Erdoğan understands just how crucial it is for his and his party’s longterm political future to make sure the Turkish economy keeps humming along. Only the prospect of serious economic damage will get him to back down, since giving in to the protestors in any way is completely anathema to his general philosophy and outlook. How long it will take for him to get to this point is way beyond my prognostication skills, but I’d be surprised if he doesn’t get there at one point or another.
Should Turkey Host The Olympics?
August 16, 2012 § 3 Comments
The bid to host the 2020 Summer Olympics has been whittled down to three cities – Tokyo, Madrid, and Istanbul – and Turkey has been lobbying particularly hard to be named as the host country. Writing in the National Review, Michael Rubin argues that Istanbul should not be selected to host the Olympics, punctuating his point with the remarkable statement that “awarding Istanbul the games could do more to undercut the Olympic spirit than any choice since Berlin in 1936.” The reason that Rubin thinks that holding the Olympics in Istanbul would be such an affront to the Olympic spirit is because he believes Turkey’s bid is contingent upon its status as a Muslim majority country and is hence an appeal to religious parochialism. Rubin contends that Prime Minister Erdoğan views the potential Istanbul games as the “Muslim Olympics” and states that what he terms “religious affirmative action” should not trump other problems with the Istanbul bid such as Turkey’s lack of press freedom, its occupation of Cyprus, and security problems due to the PKK.
Rubin is a serious scholar, but this is a laughable argument built upon a host of misleading and shoddy evidence. Rubin’s central claim is that Turkey views hosting the Olympics as a religious statement, and his evidence for this is a remark Erdoğan made while in London for the recent summer games complaining that no Muslim majority country has ever hosted the Olympics and that the Istanbul 2020 logo features religious symbols by incorporating mosques and minarets. These two facts lead Rubin to conclude that awarding the Olympics to Istanbul would be to “assign the Olympics on the basis of religion.” Looking at Erdoğan’s remarks, however, and inferring that he is making a religious argument, rather than pointing out the possibility of bias, is a stretch. The full quote from Erdoğan, which Rubin truncates, is, “No country with a majority of Muslim population has ever hosted the Olympics. People will ask ‘Why? What is missing?’” He also said during the same interview, “This is the third time for London, Madrid was the host twice. Tokyo has hosted three games. Istanbul has bid to host the Olympics five times but has never been handed the rights. This is not a fair approach, and I shared this situation with Rogge.” People can infer whatever they like from this, but it seems pretty clear to me that Erdoğan is not rooting Turkey’s bid in religion, but rather bringing up issues of unfairness in past bid decisions, one of which is the fact that Muslim countries have always been passed over. Rubin also dredges up an 18 year old quote from Erdoğan about his being a “servant of shari’a” which I suppose means that the U.S. should never have been awarded the 2002 Winter Games in Salt Lake City since President Bush reportedly said that God speaks through him and that God wanted him to run for president, so those games must have been an explicit affirmation of Christianity in Rubin’s view.
Rubin’s argument about Istanbul’s logo is problematic as well. Anyone who has ever been to Istanbul will immediately recognize the 2020 logo as an attempt to approximate the iconic Istanbul skyline. Are there lots of minarets in Istanbul? There sure are, but that hardly means that a drawing of some of Istanbul’s most famous features is an overtly religious symbol. You will also notice the Galata Tower prominently featured in the logo, which was built by Genoese traders who named it the Tower of Christ and has never had any Muslim religious significance or been used as a mosque, but you wouldn’t know that from Rubin’s characterization. The logo is an attempt to capitalize on the fact that Istanbul’s historic structures make it instantly recognizable, and is no different than the previous London Olympics logo that featured Big Ben and the Houses of Parliament. This is all the more evident in light of the fact that Istanbul’s bid organizers have purposely structured their bid around incorporating Istanbul’s historic landmarks into the Olympic venues, so the logo is just an extension of that strategy. The fact that Istanbul’s logo has minarets is incidental, not any type of coded religious message.
Rubin’s other primary argument is that Turkey is a bad choice for the Olympics because of its various issues with democracy and human rights. Certainly nobody can accuse me of being unaware of the many problems with Turkish democracy, but considering that the 2008 Summer Games were in China and that the 2014 Winter Games are in Russia, this line of reasoning rings hollow. If you are going to make an argument that the Olympics should only ever be held in liberal democracies, go right ahead, but Rubin does not make that argument. Instead, he is holding Turkey to a standard that does not exist for Olympic bids, and the credibility of this line of reasoning really breaks down in light of the fact that he unfavorably compares Turkey to Russia and China, both of which are unquestionably less democratic than Turkey. The assertion that Turkey should be disqualified because “for the Olympics to be a showcase, journalists must be allowed to ply their trade freely” with the unspoken implication that reporters from foreign countries will be jailed should they write unfavorably about the Istanbul Olympics is too silly to even deserve a comment. Additionally, the war against the PKK in southeastern Turkey is no reason to disqualify Istanbul (in Turkey’s northwest corner) on security grounds, and this is particularly so given London just pulling off an incident-free games despite serious worries about jihadist threats. The one place where Rubin is on solid ground is his concern over corruption in the construction industry, but eight years seems like plenty of time to ensure that Turkey’s Olympic venues and tourist lodgings are up to code.
In short, it is difficult to take Rubin’s argument about the Olympics at face value. Turkey has plenty of problems, but as the issues Rubin brings up have never disqualified any other country, including places like China and Russia that are far worse serial abusers of political and civil liberties, I fail to see why Turkey should be a special exception. The comparison to Berlin in 1936 is also outrageously inappropriate, and if Rubin really thinks that awarding the Olympics to Istanbul would undercut the Olympic spirit more than any other venue since then, I would love to read a more detailed exploration of how Moscow in 1980 or Beijing in 2008 better exemplified Olympic values than Istanbul today.
