Wind in the Islamic sail
International Viewpoint #256 May 1994
THE Turkish municipal elections of 27 March received a great deal of attention in the international press. This was essentially as a result of the Muslim fundamentalist's relative success. Even though this victory, which our correspondent analyses, will have major consequences, the stakes of the elections were not limited to this aspect alone. Indeed, the most important aspect was the clarification of the process of political recomposition currently underway. ERDAL TAN Istanbul, 20 April 1994
T HIRTEEN formations
contested the elections, with nine of them garnering some 25 percent of votes cast. This confirms the extreme fragmentation of political life in the country.
The 1980 coup d'etat led to a breakup of the traditional political system, based on two big parties — one of the centre-right, the other of the centre-left. Since the coup, the centre-right (which had majority support in the country in the 1950s) has been divided into two rival formations which are each other's throats. The Motherland Party (ex-President Özal's ANAP) and the Just Path Party(President Demerel's DYP).
### Division
The bourgeoisie deplores this division and for three years has been calling in vain for a rapprochement and a coalition between these two nearly-identical parties.
The centre-left split into four parts after 1980, giving birth in the early 1980s to the social democratic Populist Party (SHP, currently in a government coalition with the DYP) and the Democratic Left (DSP, of former Prime Minister Ecevit). Then followed the creation of the Republican People's Party (CHP) and the Kurdish nationalist 32
### TURKEY
Democracy Party (DEP), which both left the SHP in 1991.
This extreme fragmentation of political life - which threatens the stability of the bourgeoisie's system of rule - is accompanied by the difficulties in bringing forward a new generation into the ruling elites. This has been highlighted by Özal's death last year, the current President Demirel (who is virtually a retiree) and the retirement of Erdal Inönü from the presidency of the SHP.
One of the central issues of the elections was the settling of the conflict over the leadership of the right-wing, between Prime Minister Ciller (president of the DYP) and Yilmaz (president of the ANAP). The ANAP, which is present above all in the big cities, was favoured by a big bourgeoisie nostalgic for the time of Ozal which it sees as its golden age. The DYP, which has a more rural character, representing the small and medium-sized provincial bourgeosie, is not trusted in this milieu due to its populist tendencies.
It is for this reason that the arrival of Tansu Ciller - a young bourgeois careerist from Istanbul educated on the American model, who has the stated ambition of becoming "Turkey's Iron Lady" — at the head of the DYP was encouraged and greeted with joy in Istanbul business circles. They hoped she would incarnate Özal's liberal reformism, as opposed to Demirel's prudent and populist conservatism.
But Ciller's record in office, where she has been for less than a year, was soon to disappoint her supporters in the media and the big bourgeoisie. Helped along by their male chauvinist attitude, they quickly called her incompetent and re-directed their support to the ANAP and Mazut Yimaz, Ozal's young succes
But the election battle produced a confused result with no winners. During the campaign, neither of the two forces stood out in relation to the other, nor did either manage to push ahead of the other in the election results themselves. Only 200 thousand votes seperated the two the DYP polling 21.5 percent, and the ANAP about 21 percent).
Nevertheless, these results are a victory, even if only psychological, for DYP leader Ciller over the ANAP's Yilmaz. Indeed, in spite of polls which pointed to an electoral defeat, Ciller managed to put up unexpected resistance, even though support for the DYP fell by about 5 percent compared to the 1991 legislative elections.
While this 5 percent fall in the governing DYP's support may seem normal - given the crisis of democracy and a near 50 percent devaluation in the value of the Turkish pound — the 3 percent drop in votes for the ANAP (in relation to the 1991 elections) is much more difficult to explain, except as a result of its inability to present itself as a credible governmental alternative.
Political manoeuvres will therefore have to take the place of a clear verdict from the results of the election. But the problem remains for the bourgeoisie, which has still not found a charismatic and powerful leader of the Mendares, Demirel and Ozal variety.
The situation is even more confusing for the left, which has suffered a major defeat. The combined vote of the three parties (SHP, DSP and CHP) hit a historic low at 27 percent. It was at 31.5 percent in 1991 and 37.7 percent in 1989. The SHP remains the strongest left-wing party with 13.6 percent, but it has lost one third of its voters in the space of two years (and one half in relation to the last local elections in 1989), along with most of the local governments it had captured in 1989, including the country's three major cities: Istanbul, Ankara, and Izmir.
### Defeat
With a 7 percent drop in the SHP's score (in relation to 1991), these elections are a political defeat for its new leader, Murat Karayalcin, who succeeded Inänü last September and dreamed of becoming the "Felipe González of the Turkish left"
The DSP of Ecevit (an old charismatic leader from the 1970s, the "Turkish Papandreou", ran a highly chauvinistic and rightist campaign, especially on the Kurdish question. The party's vote dropped to 9 percent.
The CHP received 4.5 percent.
That said, the actual defeat of the social democratic left is much more limited than the psychological impact,
International Viewpoint #256 May 1994 given the loss of the three major cities and cities in the southeast (including Diyerbakir) to the Islamic fundamentalists. The SHP and the CHP received 18 percent of votes, which is only a 3 percent drop from 1991, when they ran together. In many cities - including the three major ones - the SHP candidate only lost by a frew thousand votes, and would have won with the support of the CHP or the DSP.
This factor can be explained in part as a result of the disaffection of a sizeable minority of the Kurdish electorate following the split of the DEP. This was their way to censure the coalition parties — in particular the SHP — for the repressive policy of the government in the Kurdish region.
The coalition government has been burned on the Kurdish question. Its effective complicity with the policy of repression has discredited it in the eyes of the Kurdish electorate, while its verbal opposition to the most extreme measures of repression has angered the nationalist wing of the Turkish electorate.
In this way, the SHP is paying for two years of complicity with the DYP in the right-wing government that has kept hardly any of its promises of democratisation, and which has chosen to manage the capitalist crisis on a day-to-day basis. Corruption scandals in SHP-run municipal governments also lost it some votes.
### Promises
The Kurdish question in part determined the outcome of these elections. Ciller came to power promising democratic reforms, especially on the Kurdish question. But very soon, the weakness of her political base forced her to ally herself with the army, lining up behind the policy of full-scale repression advocated by the "hawks" of the State.
In response to the dramatic increase in repression, the DEP withdrew a few weeks before the election date and the Kurdish Workers Party (PKK) called for
This clearly skewed results in the Kurdish region and in the big cities in the west (where the majority of Kurds actually live). The real participation figures in the Kurdish region are a subject for debate. Kurdish nationalists place them at 50 percent in certain cities, whereas the national figure was 92 percent. A high number of blank votes and spoiled ballots was also reported, particularly in Diyarbakir where the figure is said to have reached 50 percent of bal-
But the Kurdish movement, which received a number of blows - for example, the arrest of the 96 DEP deputies and the suspension of the nationalist daily Kurde Ozgür Gündem — is losing speed. The PKK is having difficulty in the military arena. The systematic destruction of Kurdish villages suspected of supporting its guerrilla forces has reduced its support significantly.
The Turkish army, which has been responsible for the deaths of some 300,000 people in the southeast of the country, is proceeding on a sector by sector basis and has organised operations right into northern Iraq to destroy PKK bases. It hopes to be able to declare a "military victory" sometime between now and the end of the summer, leaving the "settling of the Kurdish question" to civilian politicians who would make some superficial reforms. But reality could be very different.
The rise of Turkish nationalism in reaction to the Kurdish national movement and the actions of the PKK has certainly let Ciller make up the electoral ground lost as a result of the economic crisis. She took the lead thanks to her aggressive propaganda on the theme of the struggle against separatist terrorism (a DYP poster even declared, "each vote for the DYP is a bullet against the
This also explains the success of the semi-fascist Nationalist Action Party (MHP), which doubled its votes from the last elections, thus achieving its best score ever with 8 percent of votes cast.
At the same time, the absence of nationalist candidates worked to the advantage of the Muslim fundamentalists in the Prosperity Party (RP), which won the majority of municipal governments in the Kurdish region. It won 19 percent of votes nationally, increasing its score by 4 to 5 percent compared with the legislative elections of 1991.
If one adds the number of Islamic fundamentalist-type and semi-fascist candidates elected from the "centrist" parties, it is clear that the country is sliding towards the far-right, which took 30 percent of votes cast (between the RP, MHP and small far-right parties).
Politically, the DYP/SHP coalition government has come to an end. DYP, ANAP and MHP deputies collaborate systematically in parliament, creating a de facto right-wing coalition.
But the question of making a government out of this de facto coalition runs up against the problem of the leadership of the right-wing. For the moment, this stumbling block has allowed the Ciller government to survive.
As a result, the bourgeoisie finds itself in a very uncomfortable situation. There is a government and a prime minister that no longer enjoys the confidence of the house and the country, but it has no choice in the short-term but to support it, insofar as the government has adopted the programme of austerity and radical restructuring that it has been demanding for three years.
However, the implementation of such a plan — which calls for privatisations, the closing of so-called unprofitable public firms (such as the coal mines), radical tax reform, price rises up to 100 percent, and a semi-freeze on salaries — requires a strong government that can confront social discontent.
For the bourgeoisie, the fear of social revolt is very real. The main trade union federation, Türk-is, reacted very strongly to the social elements of the package, threatening the government with a general strike. There is furious agitation among workers in firms slated to be closed down - such as the Petlas factory in Kirsehir, the shipyards of Haliç and the Tekel factory in Cibali.
Anger is rising in the Zonguldaket and Karabük mining regions. More than 35 thousand miners and their families demonstrated in response to the call of the miners trade union of Zongulalak — against closure and privatisation. The president of Türk-is, M. Moralmi, participated as did ANAP and CHP deputies.
### Reply
That said. the trade union movement does not appear up to organising a real and massive reply in all sectors. 1993 was one of the calm years in the area of trade union struggles. Upcoming struggles will likely be largely defensive in nature. The effects of demoralisation caused by the economic crisis and the lack of a political alternative - the absence of a real "class struggle" party and the divisions and discredit of the social democratic parties (which all have a right-wing line on the question of the economy) - weaken the working class movement.
Rumour has it that trade union leaders are even in the process of negotiating a kind of social contract with the employers. One of the questions raised on the eve of the elections was whether in coming years Turkey would go through a period resembling "the Spanish model" — with sustained economic
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International Viewpoint #256 May 1994 growth (6 to 7 percent on average for the last few years, with an inflation rate of 70 percent and a foreign debt of US$65 billion), the stabilisation of a bourgeois democracy, with a social contract and democratic reforms, a peaceful and reformist outcome to the Kurdish question, and continued integration into the European Union.
### Financial crisis
The fundamentalist victory in the municipal elections comes at a time of deep financial crisis, the implementation of austerity measures, the degradation of the traditional political system, the current impasse on the Kurdish question and growing instability outside the country (the Balkans, the Caucasus, Iraq and Cyprus).
For nearly 25 years the independent Islamic fundamentalist current — represented by the Prosperity Party (RP) of M. Erbarkan — has had a constant presence in Turkey's political life. For a long time it was a marginal force restricted to certain cities in central Anatolia and in the Kurdish region, based primarily on traditionalist rural currents. This party underwent serious internal changes in the 1980s and began to set down roots in the cities.
Taking advantage of the integration of the conservative Islamic current of the traditional right into the State apparatus - particularly at the time of Özal's prime ministership, ideologically rehabilitated by Özal's "neo-Ottoman" ideological line, and profiting from a favourable conjuncture (Iran, Afghanistan, Algeria), the Muslim fundamentalists grew in force.
The new municipal governments won by the RP - thanks to the split in the liberal and secular vote - could well become "liberated zones" and a basis for future gains.
While the national score of the RP (19 percent) remains rather limited, its gains are no less real, especially if one considers the moral and material victories represented by the winning of a high number of municipal governments, including nearly all the cities in central Anatolia and the Kurdish region.
To this should be added the victories in Ankara, the political and administrative capital and in Istanbul, the economic, cultural and social capital of the country. The RP won by less than 10 thousand votes in Ankara (3 million inhabitants) in front of the SHP, and by less than 100 thousand votes in Istanbul (10 million inhabitants) ahead of the ANAP. In 34
Izmir (2 million inhabitants and the country's third largest city, it was an "undercover fundamentalist" (a candidate on the DYP slate) that won, only 20 thousand more votes ahead of the outgoing SHP mayor.
The RP is not just an ordinary party and its victory in a number of large urban centres could have a dramatic effect on the country's future. It is clear that the victory in the municipal elections is only a first step for the fundamentalists in their strategy for the conquest of State power - which mean a total change in the government and in the way of life.
The possibility of such an outcome has plunged secular milieux into disbelief and consternation - especially women, worried by threats on their freedoms and way of life. In the euphoria of the RP victory, there were random incidents of "beards" threatening and committing acts of aggression against women in the streets. The craziest rumours have begun to circulate and an atmosphere of "fear in the city" has emerged, particularly in Istanbul. The possibility of army intervention has been raised, as has a development along Iranian and Algerian lines.
Beyond the pyschological impact, however, the reality is much more complex and the fundamentalists' task is not so simple. Had there been two rounds of voting and an alliance of the centre, the RP would have won no more than 3 or 4 municipalities in central Anatolia. Moreover, it seems that the RP committed mass fraud in neighbourhoods under its control. But the State did not dare cancel elections, fearing a radicalisation of the RP and a dangerous test of strength.
The RP vote did not have the same meaning, and will not have the same consequences, everywhere. While it seems probable that it will strengthen the fundamentalists' hegemony in central Anatolia, the management of Kurdish cities - where nationalists and the PKK retain a real presence — will be more difficult and conflict-ridden. In Diyarbarkir, for example, where the RP candidate won with 35 percent of votes cast, its real score — taking into account abstentions and spoiled ballots — was only 14 percent.
In Ankara, the new RP mayor is more of a fascist-type dissident than a fundamentalist activist. He is a former member of the MHP and the nationalist wing of the ANAP, and his victory is due in part to his personal popularity in nationalist circles. As a mayor of the capital city, protocol demands that there be co-operation with State leaders and the army — and this will be a check on fundamentalist excesses. He could very well leave the RP and join a new party of the reunited centre-right.
In Istanbul, the situation is somewhat different. The new mayor, M. Erdogan, is a pure product of the RP, a committed and intelligent fundamentalist, and a leader of the "renovator" current of the party.
The RP won in nearly all the popular suburbs that surround the city, as well as in three municipalities of prestigious neighbourhoods (now rather impoverished), including Beyoglu, the city's cultural and commercial centre. The RP finds itself in command of a considerable amount of power (and money), and will have greater access to the media. This will enable it to expand its audien-
Difficult
Nevertheless, Istanbul is a difficult piece to swallow. Running a cosmopolitan and industrial city of 10 million inhabitants is a much more complex affair than an Anatolian village or a distant suburb. In spite of the knowledge of its activists, the RP may very well stumble in the process.
The RP is based primarily among new layers of migrants who come in their large majority from the Black Sea region and the east of the country. The RP vote reflects the socio-economic disarray of these uprooted and disinherited layers, a cultural shock and rejection of city life based on the western cultural model and of a capitalist mode of consumption to which they only partially have access.
For the moment, the RP victory is more a defeat for the traditional bourgeois parties than a fundamentalist victory. The main parties have virtually identical profiles and programs that the voter no longer sees the difference. If the RP is the only party making gains, it is because it is the only one that claims to represent a global and radical alternative to the system and "clean and uncorrupt" management.
In other words, it is above all the absence of a coherent left-wing force in government that has let the RP emerge and fill the void. Taking this reasoning a bit further, and given the discredit of the main bourgeois parties, it can be argued that the growth of the RP remains "modest" due to the rejection of its overly fundamentalist and backward image
International Viewpoint #256 May 1994 by the overwhelming majority of the population. This explains the attempts at "renovation" within the RP, which tried to change its image before the elections. It even recruited a number of modern women — a dentist that does not wear a scarf over her head, a former model from Istanbul's "high society", and so on.
In Istanbul, the RP is up against a number of dilemmas that could fatal. If its municipal government takes on a fundamentalist hue (to appease the extremist fringe), the RP will come up against considerable opposition from the majority of the population, which is hostile to fundamentalism and has a secular way of life that it would be impossible to change without the use of force.
But as long as the RP does not have power on a national level, it will not have the means for such a confrontation.
On the contrary, the State apparatus could well try to champion hostility to fundamentalist excesses itself, in order to avoid popular self-organisation and
In other words, will the new RP governments be satisfied with a strong dose of Muslim conservatism added to the current system (which the big bourgeoisie could easily accommodate), or will they orient themselves to a radical shake-up with the goal of setting up an Islamic Republic, thus directly confronting the powers that be?
To be sure, as the Iranian example shows, the fundamentalists' "change of the system" is limited to the political and social superstructure and does not touch capitalism as such, in spite of all the populist and anti-imperialist posturing
Among the RP's financial backers can be found Saudi Arabia and many "fundamentalist" Turkish capitalists, such as the head of the giant agro-business firm Biscuits Ölker. But the RP cannot be considered a simple bourgeois party that is more conservative
Due to the many internal contradictions and divergent social interests, the future evolution of the RP may even lead to a split. But for the moment, it has the wind in its sails, and it is the radical sectors that
The united socialist alternative
The revolutionary left was divided on the question of whether it should participate in the municipal elections or call for a boycott in solidarity with the Kurdish national movement. A number of groups (a majority of which had neither the means nor the intention to participate in the elections) called for a boycott, going so far as calling those who participated "lackeys of the Turkish State" and "collaborators in the dirty war against against the Kurdish people". Others ran independent candidates in certain regions. Two parties ran slates on a national level: the
(Maoist) Workers Party (IP) and the
Socialist Unity Party (SBP), with each winning about 80,000 votes, or 0.3% of votes cast.
The SBP ran a unitary slate, the United Socialist Alternative (BSA), in which other currents participated - the SBP (ex-CP), Kurtulus, Emek
(which withdrew from the elections but remained in the BSA), and Yeniyol
(Fourth Internationalists).
One of the main themes of the BSA
Important dish people and the struggle against
Istanbul is far too important a city on the dirty war and the repression the international level and for tourism.
meted out to Kurdish deputies. Candi-
The "cultural innovations" of the RP dates of the BSA defended this line in would not go unnoticed, and would all their public meetings and in their create scandals and provoke a reaction television spots from the ministers of tourism and cultu-
This unitary effort - a very recent
If the RP government aims first and undertaking — met with real success
(on its modest scale) and holds out foremost to meet the social aspirations promise for the post-election period of its voters in the poor suburbs, and
The goal is the building of a unitary takes on radical populist hues, it could party, not on the basis of an ideologiwell run up against tremendous resistancal debate and total programmatic ce from established economic forces fusion (which could end in the usual
(large industry, the banking sector, foreisterile impasse), but based on united gn enterprises, organised crime) — action around a platform of common which would lead to economic bandemands and on democratic internal kruptcy, in turn leading to intervention functioning that respects the identity of by the State apparatus.
each component.
If on the other hand the RP takes a
The important common work carried low profile and tries to make a temporaout during the elections bodes well for ry compromise with the powers that be the future, and other currents have in the city - within the framework of a already decided to join. o stagist strategy — it could be corrupted by the old city.
This would appear to be the evolution preferred by the major employers.
One of its main representatives declared,
"Turkey is not adapting to the RP, but the RP will adapt to Turkey."
This is the real question: will the RP maintain its identity as a radical Islamic party that hopes to change the system, or will it become a conservative "Islamicdemocratic" party integrated into the hold sway.
The fundamentalists hope to set up an Islamic Republic, a new
"Ottoman Empire" that would take out its revenge on the West and on the secular republican government, to once again become the "leader of the
Muslim world".
Turkish fundamentalism, unlike the Arab variant, has an imperial, nationalist hue.
A fundamentalist government would inevitably unleash a military adventu-
Its project also implies radical changes in social life and in the functioning of the State apparatus. A shift from "bourgeois democracy"
(however militarised) to a theocratic
Islamic dictatorship would not be without consequence for Turkish capitalism. It is oriented entirely towards the European Union
(more than half of foreign trade), and the big bourgeoisie has gambled everything on integration into the EU
The radical Islamic fundamentalists are pushing the leadership of the RP into a confrontation with the State. The depth of the current crisis in the country has campaign was solidarity with the Kurgiven the RP a key role. Its course in the coming period
• will determine much of what the future holds for the country. *
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