One of the main electoral events for 2024 that I haven’t commented on in heavy detail have been the Turkish mayoral elections which are being seen as the next major test of President Recep Erdogan’s power at the polls. Towing the line between an Islamist autocrat and a duly elected leader, Erdogan has been hit with a number of damaging stories regarding his handling of the earthquakes in Eastern Turkey and Syria coupled with rising inflation. Thus, the recent mayoral elections were seen as a chance for a reset for his ruling AKP party to get in control of elected offices in major cities like Ankara and Istanbul and change public opinion. That was the exact opposite of what happened with the CHP party gaining control of most of the ten of the nation’s largest cities’ mayoral positions.
2023 Turkish presidential election – Wikipedia
2024 Turkish local elections – Wikipedia
2019 Turkish offensive into north-eastern Syria – Wikipedia
October 2023 Northern Syria clashes – Wikipedia
Why Turkey’s Economic Crisis is (Still) Getting Worse (youtube.com)
The CHP, which faced a stunning defeat at the hands of Erdogan after running a struggling candidate in Kemal Kilicdaroglu, managed to hold seven of ten major mayoral positions across the country as well as hold the popular vote across the country even as Erdogan has proposed more economic interventionist measures such as raising the minimum wage. For Erdogan, this presents a massive public relations problem as his handling of economic woes become amplified without yes men on the local level to sing praises for his campaign. This is as Erdogan has been repeatedly feared as someone who is becoming immune from the consequences of elections in the form of Victor Orban where elections are held, but the democratizing effect they have on the nation carry little weight.
For NATO, this backlash against Erdogan can be seen as a positive development even if Turkey is technically seen as an ally from a military alliance perspective. Erdogan has been responsible for creating a stopgap in allowing the Nordic countries to join NATO despite the threat from Russia and has been responsible for attacks in Syria despite the United States attempting to stabilize the military situation in the country. For the Turkish military objective, the ongoing war and potential genocide against the Kurds that Erdogan regime has been propagating has perpetuating the suffering already felt in the poverty-stricken region of Syria, accidentally making the dictator Bashar Al-Assad more relevant than banishing him to the annals of history. Thus, while NATO countries may not be celebrating the results in the most exuberant manner, the prospect of telling Erdogan that his authoritarian ambitions aren’t allowed to ferment just yet is somewhat satisfying from a democratic perspective.
Overall, this is a positive result after years of negative results coming from Turkey. While the nation of Turkey struggles with the pressure of Erdogan pushing for Islamist governance and the militarism that it presents abroad against foreign allies, the concern for Turkish residents has been an increasing illiberalizing of the nation’s politics. With the mayoral elections and local elections showing some pushback on Erdogan and showing that the President will have to show some compromise with his political opponents with a terrible electoral performance, hopefully this means that Turkey will liberalize into the future instead of illiberalize.
The Conservatarian Millennial 