Ahval
By Haluk Özdalga
Jan 03 2021
This past year has been one of defeats and retreats in almost every
area for Turkey.
The country has turned into one of the darkest places on Earth with
respect to the rule of law and freedom of expression. Its contracting
economy has resulted in rampant and near-permanent poverty. Its
international relations have devolved into an eerie isolation. These
are not subjective expressions of pessimism; they are all based on
facts.
Turkey ranked 107th out of 128 countries in the Rule of Law Index for
2020, made by the World Justice Project, an internationally renowned
civil society organisation that advances the rule of law worldwide. If
you divide these countries into five groups, Turkey would be in the
bottom fifth.
Even worse, the same report ranks Turkey 124th for independent civil
and criminal courts systems, free from improper government influence.
The only four countries worse off than Turkey are Cameroon, Russia,
Nicaragua and Venezuela.
Turkey also ranks 154th among 180 countries in the 2020 World Press
Freedom Index. In a similar fashion, we are in the bottom fifth group
for free media.
One can see the many clear signs that we have dropped to the bottom
league. Despite binding provisions in the Constitution, lower courts
have refused to implement rulings by the Constitutional Court and the
European Court of Human Rights (ECHR) due to political influence. A
well-known member of the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP)
said on a TV programme that “not even a child would write these
indictments” – yet people remain in prison over such indictments.
If a country’s democracy is only as good as the rule of law and media
freedom it maintains, then our democracy is also fifth-class.
The most striking feature of the Turkish economy in 2020 was that it
sank into a cycle of perpetual impoverishment.
The gross domestic product and income per capita have both continued
to drop in the last seven consecutive years, plummeting sharply in
2020. Between 2013 and 2020, one-third of the GDP disappeared,
dropping from $960 billion to $650 billion. Income per capita fell
from $12,500 to $7,800 in the same period.
Taking the increasing inflation rate into account, our welfare
declined by more than 40 percent in the last seven years, a first
since at least 1960. I couldn’t find another country in the World Bank
data base that experienced such a drop within the same period.
Turkey is paying for an ideological approach to the management of
economy. President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has said repeatedly that
“interest rate is the cause; inflation is the effect”. The Financial
Times estimated that the failed currency intervention has cost $140
billion over the past two years, putting currency reserves at minus
$50 billion.
Tax revenues don’t even cover salaries of civil servants, deficits in
social security and interest on debts, without payments on the
principal. Turkey needs foreign capital.
But when you have a fifth-class rule of law, serious investors may be
hard to come by.
An example of this was when Volkswagen liquidated its $1.4 billion
investment in the western Manisa province, despite the AKP government
providing the German automotive giant with generous subsidies.
Countries in similar situations often attract speculative investors
who make windfall profits via short-term market transactions and pull
out. As interest rates are suddenly raised, Turkey is now
unfortunately facing such a situation. Turkey will most probably
continue its descent into poverty in 2021.
Separately, the health minister said 50 million people will be
vaccinated to COVID-19 by the year’s end – too little, too late. We
have a population close to 90 million, including immigrants, but the
contracts signed for vaccine shipments don’t even cover the 50 million
as promised. Turkey's economy and tourism may suffer greatly in 2021
because of that.
In terms of international relations, Ankara faced such a heavy
isolation as never experienced before.
The AKP jumps into any conflict it comes across in the region, always
taking sides in a partisan way. No other country, big or small, does
that.
The ruling party also has a proclivity to employ military means with
ease – often before all diplomatic options are exhausted.
The primary factor that shapes AKP’s foreign policy is ideology rather
than national interest; it is comprised of pro-Muslim Brotherhood
(Ikhwan) ambitions in the Middle East and an ideologically motivated,
anti-West attitude in the West.
There are unresolved issues with Greece and Greek Cypriots that date
back to the years before the AKP. However, the ideological posture
adopted by the ruling party has resulted in a decline in relations
with many other countries: Syria, Lebanon, Israel, Iraq, Saudi Arabia,
United Arab Emirates, Bahrain, Egypt, Sudan, half of Libya, the
European Union, the United States and more.
The AKP is now trying to mend fences with Israel and Egypt, so far
without any known positive outcome. If the party's policies for Egypt
and Israel were right in the first place, why would it want to change
things?
Turkey's focus on EU membership has dissipated – even though it should
be a strategic priority for Ankara – simply because of the fifth-class
democracy the AKP has moulded.
These days, the ruling party has spoken about turning a new page with
the EU, making it appear like a fresh start for the ascension process.
Many Turkish commentators view it that way. The EU can’t ignore
Turkey, whatever its regime may be – a country with a population
approaching 90 million, adjacent to its borders. There must be some
form of relation between the two.
But for the European bloc, it is no longer a relationship with a
prospective member. The AKP has destroyed the road to EU membership.
It is over. Now, the new page is about defining the nature of new
EU-Turkey relations.
Another masterfully presented recent piece of discourse by the ruling
party is that its current engagement in ‘reforms for democracy and
rule of law’.
I recollect the famous dictum in the Italian author Giuseppe Tomasi’s
book “Il Gattopardo”: for everything to remain the same, everything
must change.
In a cunning way, the ruling party in Ankara is trying to implement
Tomasi’s dictum with some distortion: for everything to remain the
same, everything must seem to change.
I do wish you a healthy and prosperous 2021.
(The opinions expressed in this column are those of the author and do
not necessarily reflect those of Ahval.)
