New Left Outlook

Bill or no bill...

2007-10-12T13:17:00.001+01:00

By Cid

With the House Committee on Foreign Affairs passing the Armenian Genocide bill, it is quite clear that not only the White House but also the political climate in the United States is losing its senses. Being entangled in two continuing wars, and with the psychological deprivation of the United States from an unchallenged Superpower into a "mere" Great Power in the international stage within a decade, certain US politicians and legislators seem to be in a mental breakdown. The Democrats are retreating into their ideological boundaries in which they can give themselves a moral injection by passing a Genocide bill after having been utterly passive and incapable on the actions carried out by the Bush administration which have infringed and violated both the United States Constitution and several International Treaties. It is in fact sheer arrogance for the House Committee on Foreign Affairs to venture into a historical issue while being incapable to properly address the issues of our present life-time; such as those in Iraq, Guantanamo, Darfur, etc.

Concerning the Turkish government, it would be unwise for her to resort to reactionary policies. The Armenian Genocide bill passed by the House Committee on Foreign Affairs is of great emotional value for the Armenians in general and the Diaspora specific and should be understand in this perspective. Bill or no bill, the essence of the issue surrounding the Armenian ethnic cleansings is the relationship between Armenia and Turkey. And no other means than the development of relations between these two states and its societies can effectuate any meaningful change. Beyond its emotional value, some advocating the Genocide bill have tried to condemn Turkey as a criminal state that has systematically denied the ethnic killings. This is sadly beyond a historical perspective in which the politicians of the early Turkish republic did acknowledge the ethnic cleansings carried out by the Committee of Union and Progress and did condemn them. The problem though is that Armenian-Turkish relations never saw chance for development as Armenia soon after its conception was annexed by the Soviet Union. As a sick twist of history, the war in the Caucasus between Armenia and Azerbaijan further hindered the development of such relations after the fall of the Soviet Union in 1991. So the idea of continual denial and this being the main cause of hindered relations is an anachronism.

Others have made an allusion to Germany, claiming that the German people did fully accept their history. However I would like to note that such view is highly simplistic. First of all the German nation was totally defeated and had to accept unconditional surrender, a condition that did not occur in Turkey or other modern nations with imperial histories and ethnic cleansings. Though the Ottoman Empire did loose in WW1, the revolutionary Turkish movement denied its acceptance and won the following war of independence. The Treaty of Lausanne signed by the Turkish republic, on equal footing with the allies, is in sheer contrast with the defeatist conditions captured in the Treaty of Sevres. Secondly the idea that the German nation abruptly accepted its history is not correct. Even after the utter defeat many Germans officials and civilians defended themselves, even those close to the camps, claiming; “Wir haben es nicht gewust” (we didn’t know). The tours in the camps and confrontation with the piles of bodies was a shocking and effective way for collective realization on what happened. There are no camps to confront with in Anatolia. Nor would the bodies, after 100 years, lead to any shocking and effective collective realization besides personal sentiments. But to pursue its recognition through legislative bills will in fact deplete the historical value and significance and provide ground for future revisionism.

Furthermore the policies of the past several Turkish governments are reactionary and in fact paradoxical as on the one hand she continuingly asserts that the ethnic cleansing is a matter only suitable for historians to decide on whether it can be attributed as genocide; yet on the other hand the government has politicized the issue by implementing reactionary policies such as economic sanctions and appealing to Jewish lobby groups to counter Armenian lobby groups in cases where other states ventured into this issue through legislative means. Moreover the government did not try to address the emotional feelings among the public on this issue through proper informing and even neglected the levels of racism resulting from these feelings.

I would like to conclude that it is the prerogative of the republics of Armenia and Turkey to settle their relationship, and the only firm foundation for this is through proper means; that is academic research, dialogues and mutual acknowledgement, not legislative resolutions, condemnation and alienation. The passing of this bill will make that even more evident and in this light the bill should be valued.

New Political Climate

2007-07-26T17:56:00.000+01:00

New parliament of the Republic has been formed with 16th free election carried out on July 22th. Rather unexpected outcome of the election has many effects on next 5 years but also some serious impositions on political paradigm of the country. These effects/impositions will be extensively discussed for a long time by many, including by the writers of this blog.

Some important messages of this rather harsh electoral manifesto are as follows:

1- Old school politics, lingering around non-issue issues like secularism, headscarves, struggle against terror, is dead.

2- If a political party appears with a relatively realist program and solid plans, embracing all segments of whole nation, then electorates of the country, from north to south, east to west, vote quite similarly.

3- Ethnicity based politics is dead. AKP's landslide success in Kurdish southeast is the clearest sign of this. MHP's defeat in its old strongholds located in central Anatolia is the another.

4- In future elections, only the parties, those manage to have certain power in every corner of the country, will have a chance to win. Thus, opposition parties require a complete overhaul of their political attitudes against the people of certain regions or certain socioeconomic levels.

5- There is no satisfactory substitute of economic proficiency in politics. Almost 80% of the electorate declares that economic policies shape their political choices.

6- The nation traditionally respects its army, but also wants it out of politics.

Here in this blog, we will be discussing these issues in coming days.

Careful analysis of this election result is a must for many, especially for the opposition. For my part, a good administration requires proficient government and opposition together. Unfortunately, the latter is not available in Turkey nowadays. We are looking forward to emergence of a new political movement(s) to fill the gap.

Vanasalus.

Valuable Experience

2007-07-23T20:10:00.000+01:00

Valuable Experience
The 2007 Turkish Election may prove to be a defining moment for Turkish politics; a turning point in the sense that it exposed the weakness and inability of the current opposition parties (CHP and MHP) and their leaders. The overwhelming support of AKP is not simply because of AKP’s successful policies (if any, aside from the reform in healthcare) in the past five years but mainly because the opposition spent their time on trivial things rather than “actual business” – for example, about a week before the elections, Deniz Baykal and Devlet Bahceli spent their time fixated on Erdogan’s watch and the yachts of party members. Yes you heard correctly. For some reason, these politicians preferred to attack Erdogan for having an expensive watch (implying that he is corrupt, which may not entirely be unfounded, as some journalists argue; but this is still irrelevant) rather than defining and announcing their policies, rather than making promises. I’m not an experienced politician, but even I can tell you that demagogy and ad hominums will not achieve anything.
Another defect in the said opposition parties is their unrealistic ideas. You have Devlet Bahceli denouncing EU and practically rooting for autarky. His questionable racist/ultra-nationalist attitude, I’m not even going to comment on that. I must say, though, that MHP didn’t entirely fail. They did double their votes and gained seats in the Turkish Parliament. Still, they need to stop feeding people with Pan-Turanist fairytales and stop playing with xenophobic, anti-Western ideas.
As for CHP; a so-called left party and the supposed protector of Ataturk’s legacy are all but what they claim to be. Not surprisingly, the Socialist International is seriously contemplating on removing CHP’s membership. CHP and Baykal must understand that many of those who voted for CHP (myself included) voted with great reluctance.
What CHP and other left parties must do know is to rejuvenate themselves by 2012 - perhaps some fresh blood in their ranks, specifically a new leader with greater appeal to the masses. Specifically, the abandonment of quasi-fascistic ideas and the adoption of more liberal ideas (liberal in regards to human rights, to the economy and in its relations EU) might be helpful. Well, CHP probably would have eased off should they have won the elections and probably would have continued Turkey’s EU Odyssey with the appropriate reforms (I honestly cannot picture them to be as illogical and anti-pragmatic to do otherwise), but they gave no indications of that. We can only hope that CHP will clean up their act and perhaps even develop more cooperative relations with the rest of the battered Turkish Left.

First step

2007-07-23T01:29:00.000+01:00

As the results of the elections began to take shape, it was clear that this election would live up to its grandeur as predicted by media and experts alike. Not because of the so called battle between islamists and secularists, but because it is a major step in the maturing process of the democratic system in Turkey. The results show that the public is at ease with the party of muslim-democrats in relation to the secular principles, signaling a less ideological and more pragmatic approach on secularism in society and the state. Moreover with almost 50% percent support for a single party the message is clear, more then politics the parties themselves need to reform. Not only their party-program but also their internal power structure and their attitude towards the public. Lip service and provoking sentiments among the electorate is not sufficient anymore. The 2007 elections have shown that the public favors a party that approaches problems from a pragmatic approach rather then a sentimental one. AKP has now a tremendous job as she has to live up, not only to the expectations of the core AKP supporters but also to those who gave their preference for AKP's approach of policy over that of other parties. I hope the AKP will succeed in living up to these expectations and will vigorously continue its reform efforts in the EU accession process. Furthermore I hope these elections will motion the establishment of progressive parties who rather then to antogonize other parties, build their program from a self reflective view and can enrich the political spectrum in Turkey, beyond just nationalistic sentiments. With this blog we would like to contribute in this new progressive effort.