[Frollein]

Thank god. No free visas for the goat herders.

[Decky]

If Germany had won the first world war they would have handed Europe to their allies the Ottoman caliphate anyway.

[Vanasalus]

Vanasalus, thank you for the informative opinion piece from the inside, so to speak. The increase of support for this referendum from the Kurdish South-East seems perplexing to someone from the outside (or the ill-informed West), who clearly doesn't fully grasp the dynamics of internal Turkish politics. Care to share your thoughts on this?

Perhaps you know there was a "ceasefire" between PKK and the state in 2013-2015 period. This period of total tranquility brought so much benefits to Kurdish South-East; a sense of security, explosive economic boom, massive infrastructure investments etc. In short, people of the region had the chance of first-hand witnessing how good the life could be if the conflict came to an end.

What happened in 2015 changed it. Out of blue, PKK demanded local autonomy for each municipality in the South-East. The government's response was a big NO-NO. And PKK decided to grab it by force; some neighborhoods in several South-Eastern towns were literally invaded by PKK and turned into fortresses by trenches, mine traps etc. This drew a drastic reaction from the state; army came with full power, put these neighborhoods under siege, and one by one, those "liberated" pockets of neighborhoods were cleansed from PKK militants. But, the climate of peace, prosperity and investment tasted in 2013-14 period disappeared alongside.

Back to your question... People of the region did to approve PKK's unwarranted and unprovoked actions in 2015. In many cases, they needed to flee from their homes because PKK picked up their neighborhoods to invade. Long story shot, people of the region found themselves squeezed between PKK's aggression and state's overwhelming reaction in response. And the turned towards HDP, Kurdish party in the parliament, for a solution.

HDP's fatal mistake was to give blindfolded support to PKK under these circumstances. They should have been acted according to the needs and demands of their constituencies; people demanded from them to play the role of mediator and moderation. Yet, they chose to align themselves with PKK. I believe, yesterday's referendum results in the South-East is showing us that people of the region are poised to punish HDP for that fatal mistake.

@Vanasalus, is it true that Erdogan improved greatly the economy and services in Turkey?

What is the result in the European part of Turkey?

2 weeks ago, for an article published elsewhere, I prepared a graph displaying "Turkish annual GDP growth rates" for the period 2003-2016. Let me copy paste it to here so you can judge yourself.



For your info, blue bars show the growth rate figures under "Prime Minister Erdogan" and red bars show the growth rate figures under "President Erdogan"

To my taste, any annual growth figure below %5 is indicating a lost year. Therefore, our growth performance is not good for the last 5 years.

That said, cumulatively speaking in real terms, Turkish economy more than doubled its size at theend of 14th year under Erdogan's governance.

For your second question; I already presented the referendum map. Are you an American or something?

- The OSCE hasn't classified Turkish elections as "fair and square" for quite a while now.

I am not aware of that. For my part, the way we cast our votes and the way our votes counted, though being ancient and inefficient, makes any attempt of election fraud virtually impossible.

That being said, if OSCE reports are talking about injustices happening during campaign period, I must concur. AKP government pushed the boundaries a lot in terms of using state resources for the YES campaign.

- Under the current circumstances a presidential system just accelerates the path to autocracy.

Perhaps yes. Yet, path to autocracy is also path to increasing discontent among people and increasing reactionary pressure. It is a stick with two sharp ends. When you gaze long into an abyss, the abyss also gazes into you. We will see whether Erdogan risk it or not.

From the outside it looks like the opposite. The combination of Islamic tradition, Ottoman history and the Atatürk Führerkult seems like an ideal foundation for authoritarian one-man rule.

From my perspective, in Turkish mindset, a strong leader is the leader that takes responsibility and that deliver the job. We like strong leaders in this sense. Not the authoritarian ones.

As for your perceptions on Islamic tradition and Ottoman history, I must disagree. No European state, perhaps except Republic of Venice, managed to form a sophisticated cabinet/privy council structure filled with powerful ministers before Ottomans did. Ottoman grandviziers's honorary title was "Holder of the State".

- Does he need a referendum for the death penalty?

Yes. Death penalty restitution must happen through constitutional amendment. There are two ways of doing it.

1- More than 2/3rd of the parliament votes for the amendment; and it becomes law.
2- More than 3/5th of the parliament votes for the amendment; and that leads to a referendum. If majority of the public votes Aye, then it becomes law.

This is T(u)rexit, basically. Turkey's ambitions to join the EU are over officially.

What gives you the impression that the ambition was "alive" one day, 1 year or 10 years before the referendum.

If Germany had won the first world war they would have handed Europe to their allies the Ottoman caliphate anyway.

The first time (and the last time for sure) we became allies with Germany was during WW1. And we lost 3/4th of our imperial land mass as a result.

[Decky]

It was never your land. In my opinion you should have lost more. You are still squatting on parts of Kurdistan and half of Armenia and the cities of Constantinople and Adrianiople and then later you went and stole half of Cyprus.

[Rancid]

Democracy is not for all I guess.

[Vanasalus]

It was never your land. In my opinion you should have lost more. You are still squatting on parts of Kurdistan and half of Armenia and the cities of Constantinople and Adrianiople and then later you went and stole half of Cyprus.

That 3/4th...In other words, most of today's Middle East. You can insinuate about whether it was our land or not... Yet, you cannot deny the fact that people in those regions who lived in tranquility for 400 years under Turkish rule, has not seen a year of peace or normality since we left 100 years ago.

And as for your phrase on Cyprus... One third, not half... Didn't steal, just liberated from the tyranny of the majority.

[noir]

That 3/4th...In other words, most of today's Middle East. You can insinuate about whether it was our land or not... Yet, you cannot deny the fact that people in those regions who lived in tranquility for 400 years under Turkish rule, has not seen a year of peace or normality since we left 100 years ago.

And as for your phrase on Cyprus... One third, not half... Didn't steal, just liberated from the tyranny of the majority.

Had similar comment on another thread

viewtopic.php?f=42&t=167946&p=14791176&hilit=Ottoman#p14791176

[Rugoz]

That being said, if OSCE reports are talking about injustices happening during campaign period, I must concur. AKP government pushed the boundaries a lot in terms of using state resources for the YES campaign.

Yes, in previous elections the OSCE didn't find outright fraud (the report on this vote will come later). Turkish organizations have more people on the ground anyway though. The opposition doesn't seem to recognize the result this time.

From my perspective, in Turkish mindset, a strong leader is the leader that takes responsibility and that deliver the job. We like strong leaders in this sense. Not the authoritarian ones.

As for your perceptions on Islamic tradition and Ottoman history, I must disagree. No European state, perhaps except Republic of Venice, managed to form a sophisticated cabinet/privy council structure filled with powerful ministers before Ottomans did. Ottoman grandviziers's honorary title was "Holder of the State".

- Given Erdogan's popularity I don't see a difference.
- The Ottoman empire was an absolute monarchy.

[kuu]

What ever direction Erdogan decides to take Turkey to, EU and europeans are going to look the other way, because Erdogan holds the refugee cards in his hands. If he promises he will not let them through then that will be enough for EU so we can continue to live a life of consumption without the distractions of chaos, misery and horror what we can see when we look at the refugees.

It's really messed up to see how turkish people cheerfully give away their human rights. And how alot of turkish people who don't even live there, voted for dictatorship.
But well, what do I know, maybe it's good? We just have to wait and see.

[Clangeddin]

The refugee card can only work for so long. (As long as the Syrian war lasts)
Immigrants are pouring in the EU by hundreds of thousands per years already, and not all of them are refugees.
They just want to go to Europe for obvious reasons: better standards of living.
On the other hand, EU politicians are still panicking about declining demographics and the fact that pension systems will simply no longer hold up if this continues, and what better way to invert the demographic trend than to let in millions of young immigrants with higher fertility rates than the natives?
As for the political backlash and elections... don't think too much about it. Both the left and the right thrive in this rhetoric, it gives them (on the surface) an element of division in a time when they are increasingly similar to what concerns everything else and the european's votes will not be too particularly skewed either way. For every right-wing voter that will vote a right that opposes (in words only, in facts they'll do nothing about it) immigration, there will be a left-wing voter that will vote a left to welcome it (but not for humanitarian reasons, but to have them pay for their pensions).

[Istanbuller]

Government structure will be more like an American type after 2019 general election. Parliamentary and presidential elections will be held on the same day. It will be always a close race as a result of these changes.