The Turkish original of this article was published as
Reddedilemeyecek teklifiniz yoksa on 15th August 2015.
In accordance with the expectations of “realistic” forecasters familiar with Turkey’s politics, the AKP and the CHP turned out to be unable to collaborate. Now one side can claim that President Erdoğan kept playing an obstructive role from the wings, while the other side can respond that the factionalized structure of the CHP forced Kılıçdaroğlu into certain rigid demands that were impossible to satisfy. But at the same time, it was public knowledge that an exclusionist approach dominated both party organizations and their respective constituencies. “Realistically” speaking, it was always going to be difficult for two such different parties who had formed their respective identities through mutual otherization to reach a meaningful compromise.
But at the same time, these coalition talks gave rise to an interesting development. Regardless of their political preferences, virtually all respectable people capable of an objective approach to politics wanted this attempt at collaboration to be successful, on the grounds that it would be good not for this or that party but Turkey. This approach was based on the notion that the political logic of the Cold War era, predicated on keeping domestic and foreign politics separate, had to be superseded. Leaving foreign policy entirely in bureaucratic hands meant a certain comfort zone where Turkey could be governed by exploiting and misusing social fault-lines. Turkish-secularist cadres established their control over state power, and they and the worlds of business and culture gravitating to them established a monopoly of governance despite being a minority. This depended on overplaying identity differences so that the majority could be kept outside the center of politics.
Over its thirteen years the AKP government accomplished a revolutionary transformation. First, the regency or guardianship exercised over politics by the bureaucracy was pushed back. Then, experimentation began with ways of forging a new social unity with the second major sociological entity excluded from the center, i.e. the Kurds. In the meantime, the economic and political weight of the provinces as a whole was considerably enhanced. The synergy produced by these three initiatives brought Turkey for the first time to the doorstep of democracy. For the first time ever, democracy ceased to be a “game” consisting of nothing but winning the elections and keeping your rivals out of power.
But all the time, the AKP was also forced to cope with all kinds of resistance. The critical element was the attitude of the CHP as the party of “white” Turks in the sociological sense, that is to say of the secularists, thus representing the heart and soul of the old régime and mode of governance. Events did not disprove the political “realists.” The CHP pursued a strategy of rejecting all possibilities of cooperation. From passing new legislation based on articles agreed upon in the House Constitutional Committee, to the draft law on reforming the High Board of Judges and Public Procurators, each time the AKP extended a hand it was rejected by the CHP.It wasn’t easy for a party that had founded the Republic and made it its own on the basis of Kemalist principles to accept and digest its historic defeat.
Finally the June elections provided the long-expected opportunity. The AKP was still the overall winner, but it could no longer govern by itself. A suitable psychological environment was born for the CHP and its supporters to get rid of their sense of defeat. AKP-CHP cooperation might make it possible to launch a forward-looking restoration and reform drive. As the CHP was finding it difficult to go over 25 percent, for them now to be in a position to share power meant a quantum jump on any scale of political achievement. The AKP, on the other hand was not psychologically ready for this coalition. After thirteen years they could not help construing it as a defeat.
In this equation, Erdoğan’s influence was not likely to be paramount and that is how it turned out to be. The real question was whether the CHP would turn out to have the skill, aptitude and political intelligence to come up with an offer that the AKP could “not afford to refuse.” In the end, they did not catch anybody by surprise. The “realists” turned out to be right yet again.