Despite the welcome news on Sweden, the old Turkey is not coming back, but Erdogan’s apparent shift to legacy-building mode will give Washington opportunities to leverage his influence abroad.
The key question following the vote is whether the alliance between the HDP and the main opposition Republican People’s Party and its Table of Six partners can endure.
On the morning of May 15, political and social media commentators as well as journalists were coming to terms with the results of the Turkish presidential elections.
Turkey marks a hundred years as a republic this year. First as Turkey’s prime minister and then as its president, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been at the political helm of the republic for a fifth of that century. His victory on Sunday in a runoff election now sets him up for five more years in power.
Sitting Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan comfortably defeated opposition leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu in this week’s runoff vote in the Turkish presidential election. The AKP leader, who has ruled Turkey since 2002, secured just over 52% of the vote, to his rival’s 47%.
The JST asked four experts on Turkey from journalism, academia and government service for their thoughts on “whither Turkey” in the immediate aftermath of the May 28 elections.
As in previous decades and centuries, geologic rumblings could be followed by political upheavals in both countries.
It is often difficult to keep track of one’s mortal enemies in the Middle East. One day you could be in the throes of a great cold or proxy war with rival regional powers, before the reality of inflation and currency crashes kicks in, or you want a larger pool of potential buyers for your homegrown drone industry, or you identify a new greater threat du jour, and you have to shift alliances.
Nadia Hassan Suleiman remembers well the day she was arrested.
Soner Cagaptay, a leading researcher of contemporary Turkey at the Washington Institute for Near Eastern Policy, has written a book of wide scope about Turkish foreign policy over the past two decades.
