Transcript 0:00 [intro music] Hello and welcome to Trendlines, a podcast on international affairs by World Politics Review. I am Peter Dirie. 0:18 Turkey is nominally a close military and political ally of the United States and other NATO countries, as well as an economic partner to the European Union. 0:28 But reading headlines from the past days, months, and years, one wonders how close the Turkish government really feels to its Western partners. 0:37 Under President Erdogan, Turkey has been in conflict with Kurdish US allies in Syria and Iraq, while at the same time supporting other militias associated with the Al-Qaeda network, Hamas, and other Islamic extremists. 0:51 It has developed a somewhat close relationship with Russia, even buying a Russian air defense system despite strident opposition from the United States. 1:00 In the wake of the Russian invasion of Ukraine, Turkey has largely successfully tried to maintain good relations with both sides, acting as a mediator, delivering weapons to Ukraine, and refraining from sanctions on Russia. 1:13 None of this can be understood without taking a close look at Turkey's domestic politics, and especially its long-running economic crisis and the upcoming general elections in 2023 that are threatening to challenge President Erdogan's increasingly authoritarian grip on power. 1:28 To explore all of this with me today, I am joined by Steven Cook. Steven is the senior fellow for Middle East and Africa studies at the Council on Foreign Relations, and he joins us from Washington. 1:41 Steven, welcome to Trendlines. It's a pleasure to be with you. I have mentioned some of the ongoing conflicts between the Turkish government and its supposed allies and partners in the West in the introduction. 1:52 Uh, I was very tempted to just ask you what the hell is going on here, and then let you talk for an hour or two [laughs]. But, um- We can do it. We can actually do longer than an hour or two- [laughs]... 2:03 but I realize not everybody wants to listen to all that. [laughs] Uh, yeah, and we should probably do it in a, in a more, a bit more systematic fashion than that. 2:10 So, um, uh, to, to kind of get us started, to get your view on, uh, how the Turkish political elites and President Erdogan himself, um, are viewing the situation they are facing, um, and how they are, um, viewing their relationships with their allies and partners. 2:31 It, it's a great question, and it's a complicated one. It is, uh, connected to domestic politics, identity, historical memory, and of course, foreign policy and, and geostrategic interests. 2:44 But I just wanna take a step back for a moment. Um, you mentioned that Turkey is an ally and partner of NATO and, and European countries, and of course, the United States. 2:54 A- and I would, I would actually kinda tweak that a little bit. Turkey is certainly an ally, but it hasn't been much of a partner, uh, from the perspective of Western leaders. 3:07 From the perspective of Turkish leaders, they believe that they have, they are not treated, uh, that Turkey is not treated as an equal partner in this relationship, and has as a result sought to pursue a more independent foreign policy. 3:21 Doesn't want-- Turkey doesn't wanna be seen as an asset or an appendage to NATO. 3:26 It wants to see i- itself as a- an important power in its own right, an important power in Europe, an important power in the Middle East, an important power in the Eastern Mediterranean and in the Muslim world. 3:39 Um, and, and I think that is one of these many complex things, for lack of a better term, that is going on, uh, among Turkish elites, political elites, in their thinking about how they're approaching 3:54 whether it's the war in Ukraine, uh, whether it is their relationship with countries in the Middle East, whether it's their relationship with the EU and their relationship with NATO, but a- a- above all, their relationship with the United States. 4:09 So, um, when it comes to specifically your, your question, I think one, let's just lay it out on the table. 4:18 You know, President Erdogan, um, has a, a number of domestic political problems on his hands, uh, an economy that is not doing well. Um, his poll numbers are at, uh, multi-year lows. 4:31 Um, the Justice and Development Party, which has dominated Turkish politics, um, is also polling at, uh, multi-year lows, and there's an election coming up in 2023. 4:42 So he is looking for different ways in which to score political points, and here's one of the things that I think is really interesting for listeners to, to, to recognize about Turkey. 4:53 Let's say that, um, Erdogan's pressure tactics, um, work, and Finland and Sweden a- a- accede to his demands with regard to the presence of the PKK, for example, the Kurdistan Workers' Party, this terrorist organization that's been waging war on Turkey since 1984. 5:11 What if they accede to the Turkish government's demands to shut down the PKK in Stockholm and Helsinki? Erdogan wins domestically. 5:21 That's a really important win domestically, especially given the kind of visceral way in which Turks view, uh, the, the, the PKK. Uh, it, it, it is, it is a, a strong political win for, for Erdogan. 5:36 If the Fins and the Swedes decide that they are not going to, uh, accede to President Erdogan's demands, that's still a political win for Erdogan, because he can use it to whip up kind of nationalist sentiment that is useful to him as he enters into, uh, uh, uh, a, an extended electoral season that will culminate in presidential elections in mid-2023. 6:01 So it's, it's these kinds of things that are- Also part of the calculation in Ankara when it comes to the conduct of Turkey's foreign policy. 6:10 Let, let's talk about the, the question of NATO expansion a bit and then the Swedish and Finnish application to join NATO. 6:18 Um, so the, the way you f- just framed it, it, it almost sounds like yes, there, there's some legitimate issues here from, from the Turkish perspective, but it sounds like this is mainly kind of domestic political play on the part of Erdogan, and that he, he will get what he can out of this, uh, leverage and then, then move on. 6:40 Um, and Sweden and Finland will actually join NATO in a relatively short term when, when Erdogan kind of got what he, what he wanted for, from, from this kerfuffle. 6:52 Um, and it's also seems to be the view of most Western policymakers. They're... Reading newspapers here in Germany, for example, one gets the impression, okay, yeah, everybody knows what's game, game is played. 7:02 Erdogan wants to get something, but at the end he will relent and, and will find a compromise, and Erdogan might kind of u- use that domestically, but it won't be, like, a huge deal. 7:14 I- is, is that a realistic view of the situation? Well, I, I'm not, I'm not entirely convinced of the it'll all work out in the end, uh, analysis. Uh, two things. 7:24 One, you know, yes, there is a, a very significant domestic political component to what Erdogan is doing with regard to NATO. That's not to dismiss the fact that, you know, the PKK is a security threat to Turkey. 7:40 What is a- an analytic leap and, and, and, and what I think is the, is the giveaway, the tell, as we say, that this really is about domestic politics is that 7:53 President Erdogan, Foreign Minister Mevlüt Çavuşoğlu have been saying that Finland and Sweden's entry into NATO is a national security threat to Turkey because the PKK has a presence in the respective capitals of those two countries. 8:09 That doesn't make any sense whatsoever. Um, so yes, it, there is a strong domestic political component to what's going on, but it's not the only political component. 8:18 The Turks do have a legit security concern, uh, when it comes to the PKK, not necessarily PKK activists in those, in those countries. When... 8:29 I've heard this a lot that, uh, you know, there'll be some sort of compromise, and we feel confident that by the time, you know, NATO meets the end of June, we'll, we'll have worked something out. 8:39 My answer to that is maybe, but I think that people run a risk when they don't take what President Erdogan says seriously. And let's go back to Turkey's purchase of the Russian manufactured air defense system, the S-400. 8:54 For a couple of years, senior American policymakers were saying, "It'll all work out. It'll work out in the end. We'll find a way out." 9:02 And throughout that period, Erdogan kept saying, "We are going to acquire the S-400." 9:09 And the American Secretary of Defense and the American Secretary of State and leading members of Congress kept saying, while Erdogan was saying, "We are gonna acquire the S-400," they've kept saying, "Oh, there's gonna be a compromise in the end, and it'll all work out." 9:21 And guess what? The Turks acquired the, the, the S-400. So I think a more likely scenario is not that there's some sort of compromise before June, uh, 24th. 9:34 It, so far it doesn't seem like other than the fact that Swedish and Finnish, uh, officials say that they look forward to continued negotiations over this, it doesn't look like they're going to alter their position with regard to the PKK, at least so far publicly available evidence. 9:49 So what's likely, more likely to happen is that 9:52 Turkey, Finland, Sweden, NATO, and the United States are going to get involved in a prolonged negotiation with Turkey over this that will delay, uh, Finland and Sweden's entry into NATO. 10:08 Now, I'm not saying that that is definitely going to happen, but what I am saying is that should be among the possible outcomes that analysts and officials and elected leaders have in mind when thinking about this. 10:26 "Oh, it'll all work out by the end of June," uh, is not to me thinking seriously about what the Turkish concerns and strategies and Erdogan's domestic political exigencies are. 10:39 This position of, of the Turkish government vis-a-vis the Swedish and Finnish accession to NATO comes of course, as you mentioned, after years of a bit of ambiguity in, in Turkey's military posture, uh, vis-a-vis, uh, Russia. 10:55 So you mentioned the, um, the, uh, purchase of the Russian air defense system, uh, which basically resulted in, uh, Turkey being kicked off the F-35, uh, fighter program. 11:07 Erdogan and Putin seem to have a somewhat cordial relationship personally. Um, at least they, they seem to be on, on the, on the same page on many things. 11:16 What has made Russia s- such a preferred partner of the Turkish government, and how has that relationship been impacted by Russia's invasion of Ukraine? Yeah. 11:28 There's a, there's a, there's a kind of wealth of things in that question, uh, that we can explore. And, and let me just, let me take a, a quick stab at, at each one of them. 11:38 First, I, I think it's important to keep in mind something that I alluded to before, which is that Turkey is above all in its foreign policy in the way in which it, i- it, it presents itself both to its traditional allies in Europe and NATO as well as the United States and to the Russians and others, is, uh, 12:01 a, an independent foreign policy because th- of the self-regard of Turkey as a, as a major power in and of itself. Um, so that- Yes, there has been, um, some cooperation between Russia and Turkey. 12:17 Obviously, the purchase of the S-400. There are, uh, important economic ties between the two countries. Russian tourism in Turkey is very, very important to the Turkish economy. Um, 12:28 Turkey gets a significant amount of its energy from Russia. We keep talking about Europe, but Turkey also is a major purchaser of Russian, Russian gas. Um, so those are all, those are all very, very important. 12:42 It's also important to understand that on kind of the major issues, Ukraine, Nagorno-Karabakh, Libya, Syria, Russia and Turkey have been on opposite ends of those fights. 12:55 Um, so and, a- a- and yet even though, you know, Turkey was a leader of the Assad must go camp and Russia intervened in Syria to save Bashar al-Assad from, uh, ignominious defeat, the two countries have managed to cooperate, um, for a number of reasons, some of them very specific to foreign policy. 13:17 The Turks have a national security interest in preventing the emergence of an autonomous or even independent Kurdish state along its frontier in northern Syria as Syria has, uh, collapsed and fragmented. 13:32 The Turks need Russian acquiescence to conduct military operations, uh, there even though the Turkish military is, is far more proficient than the Russian, than the Russian military. And that has driven, 13:44 driven ties between Erdogan and, and Putin, and they have developed this kind of, as you suggest, uh, kind of suggest this working, uh, this working relationship. 13:56 At the same time, at a level of abstraction above these kind of very specific matters that they need to deal with, Turkey and Russia are alike in the sense that neither country's governments or leaders 14:13 want, support, um, a, an American-led global order. They both believe that American-led global order, uh, detracts from their interests and their, and their power and their ambitions. 14:30 Um, which is odd because Turkey has been a member of NATO since 1952. But this, you know, the, the, the world turns. 14:38 And Turkey, uh, again, uh, particularly under the Justice and Development Party over the course of the last two decades, has seen itself as a, as a, uh, a power that's independent of its traditional allies, uh, in Europe and the United States. 14:57 Um, and I think that whether Erdogan succeeds in being reelected in 2023 or not, um, that approach to foreign policy is likely to continue. 15:07 It may change somewhat, but I don't think that the fight in Turkey, the political fight in Turkey has as much to do with foreign policy as we may think it, it does. 15:17 Turkey's role in the war in Ukraine has been a bit ambiguous, I would say. 15:23 So on the one hand, it has provided one of the highest profile weapons, uh, of the Ukrainian government, um, the Bayraktar, uh, drone, um, that has received a lot of publicity, uh, for its success, especially in the early part of the, uh, of the war. 15:39 Um, 15:40 at the other hand, it seems that it's, it hasn't taken quite as hard a stance or not, not nearly as hard a stance on Russia, uh, as European countries and the United States in as much that it hasn't applied a lot of sanctions, uh, on, on Russia or hardly any at all. 15:58 It has taken quite a lot of time to close the, uh, Bosporus to Russian warships. 16:04 Um, and, uh, today, uh, there's, uh, there's some reports of bilateral talks between Russia and Turkey over the opening, um, of, uh, the port in Odesa, which is still under Ukrainian control, but, uh, which, uh, seems to be something that Turkey has basically engaged Russia on more or less in- independently from its Western partners. 16:29 So what exactly are Turkey's interests here in, in, in this conflict, and how does the Turkish government try to play the situation? 16:38 It's a, it's a great question, and I think your question really encapsulates the complexity of Turkey's approach to the Ukraine conflict. 16:45 Uh, a- a- and I think what the, the Turks have done is they do, I think, genuinely believe in the, in the sovereignty of, of Ukraine and have been supportive of Ukraine, um, from the very, from the very outset. 16:57 Um, there is an affinity between Turks and Crimean Tatars. 17:01 Uh, so going back to 2014, the Turks were pretty vocal, uh, in their support for Ukrainian, uh, independence and have supplied the Bayraktar drones, uh, that have been very effective, um, in Ukraine as well as other theaters, uh, against Russian-backed, uh, Russian-backed forces, specifically Nagorno-Karabakh and, and Libya. 17:23 Um, what I think the, the Turks are up to is, first, you know, there is the imperative of having to work with Russia in Syria, and that's kind of an immediate issue that's on the table. 17:36 Then in terms of not sanctioning Russia, not closing airspace to Russian civilian aircraft, uh, 17:44 Turks, uh, Turkish officials believe that if they sanction Russia, they will collapse their economy, and they do need Russian tourism to help, uh, in a very difficult economic situation right now. 17:55 Uh, I, I, I'm one of these people, uh, having been critical of the Turkish government, though I, I think that the way in which President Erdogan has played this 18:03 is actually to the advantage of, uh, to the advantage, uh, of, uh, of Erdogan and Turkey in terms of- setting themselves out as important interlocutors between 18:22 Russia and the West and Russia and Ukraine. And I think because they have, again, Putin and Erdogan have this relationship, they've done business together, 18:33 they have a meeting of the minds on a number of issues, despite profound differences on other issues, they have found a way to work with each other. 18:41 And the Turks' refusal to sanction them has provided an opening for Erdogan to talk to Putin. 18:48 And not necessarily to end the war, but to make a difference in these kind of issues that have come up in the war, whether it's humanitarian corridors, which the Turks previously had talked to the Russians and Ukrainians about. 19:03 They had not been successful. But here, in terms of getting Ukrainian wheat to market, and that is a critical issue. 19:15 Well beyond the conflict in important countries like Egypt, the largest importer of wheat in the world, and the combination of Russian and Ukrainian wheat that goes to Egypt, a country of 110 million people, many of whom are poor and are dependent upon subsidized bread and the government under tremendous pressure there. 19:37 So Erdogan negotiating and at least trying to help open these shipments to the world would be very, very important. And because of the way he has played it 19:50 is an opportunity for him, which is why early on in the conflict, you know, Turkey had been at odds with its NATO allies. Obviously, this was before the Finnish and Swedish issue came up, but and had been, you know, 20:07 very unpopular in Washington in recent years. Turkey has kind of used Ukraine to rehabilitate its image. And I think this is an advantage that Turkey has in order to speak with 20:24 and work with Putin. 20:26 We don't know whether this will work, but I think that of all the people who've held themselves out as interlocutors with Putin, Erdogan has a better chance than others to move the Russian leader in a place where we can see 20:43 the possibility of Ukrainian wheat getting out to the global market. 20:50 President Erdogan seems to be preparing via media statements and public speeches his own country, but as well the kind of international audience for another large-scale Turkish intervention in Syria these days. 21:06 We, of course, don't know if he will actually go through with this, but why exactly is he publicly toying with this idea now and what would he hope to achieve with another military operation? Yeah. 21:19 Again, I'm going to sound like a broken record here and say that, you know, it's complex. There is certainly domestic political implications here. It does not hurt him to 21:35 apply military force on Kurdish terrorist organizations, the PKK and its affiliate or its linked group in Syria, the YPG, which also happens to be a partner of the United States in the fight against the Islamic State. 21:54 So that is important politically on two levels. One, striking a blow against terrorism. And two, revealing the hypocrisy of the United States all at the same time. 22:11 Then there is, and this is part of domestic politics, there's a growing desire on the part of the Turkish leadership driven by public opinion and to push Syrian refugees out of Turkey and back into Syria. 22:29 Again, also a domestic political issue. This has become something that's become more acute as the Turkish economy has run into very significant headwinds, to put it as mildly and diplomatically as possible. 22:46 Then, and interwoven with that is obviously Turkey's national security interests. These are groups that have been fighting, the PKK has been fighting Turkey since 1984. 22:55 The YPG, the People's Protection Units in Syria were stood up at the start of the Syrian uprising slash civil war with the help of the PKK. 23:07 And the Turks make the argument that there's really no difference between the YPG and the PKK. I think that's an overstatement, but it's clear that they're linked. And then I think that there is 23:18 this overall effort to declare and demonstrate independence from the United States and NATO allies. The U.S. 23:25 National Security Advisor, Jake Sullivan, made it clear to Ibrahim Kalin, presidential advisor, that in Turkey that an incursion into northern Syria would be destabilizing. 23:38 The United States did not look fondly upon this. The Turks are going to do it anyway, proving that they can calculate their own national security interests regardless of what the United States wants or desires. So 23:52 there is that. A number of analysts have made the connection between potential incursion and kind of putting leverage and as this is leverage with NATO over Finland and Sweden. You know, I don't really see that 24:08 as being as strong. I don't think that that's as strong a case as the other ones. 24:15 A-a-and, you know, the Turks have periodically done these, uh, done these incursions, um, even well before, well before the, uh, the, the issue of Sweden and Finland's accession to, uh, to NATO. So 24:33 I don't really see that as a very strong argument. You, you mentioned the, uh, Turkish economic crisis. 24:39 So to give a bit of context here, uh, the, the Turkish lira has weakened by 40% against the dollar last year, by another 20% this year. 24:48 Annual inflation rates are now hitting 70 to 80%, uh, last month, um, amidst the kind of soaring energy prices that many countries expe- countries are, are experiencing. 25:00 Um, but the inflation was already very high before the war in Ukraine started. GDP per capita, as measured in US dollars, has declined since 2013, so this is definitely not a, not a kind of recent problem in Turkey. 25:14 What exactly is going on here in Turkey's economy and, and how is Turkey's population experiencing this crisis? I, this is pure economic mismanagement on the part of President Erdoğan, who has, um, 25:29 r- rebelled against orthodox economic policies and has, uh, put tremendous pressure on, uh, Turkey's central bank, which is a- alleged to be independent, but we now know that it's not. 25:41 Um, and he has, uh, cycled through a number of, uh, central bankers over the course of the last, uh, number of years in order to pursue a policy of low interest rates, which, uh, 25:56 is important for economic growth, but it has this inflation risk and this has rattled, uh, rattled the markets and people have pulled out, uh, of Turkey and bet against the Turkish lira and this has led to this lira crisis, um, and this, uh, very, very significant inflation. 26:15 Now, the, the 70 to 80% inflation that you cited is likely a government figure. There are independent analysts who say that it's much, much higher, much, much higher than that. 26:25 And so, um, the Turks are continuing to look for, um, again, to put it mildly and as diplomatically as possible, innovative ways in order to stem, uh, the problem of Turks seeking safety in the dollar, the euro or gold by, um, you know, creating accounts in banks that are protected against, uh, changes in foreign exchange. 26:53 That seemed to stabilize things over last winter, um, but there's tremendous concern that, um, the pressure is building once again and that there'll be another crisis, uh, in the coming months. 27:06 So Turks are, um, struggling with, uh, obviously very significant i- inflation, um, food insecurity, um, a- a- and all the other attendant, uh, negative effects of, uh, a, a government economic policy that has been largely irresponsible. 27:27 Um, Erdoğan believed that he had time to kind of grow the economy a- out of and pursue an export-led, uh, strategy out of this crisis, which is one of the reasons why he has been going around and trying to mend ties, uh, around, uh, around the Middle East in particular. 27:48 There was an unofficial boycott of Turkish goods. 27:51 I, you can't see me, but I, I'm using unofficial in kind of sc- scare quo- quotes, that had an impact on, uh, on Turkish, uh, the Turkish goods going into Saudi Arabia, which was, uh, fairly significant. 28:04 So there's an effort to seek investment from, uh, wealthy, uh, Gulf countries to settle things with Israel, to improve relations with Washington, all things that I think that the government perceives to be will helpful as it tries to, uh, 28:22 grow itself out of its economic crisis. Thus far, none of those things seem to have worked. Obviously the economic climate globally is not ideal currently. 28:32 If the Turkish government would hope for, for some, some outside positive impact on the domestic economic situation, I, I don't think, um, that will be successful either. 28:43 Um, so what is the consequence of this con- continuing economic degradation in, in terms of pu- Turkey's, uh, international stature and, and positioning? 28:55 Where does this open up options for, uh, Turkey's Western, uh, allies and partners to get a bit more, more out of Turkey what they want or is this rather a, a bit of a danger, um, that, that, uh, might push Turkey further into the arms of other countries who might be willing to bankroll, um, some, some of Erdoğan's plans, uh, domestically? 29:20 Well, if you're thinking about China, I mean, China's already been engaged in currency swaps with, uh, with Turkey. I think, um, let's, let's, let's take it by a, a, a couple of different countries and regions. 29:33 I think that, um, one of the motivations for example of, uh, the Gulf countries, in particular the UAE, but to some extent Saudi Arabia as well in this new opening with Turkey is that 29:47 neither Riyadh nor Abu Dhabi could impose its will on Turkey through a variety of other means, supporting, you know, for example in Libya, uh, anti, uh, General Khalifa Haftar who wanted to overthrow the government in Tri- in Tripoli, w- and, and that government was backed by Turkey and that didn't seem to work, uh, so well. 30:08 And, and so instead they pursued a policy of opening with Turkey in which they, I think calculate that they can use the power of their, their- Enormous sovereign wealth funds, 30:22 uh, and combined with Turkey's weak economic position to gain the kind of leverage and influence over Erdoğan that they couldn't gain by supporting proxies like Haftar in, in Libya. 30:34 It remains to be seen whether that will work, but that certainly is part of the calculation of, of, of Gulf countries. When it comes to the West, I think that there is a real concern. 30:46 No one wants, in the West, wants to collapse the Turkish economy. 30:50 Um, and so, uh, applying, you know, uh, pressure on Turkey, uh, in a way that, for example, President Trump did in 2018, which he threatened to crash the Turkish economy if the Turks continued to hold an, an American pastor in jail on, on fabricated charges. 31:10 Um, n- no one wants to see that. I think European banks are exposed to Turkey, and of course, European countries are, are, are quite, uh, quite concerned about the possibility of real economic dislocation in, in Turkey 31:26 resulting in m- people trying to move from Turkey into Europe. So, um, there is, uh, a desire not to, uh, put pressure on. 31:39 But Turkey needs, you know, the IMF and, and support from i- i- from the international financial, uh, institutions, m- m- notably the IM- m- primarily the IMF. 31:53 Um, but it's not willing to do the things that are necessary in order to go to the IMF, and Erdoğan has made it a point of nationalist pride not to go to the IMF. 32:06 So there's actually very little, uh, that, um, that Western governments can do to help Turkey at this moment. Um, and so what they, Turks are trying to-- the Turkish government is trying to muddle through. 32:22 Um, they, you know, settled their differences with the UAE. Now the UAE is part of a, a, a currency swap scheme. 32:31 Uh, there is currency swap with China, with Qatar, a number of other countries, but thus far not with the United States and other major Western, uh, financial, uh, powers. 32:42 So the, the big elephant in the room here is the upcoming election next year. Uh, as you mentioned, Erdoğan is facing a multi-year low in his, uh, in, in, in opinion polls. 32:56 Uh, it seems doubtful if he would win a free and fair election today. Um, but of course, uh, he has spent a lot of time and energy and resources, uh, making elections in Turkey less free and fair over the past few years. 33:12 He has charged many of his real or imagined, uh, political foes, uh, with various crimes and put them in prison. He has, uh, he, he has, uh, uh, put pressure on, on the free press. Um, 33:26 what do you think will the election look like from a procedural point of view? Will it be free, fair? To what extent will, uh, his political opponents have the chance to make their case? 33:41 And, uh, if that chance isn't granted, um, uh, what impact will it have on pol- domestic political in- stability? Yeah. It's, it's great questions, and 33:53 I, I, I think, first of all, I'm, I'm not gonna predict [chuckles] the outcome of Turkish elections a, a year ahead of time. I, I, I've learned my lesson- [laughs]... 34:02 and, uh, it seems to me that Turkish politics really doesn't crystallize until, uh, the weeks, uh, right, you know, the weeks immediately preceding, uh, an election. 34:11 But I will say that it seems, given, you know, poll numbers, um, that if elections were held today, um, Erdoğan would not win re-election, uh, if he were up against the Istanbul mayor, uh, the leader of the İyi Party, Meral Akşener, the Ankara mayor, uh, Mansur Yavaş. 34:35 Um, the only opposition leader who he defeats is Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the leader of the opposition, the main opposition Republican People's Party. Um, [lips smack] 34:50 but all-- I think given those poll numbers, the, the idea that there'll be a kind of normal political race or the normal presidential race and normal politics in Turkey, uh, is, once again, one of those things that should be part of analysts' and officials' potential outcomes, but there are other potentials. 35:12 Um, and you alluded to it, that, um, Erdoğan has worked assiduously, uh, since 35:21 the AKP lost the 2019 mayoral campaign to Ekrem İmamoğlu from the main opposition Republican People's Party to, uh, make it harder and harder for opposition politicians and for, uh, uh, 35:39 for the Justice and Development Party to lose its functional majority in cooperation with, uh, the MHP, the nationalists. Um, 35:51 so, you know, look, that includes, uh, jailing members of the predominantly Kurdish HDP party. That's sort of repetitive, HDP party. Anyway, um, 36:04 by the architect of the, uh, Istanbul win for the CHP, the Republican People's Party, um, has recently been, uh, jailed. 36:16 Um, there is a court case against, uh, the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem İmamoğlu- Um, and of course, the Justice and Development Party and its agents have not been above, um, 36:30 playing games with ballot boxes, uh, and changing the rules mid-vote. So, um, and leveraging rules to their ad- electoral advantage. 36:41 So there's a lot of ways in which, um, the Justice and Development Party and the president can manufacture a victory that they can then kind of gaslight the rest of Turkey and the world with, "Wait, look, these were, these were elections that were regularly held, and they were free and fair." 37:02 Um, one of the things that, you know, Turkey, Turkish officials point to is that, in fact, the Justice and Development Party's mayoral candidate in 2019 won twice. Uh, after the first outcome, they, 37:21 Justice and Development Party maneuvered in a way to nullify those, that outcome and reran the, uh, the election, in which the same candidate won again by an even larger margin, which would suggest that, you know, clearly Turks have internalized the idea of, uh, elections and the way to change governments. 37:40 And like I said, I think the AKP is, is aware of this and wants to prevent something like this from happening, and they might do it through various means of electoral chicanery. 37:51 Another example, though, goes back to 2015 and the general elections then when the Justice and Development Party lost its parliamentary majority. And President Erdoğan sabotaged government coalition talks, 38:05 uh, which have a, a 45-day limit, and the election was rerun, and wouldn't you know it, the Justice and Development Party won back, uh, its parliamentary majority. So 38:16 there is precedent for both, uh, electoral, uh, maneuvering on the part, extra-constitutional electoral maneuvering on the part of the Justice and Development Party and Turks, uh, investing 38:30 tremendous meaning in the vote and the electoral procedures, uh, that Turks enjoy. So 38:38 if the Justice and Development Party kind of oversteps its bounds, you can imagine that this would bring people out into the streets to demand that the government, uh, abide by what everybody at that point would believe to be the, the actual outcome, not the outcome that the government claims it to be. 38:58 Um, that is going to be a very significant challenge if that is, in fact, the case and the polling kind of holds up. It's still that the Justice and Development Party is still the most popular party, but its 39:11 poll numbers have deteriorated. Um, so there is that possibility. Once again, I'm not saying that that is going to happen, 39:20 but this is something that I think analysts, officials, and elected leaders in both Europe and the United States do need to keep in mind, that there is this possibility of instability around the elections in 2023. 39:31 Excellent. Thanks so much for joining us today, Steven. It's my great pleasure. And thank you, dear listener. If you found this conversation interesting, you would probably enjoy more of Trendlines. 39:42 You can subscribe in any podcast app of your choice, including Apple Podcasts and Spotify, and you can, of course, listen to old episodes and find our show notes on worldpoliticsreview.com/podcast. 39:55 My guest today was Steven Cook. My name is Peter Dury, and I'm the producer and editor of Trendlines, and we are published by World Politics Review. Have a great week, and until next time on Trendlines. 40:06 [upbeat music]
