RIP Turkey, 1921 – 2017
foreignpolicy.com
foreignpolicy.com
In this referendum, for example, the ultra-nationalist party MHP played a strong role, supporting Erdogan. Along with their notorious neo-fascist paramilitary units, the Grey Wolves, which attacked "no" demonstrations, especially any linked to Kurdish groups. But these militias aren't a new development. They're decades old, and have had various political roles over the years, usually linked to the "democratic" establishment. Historically the MHP often carried out dirty work for the Kemalists, especially operations that the military didn't want to do officially, like attacks on leftist intellectuals and Kurdish cultural figures. What's changed is that the MHP has switched alliances from working with them to working with the AKP, at least for now, which is part of an ongoing reorientation of political alliances. A weird alliance though, since AKP are more Islamist and MHP don't really care about Islam.
Edit: And clearly I have voted No in this referendum. Just such spaghetti bundles of false information isn't needed. Sorry.
I would like to know more. I've never understood the parliamentarian system. I'm use to a presidential system with checks and balances.
Advantages of the parliamentarian system over presidential include:
- short campaigns where the parties run, rather than personalities - short campaigns because the PM can call snap elections any time - parliament is usually not adversarial towards the government - elections are less frequent
Disadvantages: - parliament is usually not adversarial towards the govt - elections are less frequent
What I'd like to see is a way for the House of the U.S. Congress, and the POTUS, to be able to do something similar to calling snap elections: accelerate the election schedule by shortening the terms of currently-sitting congress-critters and the POTUS. (Presidential term limits would have to be adjusted to an amount of time rather than number of terms.) I think this would give us the best of both worlds. It would give Congress a huge check on the POTUS and vice-versa: whenever POTUS is very unpopular Congress could call elections, and whenever POTUS is very popular POTUS could call elections. And campaign seasons would be much shorter: presidential campaigns would not be two years long, but weeks or months. But a new primary system would be needed, that's for sure.
This whole citation needed garbage needs to stop. Go find the information from the obvious source, or don't, your choice. The burden of proof is a BS burden and is an excuse for people to not exercise their brains and SUPPOSED education.
Just like I wouldn't trust the average American to be able to meaningfully distinguish truth from misinformation (do I even trust myself to?), I wouldn't trust "any Turkish person" to do so.
You're making a strong, blanket claim, which you say is easily verifiable. Back it up.
I have no idea what to believe of it, if anything. Kemalists supporting AKP?! That one is hard to believe, unless they've accepted that they're out of power and want to curry some -- that's a possibility, I guess.
What is clear is that Turkey is sliding towards dictatorship with an islamist feel. Nothing good may come of it.
The Kemalists are all gone from the military, so expect nothing from that department.
We live in interesting times.
Turkey is in for a very rough time.
Anyone that's been paying attention to Turkey for the past decade knew of this. It's one of the reasons I hang on Camfrog, the Turkish are prevalent there (although typically the ones you encounter are just trying to harass women into displaying some skin. Mention politics and their attention changes drastically.)
Got it.
Keep in mind that this referenfum was organized under a state of emergency imposed after last year's failed coup. So its democratic nature is rather questionable. The No campaigners were misrepresented and harassed.
No, the Shah was pretty brutal. Besides SAVAK there were many other really bad episodes, one of which I read about some years ago but have never forgotten about as the epitome of decadency:
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/2,500_year_celebration_of_the_...
Turkey is a peculiar case. Turkey's post-Ataturk government has (usually) been more secular than the United States (to the point of--at times--making it illegal for women to cover their heads). It was quite a pleasant place for non-muslims to visit, e.g. alcohol was legal and widely available, and Israelis routinely went on holiday to the Turkish coast.
In the past, when the Turkish government has veered toward theocracy, the military has stepped in, restored democracy, and stepped back. The coup didn't work this time, and its failure made the theocracy stronger. I fear that secular Turkey is over.
Erdogan and AKP's political innovation (I think) was supporting a strong muslim-nationalist identity that consolidated support from both camps (thus denying them to the opposition) and created a very coherent story for why people should support him.
He also garnered a LOT of support from the international scene, especially western Europe and the US, when he got elected. It got hailed as a step forward for democracy, who willfully ignored and dismissed Erdogan's much more shady history. And, admittedly, Erdogan did start out as a right-of-center leader, which helped people suspend some hangups. He made a lot of changes that helped his base in the long run - easier access to stable government jobs, better public services, etc. Meanwhile, eventually, the secular camp's worries would be proven correct, of course, but in a slightly different way than they anticipated.
Re: MHP, it is mostly just grasping for relevance in an age where its voter base could just as easily go to AKP and CHP, which would reduce its overall support to less than 10% of the country, which would mean that they don't get seats in parliament (a law passed during the secular era to deny representation leftist / "communist" / kurdish / extremist groups, depending on who you ask).
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edit re: whether "Islam" caused all this https://news.ycombinator.com/item?id=14131444
No sane US military leader would attack even if they created a new Sultanate and aligned with Russia or Iran.
[1] http://www.globalfirepower.com/country-military-strength-det...
In contrast, Erdogan is not the type to leave power peacefully.
Indeed it is a pity that this vote was not to completely destroy that junta crap and install a new modern constitution.
Now, one guy can rule by decree and renew elections at will.
Sad outcome. Especially with 99% or so voting turnout, and such a close result. 97-99% voting turnout on such a large scale is a classic telltale sign of fabrication balloting, and was standard since at least CCCP, just like in Crimea independence referendum. With such a close result it would mean he was losing 70/30 by vote on a standard 70% turnout, but padding his numbers by 30% with his ballots was sufficient for him to maintain grip and win. Each successive referendum will make him stronger, unleashing his full potential without pesky opposition "provocateurs".
Turnout was 86%. Vote manipulation is very likely, but it wasn't done that blatantly. More blatant was the suppression of the opposition during the campaign.
However, since no one can replay history, no one can be sure that this actually would have happened. Erdogan would still have been himself, with the same corrupt attitude and religiously fanatic mind.
"One cannot be secular and a Muslim."
"If the skies and the ground were to open against us. If floods and volcanoes were to burst, We will not turn from our mission. My reference is Islam."
"Our minarets are our bayonets, Our domes are our helmets, Our mosques are our barracks."
I would also support the opinion that Erdogan used the EU integration process to selectively weaken the kemalist/military grip on Turkey's institutions. While you could point out that the EU were a 'useful idiot', IMHO there was never a realistic chance of Turkey joining the EU. The reasons are multifold, most important ones being the resistance of the EU population in major EU countries such as Germany, France and Poland. In that regard, I think, EU politics were not on an honest basis and just a game.
Those people are obviously not Turkish. The military, by its founding from Ataturk, gives ZERO damns about membership, in fact they were pretty much established to STOP various forms of state 'membership' including religious.
This shows Erdogan's (lack of) principles.
The EU accession project was abandoned long before Syria, when it became clear a lot of EU countries (Germany above all) were not going to allow it for fear of increased migration numbers. Since then, Erdogan dropped any pretense of liking the democratic process and the rule of law, which were supposed to be strengthened as precondition of joining the EU. He used the real issue of corruption in the secular army as an excuse to strengthen his own position.
The kurdish issue is a long-standing problem and Erdogan uses them for classic "pressure management ": whenever he's under threat, he whips out the kurdish enemy to solidify his support. He's done this pretty much continuously since taking power, making a bit of progress on peace efforts to keep up appearances then cracking down whenever he needs a popularity boost. Like black and red terrorist groups in '70s Italy, kurdish groups are likely infiltrated at all levels by authorities.
Erdogan's wobbling on Syria had little to do with alignment with Putin or the US, and more to do with him initially betting on ISIS then backtracking once it became clear US and Russia weren't going to accept it anymore. The Russian plane shot down and subsequent apology was the end of that particular game, nothing to do with long-term alignment. Turkey had already denied their US bases for a number of operations before then.
Erdogan is not a pawn or even a solid ally to this or that front, he just plays his own fascist game.
That seems unfounded.
It seems most of your post is your own take, which is fine, but you're posting it as received knowledge.
The first part of your comment denotes a misunderstanding of the situation.
Turkish forces shot down the Russian plane in response to Russia's bombing of the Turkmen (Turkish minority in Syria) rebels. Turkey/US stance in Syria is also divided because the US supports Kurdish groups, just not those aligned with the PKK.
EU membreship is achieved by democracy, checks and ballances, economic stability, not by shooting down Russian planes. EU officials go out of their way to avoid conflict with Russia. Many were for less tougher sanctions than those imposed by the Obama administration.
You are right about Turkey joining the EU being a pipe dream. Turkey's alliances should be with other countries with similar cultures (Turkmenistan, Kazahstan, etc.).
The reach of any one person without an amplifier of sorts (traditional media, facebook popularity, etc), is essentially zero; Even in the extremely unlikely case that you've changed the minds of 1,000 people you talked to (because to change 1,000 people's mind and vote, you need to speak to 20,000), it's still a rounding error.
It will make you feel good that you tried while you're at it, yes. It will also demonstrate how powerless you are if the results go against your wishes (or falsely make you think you contributed if they go your way).
It's the same as fighting the centralization of the web, the big brothering of facebook/nsa, etc - you have to mobilize people to act, many of them. And sadly, it's very rarely possible or within one's power.
If you don't frame your life in a way that whoever wins matters to you very less, you are doing something wrong. If that is already the case, your vote doesn't count at all. It's one vote. The chance of your vote actually affecting the outcome of the election is so small that you might as well buy a lottery ticket instead.
If however, you have the power to convince a large enough group of people to sway the election to one side or another, you should sell some of that influence to whoever is offering more money or favors to you.
The answer is it does matter, and that you have such little influence is a failure of the system. I'm not talking about one vote, it's that some individuals have more influence over politicians due to their campaign donations. That is unacceptable.
The answer once again is get money out of politics.
You can only take money out of politics after you've taken money out of politics
The answer is not to suppress the leftist vote and care about the working class' concerns.
Have you been to Okotogon or other protests? I have and it was really inspiring to see that many young faces around. I Support all efforts of making Fidesz the least appealing party. That's probably all we can do if violence is not considered.
Also, the US government wouldn't nuke their own people. If they did, they won't target Florida. Since those are off the table, we're talking about a traditional war. As we've seen with Afghanistan, the US military doesn't know how to fight an asymetric war. Good luck trying to get people that live in the hundreds of square miles of swamp.
Arms are a big factor. Europe is at far greater risk of authoritarian regimes because their people are effectively disarmed. A few single shot shotguns won't do much. If only their population had ready access to AK47s, AR 15's or event bullpups out of Israel.
I think this bears emphasis: Pretty much every crime report provided to or made by the police within Florida, silly or sublime, is available to the public [1]. This is a gold mine for people who want to run a "stranger than fiction" web site. It could distort one's view of what Florida is like.
[1] http://www.miaminewtimes.com/news/how-floridas-proud-open-go...
It's better to allow people liberty than to take it away in the name of safety. It's better to realize that anyone can make highly damaging weapons at home (looking at you Boston Bomber).
I find this ironic since they are not part of the Eurozone. Their economy is much less at risk from mismanagement in Greece than France, the Netherlands or Germany.
it's democracy, you need to wait for next elections
In a representative democracy, you need to wait for the next elections. In a parliamentarian democracy, a vote of no confidence can trigger elections (like Canada in 2011) or the Prime Minister can ask the Crown to dissolve parliament and call elections (like the UK in 2010). This can lead to situations like 3 elections within 5 years (Canada 2006, 2008, 2011). In the US, federal elections are every two years, with the whole House being up for election and 1/3 of the Senate while the President is up every other Congressional election.
The "no alternative" is a lame excuse, Momentum is coming up and even giving a vote to MKKP would be better than staying home.
I think spending time to think about how to best answer that question is probably the best thing one can do to prevent similar events.
We are in the middle of this strange global event and you can tell from the profusion of explanations that no one knows what the reason is.
-- loss of confidence in institutions?
-- wealth gap?
-- tech enabled cultural sabotage?
-- "globalization"?
And so on. I think people don't even know why it is happening yet. There is a lot of cognitive labor ahead.
The left refuses to acknowledge the problem while the right (and far right) does, so guess where that leads?
Then take an economics course. Realise that globalisation outsources manufacturing, agriculture, services, etc..., lowering costs, but also lowering wages. This is by design. The 'Information' industry in the west was supposed to make up for the loss of blue collar jobs. Except it hasn't.
And then also realise that immigration increases the size of the workforce, especially the uneducated workforce. Again, downward pressure on wages.
Personally I think progressive economics provides a better solution than the regressive protectionism of the right. Except the left pretends there's no problem, and here we are.
However, in the context here, you think that:
Erdogan swept into power because the working class in Turkey has been "weakened" by immigration and globalization?
Second, the parent of your comment was about right-wing parties rising in Hungary and Poland.
I am asking because I think most writers think of these as part of a larger global movement, but your comments suggest you think they are different.
In Turkey and the Middle East Islamism has been rising, partly due to the collapse of Arab nationalism and partly due to Saudi Arabia's worldwide propagation of Wahhabism.
We are seeing failure of trust in to EU because its terrible at PR. Its successes are taken as local governments successes ("our govt is awesome, it snatched the money from those bureaucrats for new architecture!") which failures are easily blamed on Brussels ("We wanted to rescure our failing Shipyards and coal mining, but Brussels tells us we can't because its unfair competition! In meantime French and Germans have no issues like that! This is unfair competition and favorism of west-dominated Union!").
Then you have usual of their weird decisions that are brought as example of overgrown bureaucracy without attempt to understand the reasoning behind it. "Hey, did you hear? Idiots in Brussels decided that snails are fish, what an idiots" the popular saying goes, meantime nobody cares that such decision saved EU from making up separate legislature for seafood farming and trade.
Then we have refugee crisis which is generally something considered result of poor decisions beind done in western EU side that it is trying shift the blame on across all of the union. The situation where in Poland is explictly named amongst the countries that show no solidarity while at same time we've accepted one million people from UA doesn't help neither.
With all of this going on, its easy for populist guys to gain widespread support. However situation in Poland where traditionalistic-populistic gov gained enough of majority to rule on its own is (IMHO) primarily the result of weak opposition, whose entire idea and programme was "we are saner than those other folk" but instead we've got liberal party apparently become traditionalist one with leaks after leaks of them doing disappointing deals with each other or private business. This effectively sank primary opposition party in polls.
They've also made some harsh steps to improve the grim future of our social security system via bumping retirement age as well as forcefully relocating bulk of private savings to the public fund.
http://www.reuters.com/article/poland-pensions-idUSL6N0H02UV...
Apparently there's trend in the polls going on for few weeks now giving them growing support, but its most likely the wave of popular disgust for current gov, which would be story from 2006 repeating itself. I'm unsure if they are capable of fixing things.
The problem with this is that these hacks will continue to be used against the EU even when trying to reform them: It's easy to argue against handing sovereignty to an organisation with such a baroque decision-making process.
A lot of effort has gone into transitioning more powers to the EU parliament, but ultimately, it will be impossible to get where the EU ought to be in terms of which organs have which powers without very difficult processes in most of the member states.
Deeply direct democracy is self-sustaining - people would agree to move over to a new system because it would give them more power than they have in the current parliamentary systems.
The problem as far as I see is the current political class (parliamentarians and people in the executive branch), which would lose power. And since this is who currently has the power, and it's always nearly impossible to make somebody give up power, that's the reason why this won't happen.
But Europe is in a state of crisis now, and maybe this crisis is great enough to motivate this class to move to a more open system.
If you think about it, the current indirect democracy (with parliaments and the electoral college etc) is a remnant of a time when a decision took days to travel through the whole land, and to be reasonably fast and decisive, you had to have them. Thanks to the internet, we could even go past such direct democracies like Switzerland and allow each citizen to vote at each bill, or if she didn't want to spend the time, leave that decision to a parliamentarian of her choosing, but with the option to take power again or give it to a different parliamentarian at any moment. Now that is true democracy. No back-hand deals, and no favoritisms anymore.
Switzerland was always an okay model of how to run a federation.
Ceding sovereignity always leads to less democracy and more central control, not the other way around.
The EU is starting to look a lot like a modern day Austria-Hungary, only bigger. We all know what happened to Austria-Hungary: WWI.
As it stands, the Treaty of Lisbon went about as far as it could in handing additional powers to the EU Parliament while triggering the minimal number of constitutional changes for member parliaments, and look at the circus that turned into. And that was first after the attempt at a constitution failed.
The centralisation you worry about already happened many years ago, and the sovereignty issue is now largely the blocker to devolving more that power to the EU parliament, and after the trouble getting the Treaty of Lisbon through there's little appetite to take another round anytime soon.
That Lisbon has given substantially sharpened teeth to Parliament has been demonstrated repeatedly, with both the Commission and Council of Ministers having been forced to backtrack or compromise in areas where they previously would have been able to do what they wanted.
Poland is post-communist country. During previous system it maintained many companies that weren't economically viable. Shipyards weren't build because it was economically viable to have shipyard there or there. They were build because Communists knew it was easy to guarantee mass employment by expanding heavy industry. This means that any polish city on our coastline with population required to staff shipyard got one. This shipyard would then employ between 20 to 50 thousand people on its own, as well as give employment for countless other people working in the region in shops supplying those shipyards or their workers. People from nearby smaller towns would then flock to larger towns to work here.
When system changed, so did the need for our fleets (in old system we've even maintained the Pacific Trade fleet and Pacific Shrimpfishing Fleets!) and in result the shipbuilding and maintenance services plummeted. It was same all across the board. Coal mining, steel mills, farming, weaving. Millions of people had to find their place in new reality. It wasn't surprise that people elected those promising heavy donations for what was left from first democratic's governments mass privatization, closures and sales. This meant polish taxpayers were keeping nonprofitable remnants of heavy industry in meantime being fed promises next governments about reforms coming in that will reduce the burden and sitting down by TV after work to watch in the news how our coal miners or shipbuilders strikes made current govt cave in, postpone cuts and offer another "mobilisation package" of millions of taxpayer money for keeping those industries alive.
This was business as usual until the year 2004 happened and Poland entered EU, which has changed the rules of the game and started hammering our govts for dishing so much taxpayers money at non-profitable private companies, that thus don't have to really care about being competitive with others.
How is this judged? Depends on region you are from. Some areas judge this in plus for EU because "apparently EU respects our money more than our own government".
But for other this is proof that EU wants to kill our heavy industry. Occasional news of EU letting same slip for some company in Germany or France is then blown out of proportion by the media to whole shipbulding in the west being taxpayer funded being allright while suspiciously its wrong when its polish govt helping polish companies.
I think Poland's decision to stick with the zlot is a good one on the long term. Once you switch to the Euro you've surrendered control of your currency to Bruxelles and there is no going back.
1.5 Million vote envelope don't have seals. Who knows where they came from?
Difference between yes-no around 1.3 million.
We just can't do anything about it.
(https://twitter.com/kenanipek53/status/853675735357247490)
I am sad that yes vote win, but continuously arguing for this kind of technicalities doesn't really change anything.
All other countries (except some like Sudan) doesn't require a visa for Syrians, while all other countries require one.
The world still doesn't understand this war we have and think it's a civil war.
People can't imagine that the few news they hear is true, they think exaggerated news.. believe me, it is not exaggerated at all, the opposite is true.
Children died from chemical weapons, a father has held his two twins after they died, all of this are happening to Syrians, and no one cares.
For Syrians, Turkey has done a lot and we appreciate it a lot, and we pray that Turkey stays safe in all aspects.
I.e., if you want to thank anybody, thank the previous governments of western EU countries (not the current ones) that educated their public enough to force the governments into doing anything. Without fear of public opinion all countries would've just shut their borders.
And why they keep arguing with Turkey to keep the sea borders block so refugees don't cross to Greece via sea?
promised to get paid for it. Yet to see a dime.
Actually calling them allies from Turkey's pov is outright a foolish thing to do, a better word would be "frenemies".
The first few google results for "turkey takes refugees" are actually all quite helpful to answer your questions.
(This sounds more condescending than I mean it. It's not supposed to be a "please use google yourself" comment.)
The people of Turkey are welcoming Syrians.
It's not about money, it's about acting like humans from both Government and People.
The unknown factor from a western perspective is how this new Turkey will align itself (or not) with western interests, not a sudden sympathy for fellow Turks.
> As such, the prime minister, supported by the Office of the Prime Minister (PMO), controls the appointments of many key figures in Canada's system of governance, including the governor general, the Cabinet, justices of the Supreme Court, senators, heads of crown corporations, ambassadors to foreign countries, the provincial lieutenant governors, and approximately 3,100 other positions.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Prime_Minister_of_Canada
Chilling, isn't it? Perhaps this change in Turkey is an opportunity to engage in political change here in the Americas.
(There are hopefully other checks and balances that quote doesn't mention.)
The act defines how we vote, the constitution only requires that the vote method be reasonably democratic.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/Section_3_of_the_Canadian_Ch...
You know, like Turkey used to have. Before yesterday.
> the commons may revoke its confidence in an incumbent prime minister and Cabinet or caucus revolts can quickly bring down a serving premier and even mere threats of such action can persuade and/or compel a prime minister to resign his post, as happened with Jean Chrétien.
> The Reform Act of 2014 codifies the process by which a caucus may trigger a party leadership review and, if necessary, choose an interim leader.
> Either the sovereign or his or her viceroy may oppose the prime minister's will in extreme, crisis situations.
Also what happens if the ruling party does not have a majority and they lose the coalition that gives them enough seats to rule?
Asking the sovereign to intervene is an extreme last-resort, having last happened around forty years ago in Australia.
Canada's democracy functions excellently when in a minority; in that situation the house has the balance of power, and not the PMO.
But at the same time it is glossed over that Turkey is a NATO member, and the second largest standing army within NATO.
So in that sense it is accurate to claim this is the death of Turkey, even though the land borders aren't going anywhere.
Just like Persia preceded what we know as Iran today Turkey will now change into something that you would not recognize as the country it was only two decades ago.
The people that have means and/or skills are fleeing the country in droves (or have been placed under arrest or are afraid to even voice their misgivings). It's a very sad affair.
Probably depends heavily on the kind of skills you have. Military minded and super rich industrials may actually like the new system better.
Newspapers in Western Europe do the same. Just yesterday I've read an article that first asked something like "Well, what will happen with the country now?" and then basically just went on to explain again that more power is left in the hands of the president, not what the (supposedly negative) effects ought to be.
I wouldn't vote in Erdogan's favor if I'd be Turkish, but he's still a smart politician in my eyes. With the uncertainty of having to deal with all the refugees, with decreasing support and protection from the EU, with growing power in the East (Russia, China) taking more control may be the only thing he can do to get his ship through the storms.
Avoiding that can be quite beneficial. The real question is what you give up to get that benefit, right?
It seems to me that what you give up is largely the ability to pass legislation that is only favored by a small majority of the population. Things that have overwhelming support still end up getting passed in checks-and-balances systems, generally.
I, personally, consider the inability to pass things with small majority support a good thing, especially given statistical fluctuations in such support....
Allegedly.
And no one wanted to bring sharia law in Turkey, I wonder if I was living in the same Turkey as you in 90s..
Rural people voting to give their civil influence away. By putting all power in one hands, making future elections meaningless and reducing power of civil actions.
Why does this happen? Because in e.g. USA, rural areas are anti-big-government and anti-power-centralization. Which is exactly opposite.
Somehow a lot of folks in rural US believe that:
* Billionaire real estate developer from wealthy family, who grew up in Queens and lives in Manhattan (both are the opposite of rural America), understands their problems and "feels their pain".
* Manufacturing jobs are coming back.
* Coal mines are coming back.
* Having less health care is more freedom.
* There are death panels in ACA (Obamacare).
List goes on and on...
It is easy to manipulate the uneducated people. That is one of the main reasons that a lot of politicians have vested interest in keeping general population uneducated. Educated people will never elect them, their corrupt friends or their spoiled kids (who are gonna run for office soon). That is why they do not want to increase spending on education.
3 biggest cities in Turkey voted for No. These 3 cities are having the most educated people. As long as people get more educated and it easier for them to reach for knowledge, it is going to get better for Turkey.
https://geopoliticalfutures.com/making-sense-of-turkey/
https://geopoliticalfutures.com/turkey-secularism-and-religi...
Once you lose independence of the judiciary system you basically lost the last remaining checks and balances. This is why I never bought into the threat of fascism from Trump. He would have to make similar changes which would never get off the ground. The US system has been shown to work exactly as intended on a number of occasions in the last two months.
The problem is the executive state has grown significantly over the last few decades in the US. But that was hardly unique to Trump.
If anything the main issue is the presidents ability to conduct 'military actions' without congress. That seems like a major risk.
But compared to Turkey the situation is far better in other western states. This is one situation where saying "USA DOES IT TOO!" can't be used to dismiss this out of hand (or EU countries in this case). And even if they did it wouldn't make it a good idea.
A centralized presidential system does make it easier to have all sorts of abuse, from which no western democracy is immune.
I have followed French politics for too long to believe in coincidences.
So far, there are no proofs. You also have to realize that our political class is prone to backstabbing, much much more than any other country. Everyone has dirt on everyone in the same party. So far, the Fillon revelations rather seem like they're coming from LR, not the PS or Hollande.
In term of proof, it has kind of been confirmed by Hollande himself indirectly. In his interview book "Un president ne devrait pas dire ca", he mentioned that Fillon contacted him after he took office, encouraging him to dig more dirt on Sarkozy, otherwise they will be facing him at the next election. Hollande then praised his own virtue by pretending he did not proceed and Fillon denied ever asking that. However whether this discussion happened or not, and whether Hollande did it or not, what Hollande confirmed indirectly is that it was a perfectly reasonable request from an insider of French politics (a former prime minister) to get the president to use the justice system against his opponent.
> As such, the prime minister, supported by the Office of the Prime Minister (PMO), controls the appointments of many key figures in Canada's system of governance, including the governor general, the Cabinet, justices of the Supreme Court, senators, heads of crown corporations, ambassadors to foreign countries, the provincial lieutenant governors, and approximately 3,100 other positions.
The bigger issue is their failure to add some context to make the comparison actually interesting. Like they could say that Canadian Prime Ministers are rarely removed from office (https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_prime_ministers_defeat... ). Nevermind that it has been done a number of times in an orderly fashion.
I think many Canadians took for granted just how much process was informal tradition followed on honour and not binding rules.
'Exactly as intended' and the growth of executive influence and the federal government as a whole seem rather contradictory. And what's unique is Trump himself.
The next claim you had an issue with:
> The US system has been shown to work exactly as intended on a number of occasions in the last two months.
That's why it's not contradictory. The courts have (finally) been reining in the president. (It would have been nice if it started a decade or two ago, but Trump is, as you say, something of a unique threat, and that may be concentrating minds in the judiciary.)
http://anayasadegisikligi.barobirlik.org.tr/Anayasa_Degisikl...
It can't be done, not in Turkey. Appointing judges is in the hands of the Supreme Board of Judges and Prosecutors. The president appoints half of the 12-member board and the parliament, most of whom are Erdogan supporters, appoints the other half.
https://en.m.wikipedia.org/wiki/2016–17_Turkish_purges
But contrast that ideal with the reality that the government had already purged thousands of judges to destroy their independence and disempower then.
France is not even close to what Edrogan is doing. Yes, our system gives a lot of power to the president, more than in many countries. However, the prime minister is picked amongst the majority in the national assembly, and there are many, many countermeasures to ensure the president doesn't go wild, even if some recent presidents have tried to erode that (namely, Sarkozy).
Once again we will have to open our borders to this good people running away from a war and once again we will have to pretend that the majority of them didn't actually choose this way of life by supporting some dictator/ideology whose main ideologic pillars are xenophoby against people that don't follow their religion their way (Kurds) and a return to islamism in some form of Sharia.
We can/should help those in need and in fact we do help those in need, but don't put the blame on us for those people grave conditions in the first place.
For instance we should have known that if we don't consider Turkey as a partner, that they will at some point say "x you" and look for support from others. We could've also considered how we can take care of the refugees instead of dropping them on weaker governments. And we could have also considered how to treat Greece like a part of our community instead of sucking them more and more dry, which leaves all other fringe EU countries wondering how they will be treated if they ever get weaker.
- Turkey brought their legal institutions to the modern times
- that Turkey showed more respect for democratic and humanistic principles
- that Turkey respected more the civil rights of their citizens
- that Turkey respected their ethnic minorities (like the Kurds)
- Turkey recognized a member of the EU as an actual country (Cyprus).
And then, after Turkey failed yet, and yet again to address all those problems and we told them patiently yet again, that they needed to address those problems and they still didn't, they decided they are not going to really try and reverted the little work they had done.
And you come and blame the EU for wanting Turkey to become a country that actually respects the right of its own citizens.
How could we be so heartless, right?
Yes. You still haven't managed to think about what's our fault and why yet, though.
Europe and America invaded iraq.
Europe killed Gaddafi and then abandoned Libya to the vacuum.
On Syria, i guess Europe and america and share blame with their middle eastern allies. But again Europe was willing and eager participant.
Its called blowback. You reap what you sow.
Really? I'd have chosen different words, or none at all.
Iran isn't a dictatorship.
I'm sure there are more, but these are off the top of my head.
To be clear, Iran is not totalitarian, but definitely shades of dictatorship.
It really feels like a repeat of communism. The rise of an ideology across the world. It's not an homogeneous block. Various muslim ethnic groups hate each others, as did the Maoists, Stalinists, Trotskyist, etc. It happens pretty much everywhere there is a muslim population. Morocco, Algeria, Tunisia, Lybia, Egypt, Yemen, Somalia / Eritrea, Iraq, Syria, Turkey, Iran, Afghanistan, Pakistan, Indonesia, etc. Western leaders like to pretend that islamists are a minority of extremist groups but the reality is that pretty much anytime there has been a free-ish election in any of these countries, the islamists toped the polls, or got an outright majority.
I think it will get worse before it gets better.
Iran certainly cannot be called a full democracy, the religious council has to approve candidacies for President - it isn't even clear if the current President Rouhani can pose as a candidate!
But there are some Muslim democracies working better, like Indonesia and Malaysia.
Isn't the hallmark of a healthy democracy a strict separation of church and state, regardless of the religion concerned?
This is all a reaction to changing times, with globalization a key driver in loss of status. Some cultures can handle it, some can't.
Bangladesh has been ruled by a woman (a long running rivalry between Sheikh Hasina and Khaleda Zia) since 1991 pretty much continuously.
All three have secular, and at least nominally democratic governments. Not without their problems, far from it. There are many reasons for these, domestic, colonial, Islamic neihbours, etc... but I think your comment betrays an extremely superficial view of the world.
"Thinkers within the AKP — notably former Prime Minister Ahmet Davutoglu — harbored reservations about the compatibility of Western political and social institutions with their predominantly Muslim society. But the AKP leadership never acted upon this idea, choosing instead to undermine aspects of Ataturk’s legacy within the framework of the republic. That is no longer the case."
The fact that not a single muslim country can be called a democracy does raise some question about the religion itself and its current set of values.
The AKP is an Islamic party and we've been discussing it's threat to secularism and democracy in Turkey vigorously for many years. The supposed (self-)censorship of which you speak doesn't exist.
For the record, elections are coming up in Indonesia, the largest muslim country. And yes conservative Islam and Islamism are a threat to democracy in many democratic Muslim countries. Which is why it is opposed by moderate democratic muslims (like the 49% that voted no in Turkey).
https://www.nytimes.com/2017/04/17/world/asia/jakarta-electi...
"As of 2012, Indonesia is the only Muslim-majority nation acknowledged as fully democratic by both Freedom House and Economist democracy indexes."
RIP Austria (OVP), long time ago. RIP France (soon, NF - Le Pen). RIP Germany (soon AfD). RIP Holland (soon Vilgers), RIp Russia, RIP Hungary. In similar lines - Maybe RIP USA too. (Trump).
I know this is the line being hyped by anglophone newspapers, so I don't blame you for believing it, but we're talking about a party which has peaked at around 12% in national polls. Every single other notable party despises the AfD and is completely unwilling to consider a coalition with them.
It would take a small miracle to dislodge the current CDU/CSU/SPD grand coalition at all (about 66% combined), and the only remotely plausible alternative would be a shift to the left with SPD/Greens/Left. Nobody is talking about the AfD.
Hey, you wanna make a bet on that? I'd love to win easy money from gullible people. The only way Le Pen wins is if she gets an absolute majority in the first round.
She doesn't win the second round. She doesn't win the legislatives. The National Front is nothing.
I'd say more RIP USA than RIP <western european government> for now.
He would rank so left on the US spectrum of politics, Bernie Sanders would call him "a fucking commie".
Just sayin'.
I can laugh at the hypocrisy of Western media and it's support to.. Democracy.
PS: Thanks for down vote, I can understand this unexpected results are not making many happy, that's OK. I was not happy when Trump became President but then I respect the choice of voters :-)
Besides, even if Erdogan had been Christian, the end result would be the same: he now has fewer controls on his power, fewer people he needs to make happy to stay in power, and more ways to entrench himself in the Turkis government.
Hahah, keep dreaming, he is here for 8 years :-)
Dictator and terrorist are the terms that are relative, everyone use for his own sake.
"Enabling Egypt's President Sisi, an Enemy of Human Rights"
"The U.S. Should Not Be Egypt's Accomplice "
"Trump Shifts Course on Egypt, Praising Its Authoritarian Leader"
"Abdel Fattah el-Sisi, the defense minister and commander in chief of the armed forces, seized power in July 2013 and outlawed protests."
"Egypt's Ricketty Dictatorship"
Yet to find such country. We re not talking about bookish knowledge. World witnessed what's been happening with Blacks in US and Muslims in India.
You know about these events because something resembling an independent and strong media exists in both of those countries. The lack of which is also the reason you hardly ever hear about the persecution of non-Muslims in Pakistan and Bangladesh.
Erdogan has already cleansed the media off his opponents. That pillar of democracy is already down.
It's easy to justify one's actions, no matter how repugnant, against the spectre of some unknown enemy.
Politicians and public officials perjuring themselves (2 years from Nixon)
Intelligence agencies run amok (CIA toppling governments like they are made out of cards)
Flagrant civil rights violations by police (LOL no example needed here I should hope)
Please don't conflate better information with worse conditions. Things have never been better and they are getting better all the time (public shaming of politicians who say or do stupid shit, Snowden level leaks of intelligence agency bad behavior, federally recognized rights for gays in the military and marriage etc).
CIA and NSA are enjoying unprecedented levels of low oversight and restraint.
For all the "public shaming" that is supposedly happening, where are the actual consequences?
Just leave the people the chance to state/express what they want (democratically) without coups that we always suffer from. When the people choice doesn't go with the west the unleash their military pets and force a coup.