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The Trouble With Turkey
Liberal newspapers are very keen to convince Europeans that the AK Party of Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is only "mildly Islamist" and thus nothing for either us, or secular Turks to worry our little heads about.
The AK, which not only runs Turkey's government but also its Presidency, is more or less a Turkish version of the German Christian Democrats. The Economist, to name one example, praises AK's relative economic liberalism and how it faced down Turkey's generals in the 2007 general election, calling their bluff when rumours of a coup were muttered.
Allowing women in headscarves to enter public office and universities isn't creeping Islamification but a long-overdue liberal measure which overturns archaic laws allowing the state to interfere in how people dress, they argue. Let's just forget about the claim by one AK member that "democracy is a bus we get off when we reach our destination."
Then of course, there's the EU issue. Turkey can become even more democratic if it joins the EU, the argument goes. Bringing a nation of 70-odd million Muslims into the union will prove that the EU is not a Christian club, and convince their fellow believers in the Middle East and elsewhere that a democratic alternative to secular despotism and religious fundamentalism exists. Anti-federalists believe that a nation the size of Turkey, with its peculiar regional situation, ties to NATO and youngish democracy would spell the end ofthet dream of a European Superstate for ever. Liberals say, Think of the extra clout a nation that size would add to the EU's common market. Think of the huge pool of cheap labour Turkey could offer the EU, both immigrant and Turkish... and never mind that the EU's borders would soon extend to Iran, Iraq and Syria.
We are even warned that to refuse Turkey entry to the EU could fuel terrorism - as if Europeans can be expected to be happy with those terms. Did those supporting Polish, Estonian or Maltese accession argue that to refuse membership could mean we could all be blown up somewhere down the line?
The leaders of AK are polished European cosmopolitans who just happen to be devoutly religious, the Economist has argued. Tony Blair was a confessed Christian, though this didn't guide day-to-day policy in Britain; pretty much every US presidential candidate has declared his or her Christian faith. Why should Turkey's leaders be treated differently?
Well, Turkey is not Spain or Poland. EURSOC has covered several moves by Mr Erdogan's government that Turkey's cheerleaders in the western media have had difficulty finding excuses for. In 2004, his party announced plans to make adultery illegal and punishable by up to three years in jail. Erdogan shelved the plans under EU pressure, but his "moderately Islamist" party was furious and threatened to withdraw support for a new penal code.
Last year, AK party workers tried to ban posters of bikini-clad women in Istanbul. The government wants to lift the headscarf ban for women.
The appointment of "former Islamist" economist Abdullah Gul to the Presidency rattled some secularists, as they worried he might sign AK-inspired laws which would reduce sentences for religious teaching in unauthorised schools. Others warn that the AK Party hopes to make Turkey an Islamist state.
Things have been changing quickly in Turkey. Archbishop Cranmer reports on how Erdogan "retired" hundreds of secular judges, replacing them with party faithful.
"He also has instituted an interview process - controlled by party loyalists - designed to evaluate government technocrats on the basis of religiosity rather than merit. Turkish Air employees, for example, have even been questioned on their belief in the Qur’an", Cranmer continues.
Journalists have complained of pressure. On a day to day level, life is changing in little ways. Turkish secularists used to enjoy eating pork in defiance of Koranic dogma: Now, abattoirs where pork is prepared claim they are being closed on health and safety grounds. Industry workers say that pork production has become informally banned by officials.
All little things, as we said. But ignored by the BBC, played down by the Economist, forgotten by the foreign office, which is the loudest supporter of Turkish membership of the EU. Nothing to worry about?
