YEREVAN, Armenia — On May 12, the Turpanjian Institute of Social Sciences (TISS) at the American University of Armenia invited Dr. Cengiz Aktar for a discussion of his latest essay, “The Turkish Malaise,” with TISS Director Dr. Stephan Astourian.
Published in 2021, “The Turkish Malaise” reflects on the causes of authoritarianism in Turkey, in particular President Recep Tayyip Erdogan’s autocratic drift after 2013 and especially following the attempted coup d’etat in 2016. This evolution is characterized by the merger of political Islamism and Turkish nationalism and the emergence of an exclusionary public discourse lauding the “native and national.” Dr. Aktar’s thesis is that this situation is not merely the result of President Erdogan’s policies; rather, he argues that it reflects the mindset of large segments of the society, including people who did not vote for him. De-Westernization and unmooring from Europe, he argues, have facilitated the emergence of a neo-Ottoman delusion, combined with an Islamist and Turkist ideology. Dr. Aktar traces the roots of the current situation in Turkey to the ambivalent relationship of the Ottoman Empire with the Western world and to the denial of its past, in particular the Armenian Genocide. Nevertheless, he is far from uncritical toward the West in general and the European Union in particular, who have never been capable of interiorizing the idea of Turkey’s membership.
Following brief introductory remarks by Dr. Astourian, Dr. Aktar opened the lecture by outlining the five causes behind the general state of malaise in which Turkey finds itself today. These include the invention of the Turkish nation; the role of religion, and particularly Sunni Islam, in the Turkish state’s founding; statehood as a necessity for survival; the top-down imposition of Westernization during the Ottoman Empire and thereafter; and the collapse of the imperial myth.
Dr. Astourian then presented a series of topics for discussion, including the impact of the Tanzimat reforms on Turkish society; the conception of the Turkish identity on European concepts of race; post-imperial Turkish nationhood; the ideological continuity between the Young Turks and Kemalist periods; the subjugation of the foundational institutions of the Turkish Republic under the total control of the Erdogan regime; the ability of Turkey to play all sides in international relations; and more.
The event concluded with a Q&A session, which saw Dr. Aktar respond to questions about signs of the malaise in Turkish polity: the expansion of Turkish power throughout the Middle East; the serious impacts of the brain drain on Turkish society; and more.
Founded in 1991, the American University of Armenia (AUA) is a private, independent university located in Yerevan, Armenia, affiliated with the University of California, and accredited by the WASC Senior College and University Commission in the United States. AUA provides local and international students with Western-style education through top-quality undergraduate, graduate, and certificate programs, promotes research and innovation, encourages civic engagement and community service, and fosters democratic values.
