Turkey’s Game-Changing Election

How has the AKP remained so popular for over a decade? Will that trend continue?

Ülgen is a visiting scholar at Carnegie Europe in Brussels, where his research focuses on the implications of Turkish foreign policy for Europe and the United States, nuclear policy, and the security and economic aspects of transatlantic relations.

A main reason for the AKP’s long-term success is that the party continued the economic reforms introduced by Turkey’s pre-2002 government. As the Turkish economy boomed, the AKP made huge investments in infrastructure and social services, significantly improving the lives of a large segment of the country’s population.

For this, the electorate has rewarded the AKP at the polls, but the economy is now suffering from a slowdown and is starting to be seen as a liability for the government. It is no surprise that the main opposition, the CHP, has very much focused its electoral rhetoric on an economic platform.

Democratic freedoms have also become an electoral issue. The AKP has lost its initial position as a pro-reform party, especially since the mid-2013 Gezi Park protests, which brought millions of Turks to the streets in growing frustration over rollbacks of social freedoms and Erdoğan’s increasingly top-down rule. A wave of corruption allegations against the AKP followed. But so far, neither development has significantly dented the AKP’s support base.

In contrast, the pro-Kurdish HDP has adopted a more inclusive rhetoric, aspiring to move beyond its traditional ethnic vote and embrace Turkey’s more liberal constituencies. The HDP’s championing of gender equality, with significantly more female candidates than all other parties, is also of note.