7 ms·

I've read the Economist for a long time, and they should be ashamed of themselves for not calling out how wrong they were when Erdogan was first elected. Their

I've read the Economist for a long time, and they should be ashamed of themselves for not calling out how wrong they were when Erdogan was first elected. Their line was that the AK's "moderate Islamism" would be good for democracy long-term, and anyone who was afraid of political Islam was regressive. Yeah, sometimes editors and opinion pieces are wrong. But admit it when you are -- I haven't seen the Economist staff learn anything from this sad episode.

davidw 10y ago
They - at least for a time - regularly mentioned how wrong they'd gotten the invasion of Iraq. So they do that on occasion.
bogomipz 10y ago
To be fair the Economist wasn't alone in a such optimistic proclamations surrounding Turkey's democracy in the region. Similar sentiment was coming out of Washington as well: http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/06/obama.turkey/ http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/06/obama.turkey/
rz2k 10y ago
What kind of turnover do they have at the Economist? The writing seems a lot like a student newspaper staffed by really smart people who have studied a year or two of economics or international relations.
sdiq 10y ago
I think Erdogan, the dictator, and 'moderate Islamism' as you quote, are two different things and we shouldn't conflate the two. If anything, his arch-nemesis, the US based Fethullah Gulen, is also an Islamist though of a different shade. Now, if this Gulen (if it is true he was behind the recently failed coup, or, otherwise) did manage to lead Turkey and ended up being different from Erdogan, when it comes to the dictatorial tendencies being overtly exhibited currently, Islamism, I think, wouldn't be the problem here but Erdogan, the individual.
- kolbe 10y ago
  Is it? I don't have any real data on it, but anecdotally, it seems like Islamic rule correlates very strongly with dictatorships.
  - shitgoose 10y ago
    Saddam, Qaddafi, Assad, Mubarak? Islamic rule?
    - kolbe 10y ago
      I think I used the present tense. For Libya and Egypt, last I checked, they were Islamic military dictatorships. House of Saud and the Ayatollah both functionally are dictators. I don't know what's going on in the Phillipines, but IIRC, they're falling into a dictatorship.
      - hprotagonist 10y ago
        Duerte and the philippines are Very Catholic Indeed.
        tim333 10y ago
        Duterte was elected five months ago with massive popular support and the Philippines is still mostly categorized as democratic.
      - deleted 10y ago
        [deleted]
  - tim333 10y ago
    I think it's more that Islamic culture seems to correlate with dictatorships. The Wikipedia article on it lists 47 islamic countries and says only one " Indonesia is the only Muslim-majority nation acknowledged as fully democratic by both Freedom House and Economist democracy indexes." Which may be because having been to Indonesia it doesn't seem that Islamic - a lot of the temples are more Hindu in style. Maybe the documents of Islam with the death to apostates type stuff don't encourage democratic ideals.
enraged_camel 10y ago
Back when he was first elected in 2004, Erdogan was not the huge asshole that he is today. His party actually conducted a lot of useful reforms that were beneficial for the country. Over time though he slid into authoritarianism, and started jailing or exiling people who disagreed with him. Some people believe this was him showing his true colors, while others think it's a combination of his narcissism and severe paranoia getting the better of him. Don't get me wrong: Turkey was never the pinnacle of freedom and the fair treatment of minorities. But, for people who care about liberal democracy and the separation of religion and state, things are inarguably in a much worse shape today than they were a decade ago.
- hackuser 10y ago
  > Back when he was first elected in 2004, Erdogan was not the huge asshole that he is today. His party actually conducted a lot of useful reforms that were beneficial for the country. / Over time though he slid into authoritarianism That is the standard practice of authoritarians. Rarely do they announce before being elected, 'if you elect me, I'm going to do away with democracy and become a dictator'. First they get elected, then consolidate power (including by governing in a way that builds political support), and then they seize power. The fact that he behaved in the way the parent describes doesn't mean he didn't plan to seize power as an authoritarian dictator (and it doesn't mean that he did). If the future authoritarians were easily identified ahead of time, they wouldn't have much chance of advancing their plans.
  - true_religion 10y ago
    Because they're not easily identified no one should feel like they have to apologise for not guessing their nature.
    - grappler 10y ago
      If the same thing (god forbid) should happen with Trump, it will be pretty hard to claim that he wasn't showing authoritarian colors in his 2016 campaign. He definitely was.

davidw 10y ago

They - at least for a time - regularly mentioned how wrong they'd gotten the invasion of Iraq. So they do that on occasion.

bogomipz 10y ago

To be fair the Economist wasn't alone in a such optimistic proclamations surrounding Turkey's democracy in the region. Similar sentiment was coming out of Washington as well: http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/06/obama.turkey/ http://edition.cnn.com/2009/POLITICS/04/06/obama.turkey/

rz2k 10y ago

What kind of turnover do they have at the Economist? The writing seems a lot like a student newspaper staffed by really smart people who have studied a year or two of economics or international relations.

sdiq 10y ago

I think Erdogan, the dictator, and 'moderate Islamism' as you quote, are two different things and we shouldn't conflate the two. If anything, his arch-nemesis, the US based Fethullah Gulen, is also an Islamist though of a different shade. Now, if this Gulen (if it is true he was behind the recently failed coup, or, otherwise) did manage to lead Turkey and ended up being different from Erdogan, when it comes to the dictatorial tendencies being overtly exhibited currently, Islamism, I think, wouldn't be the problem here but Erdogan, the individual.

kolbe 10y ago
Is it? I don't have any real data on it, but anecdotally, it seems like Islamic rule correlates very strongly with dictatorships.
- shitgoose 10y ago
  Saddam, Qaddafi, Assad, Mubarak? Islamic rule?
  - kolbe 10y ago
    I think I used the present tense. For Libya and Egypt, last I checked, they were Islamic military dictatorships. House of Saud and the Ayatollah both functionally are dictators. I don't know what's going on in the Phillipines, but IIRC, they're falling into a dictatorship.
    - hprotagonist 10y ago
      Duerte and the philippines are Very Catholic Indeed.
      - tim333 10y ago
        Duterte was elected five months ago with massive popular support and the Philippines is still mostly categorized as democratic.
    - deleted 10y ago
      [deleted]
- tim333 10y ago
  I think it's more that Islamic culture seems to correlate with dictatorships. The Wikipedia article on it lists 47 islamic countries and says only one " Indonesia is the only Muslim-majority nation acknowledged as fully democratic by both Freedom House and Economist democracy indexes." Which may be because having been to Indonesia it doesn't seem that Islamic - a lot of the temples are more Hindu in style. Maybe the documents of Islam with the death to apostates type stuff don't encourage democratic ideals.

enraged_camel 10y ago

Back when he was first elected in 2004, Erdogan was not the huge asshole that he is today. His party actually conducted a lot of useful reforms that were beneficial for the country. Over time though he slid into authoritarianism, and started jailing or exiling people who disagreed with him. Some people believe this was him showing his true colors, while others think it's a combination of his narcissism and severe paranoia getting the better of him. Don't get me wrong: Turkey was never the pinnacle of freedom and the fair treatment of minorities. But, for people who care about liberal democracy and the separation of religion and state, things are inarguably in a much worse shape today than they were a decade ago.

hackuser 10y ago
> Back when he was first elected in 2004, Erdogan was not the huge asshole that he is today. His party actually conducted a lot of useful reforms that were beneficial for the country. / Over time though he slid into authoritarianism That is the standard practice of authoritarians. Rarely do they announce before being elected, 'if you elect me, I'm going to do away with democracy and become a dictator'. First they get elected, then consolidate power (including by governing in a way that builds political support), and then they seize power. The fact that he behaved in the way the parent describes doesn't mean he didn't plan to seize power as an authoritarian dictator (and it doesn't mean that he did). If the future authoritarians were easily identified ahead of time, they wouldn't have much chance of advancing their plans.
- true_religion 10y ago
  Because they're not easily identified no one should feel like they have to apologise for not guessing their nature.
  - grappler 10y ago
    If the same thing (god forbid) should happen with Trump, it will be pretty hard to claim that he wasn't showing authoritarian colors in his 2016 campaign. He definitely was.