'Nonviolence means avoiding not only external physical violence but also internal violence of spirit. You not only refuse to shoot a man, but you refuse to hate him' – Martin Luther King When the wave of uprisings often called the Arab Spring swept over the region, Ankara's hopes were up. Now was the time, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan and his Justice and Development Party (JDP) imagined, that Turkey would lead the region into a new era. This wasn't to be. In fact, nothing that Erdogan did seemed to work, the Arab revolutions going their separate ways and Turkey ending up more isolated and disjoined than ever before. To add insult to injury, Erdogan mishandled protests at home, thus erasing any hope that his country could be a beacon for progress in the Arab and Muslim world, a claim that Ankara long entertained, even more so under its current breed of Islamist rulers. In hindsight, we all know that the wave that swept the Arab region wasn't going to stop at any imaginary or real borders. In hindsight, we all know that Turkey was not immune to political discontent. But three years ago, this was all still in the future. And Erdogan was utterly thrilled to see Egypt's Hosni Mubarak overthrown. There is a tale that may explain why Turkey's ruling JDP was thrilled to see power change hands in Egypt. Back in 1996, then prime minister Necmettin Erbakan — generally viewed as the father of political Islam in Turkey — was on an official visit to Egypt. During talks with president Mubarak, Erbakan had a few words of praise for the Muslim Brotherhood, calling them “good people”. Mubarak, who had no love lost for the Brotherhood, made a joke. “So, perhaps you don't mind if I send them to you,” Egypt's then-president said. Since that moment, the story goes, Turkey wasn't fond of Egypt's political leadership. So as soon as protests broke out in Cairo, Erdogan's government jumped to criticise Mubarak's heavy-handed reaction to peaceful demonstrations. In Tunisia, Ankara was more careful. It wasn't before it made sure that the Islamists were about to win that it sided with the revolutionaries. In Libya, Turkey was even more cautious, speaking against NATO's intervention and acting as if Muammar Gaddafi's brutality could be allowed to go on. Some say that in this case Ankara was reluctant to endanger its extensive economic interests in Libya. Others say that the fact that Erdogan had received a human rights award from Gaddafi somewhat clouded his judgement. When it was Syria's time to erupt, Erdogan advised the Syrian president, who was a close friend of his, to introduce reform. When Bashar Al-Assad balked, Ankara changed its tone. As thousands of refugees began spilling into Turkey, Erdogan turned against his erstwhile friend and — hoping that Al-Assad would fall within months — made common cause with the revolutionaries. Then the revolution ran out of breath, and Turkey found itself in a majority of one in what was once a solid Western backing of the anti-regime revolutionaries. Then Turkey was hit by protests, and Erdogan found himself the subject of international irony. Instead of siding with foreign nations against their rulers, he was the one failing to deliver leadership at home in times of turbulence. When the anti-government protests broke out in Istanbul on 26 May 2013, the focus was not on politics, but on trees. The demonstrators were objecting to a municipal plan to cut trees to build an Ottoman-style barracks off Taksim Square in Istanbul. The debacle soon turned into a national crisis, pitting the ruling Islamists against a broad based Turkish opposition that — just like the revolutions of the Arab Spring — was joined but not led by politicians. Professor Soli Ozel of the Kadir Has University offered this account of the early days of the Gezi Park confrontation in Istanbul. “The smell of tear gas hung over Gezi Park. I had passed by the park just after midnight on Wednesday, 12 June. It was relatively quiet under the sycamore trees. Then sporadic turbulence set in. On Tuesday, 11 June, the police had fired tear gas and dispersed protesters in Taksim Square using water cannons and rubber bullets.” On Wednesday morning, the demonstrators came back, some to protest the plan to cut down trees and others to protest the heavy-handedness of the police. Opposition political parties soon joined the melee. The Peace and Democracy Party, the political arm of the banned Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK), took part in the protests. Imprisoned PKK leader Abdullah Ocalan denounced the government's “oppression of young people”. The Republican People's Party leader Kemal Kilicdaroglu spoke against “police brutality”, claiming that Erdogan was pushing to country towards civil war. “Fellow citizens, the strongest point in your resistance is that you are right and you are peace-loving. You are right and strong, and people of conscience all over the world are proud of you,” Kilicdaroglu said. So what exactly happened? Was Turkey, the country that once posed as a potential model for democratisation in the Arab world, experiencing a temporary hiccup, or is this a lasting malaise? The turbulence has ebbed in Turkey now, but not without considerable damage to the political standing of Erdogan and the JDP. Ozel believes that the Turkish demonstrators were trying to define the meaning of democracy. “One must remember that the poorest neighbourhoods in Istanbul took part in the protests, so did the football fans. So the protesters' identity cannot be pinned on one class,” he said. In their demonstrations, the Turks appeared to be interested in broadening the base of liberalism and redefining the boundaries of democracy. The demonstrators in Taksim Square challenged Erdogan's understanding of democracy. Having won power with the support of 50 per cent of the nation, Erdogan imagined that the rest of the nation must accept any policies his government pursues. This — everyone now knows — was not accepted. The Turks were rebelling against the narrow religious and cultural outlook of the ruling party. And their discontent is redefining Turkey's concepts of citizenry and equality.
