The New Turkey and Its Discontents

TURKEY The New Turkey and Its Discontents, by Simon A. Waldman and Emre Caliskan. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2017. 321 pages. $27.95.

Reviewed by Birol A. Yesilada

This book is a good account of developments since the 2016 coup attempt in Turkey and serves the purpose of drawing attention to what is happening in what is a pivotal country in the region as well as in global affairs. While authors Simon Waldman and Emre Caliskan's coverage of many topics remains mixed in their depth, the manuscript is appropriate for general readership. Chapters cover the role of the military in politics, decline of the generals' influence, the rise of the Justice and Development Party (AKP, from the Turkish Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi) and Recep Tayyip Erdoğan to power, Erdoğan at the helm, the impact of urbanization and rural migration on Turkey's socioeconomics and politics, the seemingly impossible peace process with the Kurds and its aftermath, and relations with regional neighbors and the reorientation of Turkey's foreign policy under Ahmet Davutoğlu. Tackling each one of these topics is a monumental undertaking. The authors, while trying their best to provide sufficient analysis, sometimes fall short of connecting the key points to account for Turkey's political decline into authoritarianism and its consequences.

While the main purpose of The New Turkey and Its Discontents is to account for developments since the AKP's rise to power, the authors provide a good overview of civil-military relations dating back to the first coup of 1960 and political developments thereafter in the introductory chapter. Waldman and Caliskan explain the beginnings of the Kurdish issue, the role of the generals in shaping Turkey's constitutional order after three coups, the rise of Islamist groups with private political agendas like the movement of Fethullah Gülen and its role in the failed July 2016 coup, and societal cleavages that will shape future of Turkey. One such cleav age is a product of the AKP's political message: "White Turks" versus "Black Turks," or members of the secular, bureaucratic-military elite from the Balkans versus conservative, rural Anatolians. Other societal cleavages that could have been identified are the divides between Kurdish and Turkish nationalists and advocates of laicism and Islamism that threaten to tear the Turkish nation apart. Second, the introduction...