A Close-Knit Bunch: Political Concentration in Turkey's Anadolu Agency through Twitter Interactions

Turkey’s news media landscape in Twitter: Mapping interconnections among diversity

“…A recent report of Genel İzleyici explores the closeness of connections among the mainstream media outlets in Turkey based on the audiences they have in Twitter (Mat, 2016) and suggests a grouping of users who tend to follow the same media. 7 Another study, conducted by Irak (2016), provides an analysis of the Twitter interactions regarding the AA board members and points out the issue of political concentration in Turkey’s public service media: AA, along with the TRT [the national public service broadcaster], has always presented a pro-government editorial line and political clientelism; with its 90 percent of content being devoted to the AKP, board members being former consultants of Arınç and Erdoğan or columnists of the ‘pool media’, and the cozy relationship founded in Twitter with other influential ‘New Turkey’ supporters do not depict a healthy picture for the Turkish media or the country’s democracy. (p. 20)…”

Where news could not inspire change: TRT World as a party broadcaster

“…With the AKP in power in 2002, the media structure in Turkey has transformed and reorganised drastically. TRT was restructured and controlled by people close to the AKP leaders ( Inceoglu et al, 2020 ; Irak, 2016 ). Thus, TRT became strongly in line with the AKP’s messages and gave the party’s members more time on-air compared to their opponents during election times ( Inceoglu et al, 2020 ).…”

Redefinition of State Apparatuses: AKP’s Formal–Informal Networks in the Online Realm

“…19 Scholars such as Berk Esen and Şebnem Gümüşçü define the situation, especially after 2013, as 'competitive authoritarianism', arguing that Turkey no longer satisfies even the minimal requirements of democracy. 20 Dağhan Irak uses the term "autocratic Islamists" when referring to the ruling party and its leader, 21 while veteran scholar Ergun Özbudun has adopted the moniker "majoritarian drift." 22 Fuat Keyman and Şebnem Gümüşçü also define the party and Erdoğan as a hegemonic power, and by doing so argue that AKP has combined a conservative, religious-based political discourse with a commitment to economic and political stability, in order to mobilize the majority of Turkey's citizens as permanent supporters.…”

“…In so doing it has cultivated both a pro-AKP media, and instrumentalized the state-run mediasuch as Turkish Radio and Television (TRT) and Anadolu Agency (AA)to advance and support the government's agenda. 26 In their brilliant study, Ayşe Buğra and Osman Savaşkan demonstrate that during the AKP period most successful businesses have been drawn into patrimonial relations with the government and have adopted its distinctive cultural values and beliefs while cultivating the loyalty to the leading cadre of the AKP, who have themselves moved in to leverage their political power to maximize their commercial interests. 27 With the exception of few aforementioned studies, the network-based characteristic of AKP rule is often neglected in academic work.…”