Contesting Working-Class Politics in Turkey: Social Transformations, Islam, and the Left

Bekmen, Ahmet; Öngel, Ferit Serkan; Hadiz, Vedi R.

doi:10.1177/0896920520934171

Cited by 8 publications

(3 citation statements)

References 25 publications

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“…According to these findings, workers may be driven by an ideological commitment to party agendas which may be quite different than the overall political orientation of the union leadership. Empirical findings from the Turkish context also resonate with these expectations: there, the landscape of organized labour is much more diverse and includes unions that have members with extreme‐right wing, nationalist orientation and others that have traditionally stood on the left (Bekmen et al, 2020). Similarly, unions—including Birlesik Metal‐Is—exhibit a politically diverse membership profile (Öngel, 2014, p. 215).…”

Section: Understanding the Political Preferences Of Workersmentioning

confidence: 72%

When do workers support executive aggrandizement? Lessons from the recent Turkish experience

Apaydin

Öngel

Schmid

et al. 2022

Industrial Relations Journal

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Following the 2017 constitutional referendum under the Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi (Justice and Development Party‐AKP) rule in Turkey, the reforms granted judicial and legislative powers to the head of the executive under a presidential system. Initial observations reveal that some blue‐collar workers who are members of a historically progressive union have also supported these reforms. This is surprising because the union leadership has publicly opposed these changes. What explains this discrepancy? Why did some of these workers support reforms in favour of a powerful executive? Based on a sample from a major metalworking union, this paper finds that partisan identity moderates support for AKP's push for challenging the separation of powers. Although we find that higher amount of debt may reduce worker support for stronger executive, this is conditional on the metal workers' pre‐existing partisan commitments. Under these circumstances, highly indebted partisan workers do not diverge from the party line. These results also raise further questions for students of labour and regime change elsewhere in the developing world.

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Section: Understanding the Political Preferences Of Workersmentioning

confidence: 72%

When do workers support executive aggrandizement? Lessons from the recent Turkish experience

Apaydin

Öngel

Schmid

et al. 2022

Industrial Relations Journal

Self Cite

View full text Add to dashboard Cite

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“…The number of strikes has dropped significantly under the AKP government when compared to earlier periods (Bozkurt-Güngen, 2018, see also Bekmen et al, 2020). This goes hand in hand with the decreasing unionisation, and disorganisation of labour.…”

Section: Strikementioning

confidence: 93%

Consolidating and Contesting Authoritarian Neoliberalism in Turkey: Towards a Framework

Borsuk

Dinc

Kavak

et al. 2021

Authoritarian Neoliberalism and Resistance in Turkey

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During the early years of the ruling Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi (Justice and Development Party, AKP), Turkey was seen as a burgeoning democratic power propped up by economic prosperity in line with the reforms for European Union (EU) accession and International Monetary Fund (IMF) conditionality. However, 20 years later, it is considered an emblematic case of democratic backsliding in line with rising poverty and inequalities that have been amplified as a result of sweeping neoliberal reforms and authoritarian consolidation in the country. The recent literature has identified these concomitant and complementary modes of authoritarian governance and neoliberal policies in Turkey as ‘authoritarian neoliberalism’. In this chapter, we discuss the dynamics of consolidation of authoritarian neoliberalism in Turkey as well as the acts of contention against it. Building mainly on the eight case studies presented in this volume, we put forward a framework that explains the consolidation of authoritarian neoliberalism in Turkey through the mechanisms of executive centralisation, autocratic legalism, cronyism, violence-fuelled rentier accumulation, criminalisation and stigmatisation, and contestations against authoritarian neoliberalism through strikes, protests, demonstrations, network building, litigation, everyday struggles, and armed acts of contention.

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“…However, labour activism re-emerged in the 1990s and 2000s. Workers in various sectors, from textile factories to automotive plants, travelled the streets to demand better working conditions, higher wages, and job security (Bekmen et al, 2020).…”

Section: Sociohistorical Context and Assistants’ Solidarity Movement ...mentioning

confidence: 99%

Territorial dynamics in organizing resistance: The assistants’ solidarity movement in two universities

Güneştepe

Tunçalp

2023

Environment and Planning C: Politics and Space

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How do social movements develop and sustain their territoriality within large-scale organisations? This study explores the emergence of resistive movements in organisations counteracting a new administrative regime with a relational approach to territoriality in the physical and virtual environments. Drawing, maintaining, and changing boundaries in physical and virtual spaces are crucial in organisational resistance. However, the extant literature mostly overlooks these topics. This paper shows how collective actors form a resistive movement in organisations through territoriality with a qualitative study conducted in two Turkish Universities. The study findings show territoriality provides more than a space of isolation and this space has no fixed resistive boundaries. Territorialisation within and out of organisational spaces, covering physical and virtual environments, supports the development of a resistive identity. Our comparative analysis of two movements in universities shows that territoriality in the physical world is essential. However, territorialisation in the virtual environment helps resistive identities in organisations to last even their physical activities fade. Moreover, territorialisation in physical and virtual spaces communicating the movement’s message to mobilise others varies according to the different stages of the movement’s lifespan. In addition, this study indicates how the activities of social movements of organisational actors in physical and virtual environments interrelate.

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Contesting Working-Class Politics in Turkey: Social Transformations, Islam, and the Left

Cited by 8 publications

References 25 publications

When do workers support executive aggrandizement? Lessons from the recent Turkish experience

When do workers support executive aggrandizement? Lessons from the recent Turkish experience

Consolidating and Contesting Authoritarian Neoliberalism in Turkey: Towards a Framework

Territorial dynamics in organizing resistance: The assistants’ solidarity movement in two universities

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