A Fetih Accompli: How Erdogan Married Religion and Nationalism

Source:New Lines Magazine Date:01Jan2024

by Nicholas Danforth.  Kind  of dated, because the piece  was written before May 2023 elections, but presents  an internally consistent and refreshingly unique view of Erdogan’s ideology to reshape  Turkey’s future

For scholars and journalists who have watched Erdogan consolidate his power, this may finally be the moment to concede that he was always more sophisticated in his use of history than we gave him credit for. Where observers contrasted neo-Ottomanism with Kemalism, 1453 with 1923, and Mustafa Kemal Ataturk with Fatih Sultan Mehmet II, Erdogan understood that many voters wanted all of it, and gave it to them. Where observers focused on the divide between religion and nationalism, Erdogan grasped how effectively they could be wielded together.

And he proceeded to do so, fusing these overlapping traditions together through a series of real and imagined battles against such common enemies as Western imperialism, Greeks and left-wing Kurds. The result is a potent ideological current that will continue to bedevil Turkey’s democratic aspirations and relations with the West long after Erdogan exits the scene.