Turkey: The Politics of the Referendum

Writing in The Guardian, Simon Tisdall warns that, “…after months of impassioned, increasingly polarised campaigning, the vote has effectively transformed into a plebiscite on the eight-year rule of the prime minister, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan…” and that a “no” vote on the constitutional referendum could cause unrest. Tisdall sees this as unacceptable due to the growing importance of Turkey in the region: “Turkey’s strategic importance as a moderating influence and a sometimes controversial go-between…in the west’s dealings with Iran, Iraq, and Syria has grown rapidly in recent years.”

Concerns about the referendum are echoed by Haldun Gülalp in the Daily Star: “Turkey’s Constitution has been amended repeatedly since the (1980) coup. But its anti-democratic core remains intact – and, unfortunately, the current proposals do not dramatically alter that reality.” He goes on to describe the nature of other constitutional reforms that AKP has attempted to pass since coming to power 2005.