Walking along the waterfront promenade, I came to what appeared at first sight to be a piece of modern art -- a concrete block looking like a half-finished road or bridge not unlike many other unfinished flyovers of this city. Except this one is directed toward the sky, looking more like a missile launcher or a miniature Cape Canaveral. My columnist instincts told me to inspect that interesting slab of concrete just a little bit closer.Then surprise struck: On one of the sides of this monument, I spotted a signature in somewhat fading black. Willy Brandt, president of the Socialist International (SI) from 1976 to 1992, donated this work of art to the people of İzmir. I had followed his career very closely as I believed that he was a social democrat who really deserved to be labeled that -- I will never forget his famous saying, “Let's try [or let's dare] more democracy,” which became a pro-democracy slogan all across Western Europe.
I was at the tender age of 23 when I was first exposed to Turkey's complexities. The year was 1985, and I had been nominated by my national youth movement to attend a European gathering at the site of the Council of Europe in Strasbourg, France. In one of the plenary sessions, a Turkish and a French delegate exchanged more than only friendly comments -- it became obvious from the heated arguments that the tension was rising and the organizers had to calm both speakers down, and rapidly. The debate centered on the question of whether Turkey was a democracy and what was happening to the Kurdish population in that country.
I always enjoyed the pleasure of having a number of close Turkish friends long before I moved to this exciting country and was even invited to attend a Turkish wedding back in the mid-'80s. My Turkish friend who got married that night was a very successful university student -- aiming at a law degree -- and married a man of Kurdish ethnicity. Her stories about Turkey were not very promising as her husband had to leave Turkey due to internal conflict while many friends who stayed behind could not. Not having taken sides at that time, I decided to learn more about Turkey. Traveling back in time, I must admit that my interest and ultimate decision to come to this country dates back to 1985.
Coming back to the SI, I have always felt that it had one big advantage: It was a global association as opposed to being merely a group of European Union-based political parties. It grew so big, however, that some parties were allowed to become members that perhaps did not entirely reflect positively on a socialist's core values. The strategy was to have “satellite” members that would then act as a bridge between the SI headquarters in London and the country in question and later on facilitate future socialist election victories!
What struck me as extremely odd was that the SI turned a blind eye to most non-democratic developments in Turkey for most of the past few decades. Then, and for reasons beyond my understanding, a party without a distinguished civic society record became the SI's official Turkish member. Does SI-type socialism mean one step to the left, one step to the right? What had happened to the SI's slogans of promoting civilian democracy? I never understood why the SI did not more proactively support social democratic and socialist movements in Turkey. Is one conclusion that there most likely was simply no political party that fit “100 percent”? From an SI perspective, it probably made sense to keep the Republican People's Party (CHP) as its Turkish branch instead of losing touch with the country.
Let us not forget that trade unions and socialist parties had to discover Europe similarly to civil society here in Turkey. Many left-leaning European parties opposed a closer EU, fearing that an economic union would create job losses at home. Perhaps this explains why for so many years the SI ignored civil society developments in Turkey and also why it did not question the ideology of its Turkish member party, the CHP.
A modern day SI must use its statutory options to suspend active membership if a member party fails to wholeheartedly embrace universal norms of civilian democracy. Any member party should then in return be invited to enter a similarly proactive dialogue with other SI members to address issues which perhaps have led to ideological differences. Re-admittance is always an option.
Leaving Karşıyaka by one of the steamers and looking back at the gift Brandt bestowed on the people of İzmir, I was reminded of the fact that Western European socialism inherited the former Soviet Union's apparent love for monumental designs and wide boulevards for parades and manifestations in using a lot of concrete. The piece of art I describe in this week's column looks more like a road leading to nowhere than anything else. Why did the SI at the time not donate books, pencils and other educational tools to Turkish schoolchildren instead of a useless artifact?
