For example, we all know that the main opposition Republican People’s Party (CHP) is against the governing party, but it is not clear which one of the government’s policies it opposes, and why. The main opposition party seems only to react to the government’s statements or policies, and does so on a daily basis. However, the criticism directed against the government could be more meaningful if it were based on identifiable principles.
The opposition party has of course a number of principles, but these are apparently no longer persuasive enough to the public opinion as this party has not been able to come to power in recent years. The CHP still defends a timeworn version of the republic and it claims that everything that is wrong in the legislative, judicial and executive branches is solely the fault of the Justice and Development Party (AK Party).
Even if the current government was a very bad one, this would not make the people automatically vote for the CHP in the next elections because when people cast their votes they think about what the opposition parties promise for the future. The public has two methods in order to understand what to expect from a political party: They look at what this party had done in the past and at what it says or does in the present.
The CHP’s past record is, unfortunately, not so good. Its current position is also complicated. No one knows what this party’s concrete proposals are to reinforce Turkish democracy, we don’t know how it imagines resolving the problems of the Kurds or non-Muslims, what kind of solution it supports in Cyprus, what its position is on opening the border with Armenia, or on the Syrian crisis. Worst of all, the CHP’s economic policy is unknown.
What we know for sure, though, is that there is a fierce power struggle going on inside the party. Such a fight could be constructive if it were between a democratic team and a pro-state group; however, it seems that the fight is between two cliques whose only difference is the level of populist rhetoric they use while criticizing the government. This is definitely not a debate about democracy, or human and minority rights.
There are people within the main opposition party craving for more democracy and willing to transform the CHP into a real social-democratic party. They are often called the “young team.” I’m not sure if this label is a good one as perhaps it connotes a disdain and underscores that they are inexperienced. Maybe there is another unpleasant message in it, too: “One is social-democratic only when one is young.”
Anyway, the problem is that this “new team” is not the one that pilots the party. The CHP has three options in the foreseeable future. The first scenario is that this group will succeed and lead the party. A second scenario may be that they will leave to create their own party. In a third scenario everything will remain as it is and the CHP will linger in the opposition.
The lack of a credible opposition party is not a good thing for the government either, as the “opposition gap” is sooner or later filled by others, maybe by the press and the civil society or by the “deep state,” in Turkey’s case. So the government, too, has three options. It may try to “seize” the deep state at all costs; it may decide to put an end to the deep state mechanisms once and for all by, for example, accelerating the constitutional reform process; or it may encourage the emergence of a system composed of liberal-democrats and nationalist-conservatives.
