This is an election filled with warnings, and with no winner. The AK Party is the big loser, falling prey to its overblown self-esteem. Its leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, has, by his sheer overwhelming presence, managed to overshadow the given character of these elections -- that the vote was, after all, meant to be influenced by the choice of local politicians. The choice of candidates for mayoral posts in many provinces did not overlap with what the voters had in mind. The ruling party lost 16 important provinces.
Then, you have the big picture. Although the election campaigns in many places were basically shouting matches, a nasty duel of rhetoric between Erdoğan and his adversary, Deniz Baykal, leader of the Republican People's Party (CHP), the focus of many voters remained unchallenged: The global economic crisis and its most visible result in Turkey at the moment had an impact on the decline of popular support for the AK Party.
Despite the fact that Erdoğan and his government first delayed and then underplayed the significance of the creeping crisis on households and despite the fact that Baykal grossly failed to push his campaign on it, the shift from the AK Party to two other parties in the conservative right, the Democrat Party (DP) and the Felicity Party (SP), is to be explained as protest votes. Significant numbers of voters are not happy with the management of the economy.
Is it a warning to the AK Party? Yes. If we leave the Kurdish votes aside for a moment, it is obviously the segments of the middle and lower-middle classes that "lent" their support "temporarily" to the DP in the center-right and the SP in the conservative-religious flank. Erdoğan seems to have received the message quickly. He knows that the powerful center-right party of the 1980s, the Motherland Party (then ANAP, now ANAVATAN), which was led by the late Turgut Özal, fell into a process of dissolution after a surprising defeat in the local elections in 1989. The movie, seen 20 years ago, can repeat itself if one keeps in mind the fact that the AK Party is a focal point of realignment as ANAP was then. Worth keeping in mind, too, is that politicians know how to manage success (later to mismanage it), but have shown no skills in managing failure. It often leads to party deaths and funerals.
Erdoğan will feel unarticulated pressure within the AK Party, and he will need to specify a new direction for his party. How can those votes that went to the DP and the SP be won back? How can the struggle to stay above 40 percent of the national vote be carried out? It remains to be seen whether he will seek a less global, more nationalistic path or open up even more to the path toward the European Union. It will be a vital decision for the AK Party's future.
The reform packages he pledged, seeking a consensus for a new constitution and changes in political party and election laws may all depend on how he designs his new strategy. What he has before him, in the theater of politics, from now on, is a new excitement and vitality within the opposition. The challenge, therefore, is most likely to be humbling.
As with the Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), the CHP cannot claim victory either. But there is now a brand new phenomenon, as predicted by pollsters before the vote, symbolized by the radical shift of choices in İstanbul. Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu, the CHP's soft-spoken candidate for İstanbul, is now emerging as a de facto challenger for Baykal as the next leader of the party. Had he won the third most important political post in Turkey, Baykal would share the glory; but the loss poses a new situation inside the severely criticized CHP, which might escalate to a new fight for power. Let us keep in mind that the gap between the AK Party and the MHP and CHP is still very large; the AK Party still received more votes than the CHP and MHP combined. No significant gain (it is the city councils that count) for the opposition and a loss for the AK Party mean, most importantly, that the average dismayed voter is keenly seeking to "carve a new political channel." Those who are unhappy tend to vote against their better judgment, rather unwillingly, for other parties, in the hope that a real political alternative, a bold challenge emerges in the next elections.
The vote in Kurdish provinces meant that the Democratic Society Party (DTP) did not lose, and Erdoğan failed in what many see as a referendum on where Kurds really stand: pocket or identity. They chose the latter, regaining Van and Siirt, sending clear signals to Ankara. Erdoğan's other challenge will, therefore, be how to "normalize" Ankara's relations with the DTP and go ahead with Kurdish reform.
The March 29 elections might be a strong forecast for a new balance taking shape in Turkish politics. Voters are behaving rationally, they are increasingly more "issue related" than before and they seek a major alternative. The good news is that in civilian politics, democracy is maturing and is seen as a natural part of life. One hopes that those who acted in fear that Islamic rule was creeping in and have harshly attempted to engineer society into their own undemocratic projects have learned their final lesson and have learned to trust each and every citizen.
