Is Democracy Retreating in the US and Europe?

Written by: MARKER ESYAN

I recently had an interesting conversation with a European journalist who was visiting Turkey.

The journalist said: “There are some concerns in Europe over Turkey. They are arguing that Turkey has been moving towards a religious administration and for this reason Turkey's membership in the EU should be given serious thought. Like Merkel recommends, maybe Turkey should be given a status of advanced cooperation instead of full membership in the EU. What do you think?” I told him that there are also concerns in Turkey over the EU and the US. I added that the failure of the US and the EU to call the coup in Egypt a coup raised concerns among the people of Turkey, whose attachment to democratic values has grown over the last decade. I told him that such questions as, “Are the US and EU going back to the dark ages? Will Turkey become a genuine winner by EU membership?” are voiced more frequently. Yes, maybe Merkel's offer could have been better for Turkey rather than Europe. There are doubts that the EU, whose economy has collapsed and democracy has stalled and where racism is on the rise, would be beneficial for Turkey. How reliable could a “democracy” that is unable to stand against a visible violation of democracy like a coup be? Of course, what I was trying to do was to shake the European journalist and make him review his position. His question and my response were based on mutual distrust.  However, democracy is something that should be performed jointly. It is not possible to see the EU and US as strong supporters of a coup, but it is also not possible to evaluate Turkey through the clichés in the questions by the European journalist. Democracy is a matter that needs to be deliberated collaboratively. I believe that the European Union is one of the most advanced models for world democracy and peace. However, this latest crisis showed that no single gain is safe, as seen in examples such as signs of weaknesses in the EU, the strong emergence of racism and the mistreatment of migrants. Turkey is not becoming Iran. As the reforms are stalled, the government will have difficulty preserving the positive outcomes of what it has achieved over the last decade. This is actually what is happening. There are ultra-seculars in Turkey who believe that a coup is the best option to get rid of a religious government. They think that being secular and pro-Western makes them democrats. In this way, they are experiencing a class clash with the religious people over a colonial mentality. As a result, they fail to realize that the religious people have by far become stronger democrats than them. And therefore, they do not care that their struggle against the religious people is not democratic. At this point, there is an overlap between the West and the ultra-seculars in Turkey in respect to the failure to properly call the coup in Egypt a coup. This is the sociological reason -- other than the national interests of the West -- for the West's reaction to the Gezi uprising in Turkey. The fact that the US made numerous statements on the Gezi crisis, that the EU made exaggerated comments on this matter and that CNN, the BBC, The Economist, The New York Times and other media outlets made biased reports on Turkey is troubling. Presenting the case as the resistance of the seculars against the religious fascists in Turkey is not the reality of Turkey; this proves the democracy deficit of the West on the East. Because of this rigid attitude, the reasonable criticisms against Turkey become unreliable and irrelevant. The religious people who realize that the Gezi crisis is being used as a coup attempt against the government dismiss this attitude of the West categorically. This is what happened. The West needs to overcome its perception that the East is savage, lazy and unreliable, and the East should abandon the idea that the West is behind everything bad that happens to us. For this, the reasonable voices on both sides need to become influential. (With Thanks to Turkish English Daily 'Today's Zaman')