Stop me if you've heard this one before: "In short, a natural politician, Erdogan has a common touch and an ability to communicate his empathy for the plight and aspirations of the common citizen. He projects the image of the Tribune of Anatolia, ready to take on corruption and privilege and to defend conservative traditions."
America's former ambassador to Turkey, Eric Edelman, writing what he thought was a classified memo in 2004, was at least good enough to furnish the U.S. State Department with a few prescient caveats about this natural politician, all related to deficiencies in Recep Tayyip Erdogan's character. The then-newly elected Turkish prime minister was "seriously vulnerable to miscalculating the political dynamic, especially in foreign affairs, and vulnerable to attacks by those who would disrupt his equilibrium." His pride was "overbearing." His ambition was messianic: Erdogan believed himself "anointed" by God to lead Turkey - never a good sign in a freshman head of state. And his "authoritarian loner streak" rendered around him little more than sunken-chested yes-men incapable of controlling an outsized ego and "thin-skinned" disposition. Also, Erdogan had an incurable "distrust of women," which is why there were none in positions of authority in the Islamist Justice and Development Party (AKP) that he co-founded. This is also probably why heterosexual smooching on subway platforms, seven years on, is a major cause of national concern to him.
Turkey is paying a high price for Erdogan's charisma. The Gezi Park protests, which have actually been happening for weeks (complete with chivvying riot police), but which only turned violent last Friday, have nominally been waged over the planned uprooting of trees in a derelict patch of vegetation in Istanbul. The reason for the uprooting was a new construction project that had been rammed through by the AKP-controlled municipality without any consultations with ecologists or urban historians, and it would have remade a 19th-century artillery barracks into first a hotel, then a shopping mall.
Yet the real, unmistakable, origin of this wide unrest was the man who has lately been recast as a combination of Boss Tweed and Vladimir Putin. That Erdogan was last re-elected with close to 50 percent of the popular vote is all the justification his self-conceit needs to keep going. Why should he work for the people when they're happy to continue working for him? To his enemies, however, Erdogan only proves that megalomaniacs with dictatorial tendencies don't necessarily have to seize power - sometimes they win it fair and square.
The prime minister's contempt in the last week was palpable, not only for the Kemalists who never supported him but for the liberals, nationalists, bourgeoisie, and intellectuals who now regret doing so. He didn't even bother to stay and manage the gravest domestic political crisis in a decade - he had a plane to catch to the Maghreb - but not before quitting the country with a few parting insults. Just as the Gezi demos were spreading into a solidarity campaign encompassing 67 cities and towns throughout Turkey, Erdogan offered a contradictory and paranoid array of explanations for what was happening. He said that "extremists" and/or the secular Republican People's Party (CHP) were sowing chaos. He intimated the presence of foreign agents egging the protestors on, and assured everyone that Turkish intelligence would be investigating these fifth columnists. He called Twitter - which for 48 hours had become the only real source of homegrown news - the "the worst menace to society." And he referred to tens of thousands of people chanting for his resignation as "looters," "bums," and alcoholics. Plus, the recent ban on selling booze after 10 PM, and the new zoning restriction on opening bars or drink-friendly restaurants within 100 meters of schools or mosques, helped make Efes (Turkey's national beer) into an unlikely symbol of defiance. As for damage control, Erdogan left Abdullah Gul, his neutered president, to remind the world that democracy isn't just about holding elections, it's also about respecting minority opinions and the right to dissent.
