The Changing Channels of Political Participation: The Gezi Protests in Turkey
The channels of political participation in Turkey has been radically altered over the last two weeks. To speak of a Turkish Spring is inaccurate, but one direct contagion from the widespread and tumultuous Arab revolutions is the role of social media and its impact on popular political participation. Put simply, the advent and wide usage of social media tools such as Twitter and Facebook have enormous crowd organizing capacities in terms of motivation as well as information dissemination. So much so that individuals no longer feel the need to rely on the organizational networks of civil society and political parties to effectively raise their concerns and have them acknowledged by their governments. This presents a problem for all governments because the process of interest projection has become unpredictable, even unstable. The usual channels of petitioning government through membership-based organizations are less relevant today. The ongoing Gezi protests are a testament to this and have caught the governing Justice and Development Party (Adalet ve Kalkinma Partisi-AKP) off its guard.
More:Sinan Ciddi: The Changing Channels of Political Participation: The Gezi Protests in Turkey
