Adieu, Turkish Democracy
By John Hannah
November 13, 2015 - 1:12 pm
It’s already become a cliché to say that the results of Turkey’s Nov. 1 parliamentary elections, officially confirmed on Thursday, were “stunning.” But that doesn’t make it any less true. Most observers believed that far and away the likeliest outcome would be a re-run of the June 7 elections, which saw the Justice and Development Party (AKP) lose the ruling majority that had empowered it to dominate Turkish politics since 2002. A few analysts allowed for the slim possibility that the AKP might yet eke out a razor-thin majority. But virtually no one — not the experts and certainly not the pollsters — foreshadowed what actually happened: a resounding AKP victory, a pickup from June of nearly 5 million votes and almost 60 seats. In just 5 months, the AKP had gone from badly weakened and on the ropes to triumphant and once again dominant. The sudden reversal of fortune was all the more shocking precisely because it was so unexpected.
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