Friday, June 22, 2018

Nationalism and piety dominate Turkey's election

Nationalism and piety dominate Turkey’s election

June 22, 2018 10.11pm BST

Turkey goes to the polls to vote for president and parliament on Sunday.

As a scholar of the history and politics of the Middle East, I believe the most striking feature of the campaign is the ideological uniformity displayed by the main parties and their presidential candidates. With the exception of the pro-Kurdish People’s Democracy Party, candidates espouse strong sentiments of activist nationalism, Muslim piety or, sometimes, both.

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