Two court cases in Turkey and the republic's future

Beirut -- There is more than the usual dose of convulsions in the Turkish body politic these days. Two critical court cases are unfolding and although they are not related legally, politically it is difficult if not impossible to assess them independently of one another.

The first case is against the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP). On March 31, Turkey's Constitutional Court decided to hear a case to close the AKP and ban 71 of its active and retired politicians from politics. The list of politicians to be banned included Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdogan, whose expulsion from politics was possibly the most ardently desired goal of those who were behind the move. The court is expected to rule on the case in the next several weeks.

Earlier on, in a separate but closely related case the court overruled a constitutional amendment passed by an overwhelming majority of the Parliament that also included members of two opposition parties. The amendment made it possible for headscarf wearing female students to attend university in that attire. The prosecutor general's legally weak and politically charged indictment against the AKP, accusing the party of being a focal point of reactionary-Islamist activism and of undermining Turkey's sacrosanct principle of secularism, was mainly built on the passing of the constitutional amendment.

The second case was brought against an illicit organization that called itself Ergenekon (from the founding legend

of the Turkish nation). The prosecution, after an investigation that lasted 13 months, prepared a voluminous indictment (2,500 pages) against a network of security personnel, business people, journalists and assorted others who had organized themselves to undertake the overthrow of the civilian government, create conditions for a military coup, abrogate the constitutional order and engage in terrorist activities.

The indicted, 86 individuals so far including two retired generals, are being charged among other things with forming a terrorist organization. It is expected that at least one additional indictment will be prepared that might charge the former commander of the gendarmerie of having attempted to stage two military coups back in 2003 and 2004 while on active duty. These attempts were aborted by the then chief of staff and his immediate subordinates at the General Staff. (The story of these attempts is chronicled in the diaries of the former commander of the navy, although he denies that the diaries published by a now-defunct weekly magazine are his).

The uninitiated would be totally confused with the arcane details of both cases, particularly the Ergenekon one. But from a broader perspective it is possible to invest meaning in both cases and assess their impact on the future of Turkish politics. The case against the AKP is a move of despair on the part of the statist-secularist camp that never reconciled itself to the rise to power and consolidation of power by that party. There is no visible endgame if, as expected, the party is closed. The AKP is certainly going to regroup and constitute itself as a new party that will then be able to form a new government. A disenchanted public that has no viable alternative to turn to and that is resentful of the judiciary's intervention is unlikely to massively withdraw its support from the AKP.

The Ergenekon case is ultimately a more promising one for Turkey's political future. All available information suggests that the case is at least partially about the reconstruction of the Turkish military. By now it is clearly understood that two broadly defined camps within the military were fighting it out for ideological dominance within the institution. One is still Western-oriented and therefore supportive of the democratic order, and the other more Eurasia-oriented, prone to secular authoritarianism and willing to move Turkey in the direction of Russia. Ergenekon in that sense is a cleaning-up operation. Both the success in aborting the coups in 2003 and 2004 and the generally supportive posture of the current military top brass on the Ergenekon arrests and indictment mean that the days of military intervention and rule in Turkey are finally over. Even if the legal case does not go as far as it currently promises, the political significance of the case and its liberating effect on Turkey's civilian politics are to be celebrated.

At this particular juncture, then, the burden of improving Turkey's civilian politics and consolidating its democracy along European Union lines falls on the country's political leadership. But the politics of the two cases, the way they were covered in the media, and the polarization that they encouraged exposed two deeper problems that are worrisome.

For one, it is quite clear that the old authoritarian republican order and mindset are incapable of rejuvenation. They have nothing to offer to a youthful, dynamic and extroverted nation and increasingly their struggle appears as one for preservation of privilege rather than defense of principle. On the other hand, the new political elites whose political representative the AKP claims to be and who represent Turkey's new demographics and socio-economic dynamics fall far short of the task they are burdened with. They lack the imagination and the commitment needed to forge a new consensus for a system that would propel Turkey forward in a liberal-democratic direction.

The second and related problem is the propensity for authoritarianism that all engaged parties demonstrated in the course of their struggle. The secularist elites have an authoritarian understanding of modernity and are comfortable with the instrumentalization of the law. The AKP, in turn, chose not to stave off the attack against itself by broadening the public space for democratic participation and liberal reforms. Its (mis)management of May 1 demonstrations, the language chosen by the prime minister and the relative indifference shown to penetration of many aspects of public life by security agencies are cause for concern. It has also shown an equally worrisome propensity to instrumentalize the law, which leads many observers to wonder if civilianization of the polity will necessarily bring along its democratization as well.

In short, the days of military tutelage over Turkey's politics are arguably over. Whether or not Turkey's civilian politicians, particularly the AKP (or its successor party in the undesirable event of closure), will rise to the challenge of firmly establishing the rule of law and engage Turkey determinedly in a secular, liberal, democratic path remains to be seen.

Soli Ozel is a professor of international relations at Istanbul Bilgi University and a columnist for the Turkish daily Sabah. This commentary first appeared at bitterlemons- international.org, an online newsletter.