Governing Anxiety, Trauma and Crisis: The Political Discourse on Ontological (In)Security after the July 15 Coup Attempt in Turkey

Abstract:

Concern about the ontological security of the state has been at the center of Turkish politics since the beginning of the republican regime in 1923, shaping both the domestic and the foreign policy of Turkey. Taking the July 15 coup attempt in 2016 as a case, this article critically analyzes the political discourse on ontological (in)security in Turkey. The discussion begins by locating the discourse on the survival of the state [beka meselesi in Turkish] in a historical and sociopolitical context. Building on this discussion, the article investigates how unprecedented political instability caused by the failed coup attempt created a political space for the ruling Justice and Development Party to re-articulate the state’s survival discourse and related security practices. The article argues that governing elites followed a double strategy. On one hand, they aimed at simplifying the sociopolitical space with a ‘one nation, one state, one homeland, and one flag’ discourse; on the other hand, they actively prevented public contestation by keeping the political dimension of the coup at bay. To advance this argument, the article develops a discursive-theoretical framework by cross-fertilizing Ontological Security Theory with Post-foundational Discourse Theory.

Key Words:

• July 15 Coup Attempt
• Justice and Development Party
• Ontological Security
• Turkey

Acknowledgements

Both authors contributed equally to the article and their names are in alphabetical order. An earlier version of this paper was presented at the “Beyond ‘Sectarianism’? Towards an Alternative Understanding of Identity Politics and Communal Antagonism” workshop at University of Cambridge in October 2019 and “Turkish Studies Project” workshop at the University of Utah in April 2019. We are grateful for insightful comments and feedback from participants. All remaining errors are our own.

Disclosure Statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author.

Notes

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3 Gocek, Transformation of Turkey.

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5 Ibid, p. 8.

6 Etyen Mahcupyan (2015a), Yeni Türkiye (5) [New Turkey (5)], 12 April. Available at: https://www.aksam.com.tr/etyen-mahcupyan/yazarlar/yeni-turkiye-5-siyaset/haber-397467, accessed March 11, 2020.

7 Idem (2015b), Yeni Türkiye (2) [New Turkey (2)], 2 April. Available at: https://www.aksam.com.tr/yazarlar/etyen-mahcupyan/yeni-turkiye-2/haber-394807, accessed March 11, 2020.

8 Mahcupyan, Yeni Turkiye (5).

9 Sozcu (2019) Erdoğan’dan ‘Tarihi’ Açıklama! ['Historical' Statement from Erdogan], 16 March, Available at: https://www.sozcu.com.tr/2016/gundem/erdogandan-tarihi-aciklama-1139642/, accessed March 11, 2020.

10 Bahar Baser & Ahmet Erdi Öztürk (2017) Authoritarian Politics in Turkey: Elections, Resistance and the AKP (London: I.B. Tauris); and M. Hakan Yavuz & Bayram Balci (eds.) (2018) Turkey’s July 15th Coup: What Happened and Why (Salt Lake City, UT: University of Utah Press).

11 Anthony Giddens (1991) Modernity and Self-Identity: Self and Society in the Late Modern Age (Stanford: Stanford University Press).

12 Jennifer Mitzen (2006a) Anchoring Europe’s Civilizing Identity: Habits, Capabilities and Ontological Security, Journal of European Public Policy, 13(2), pp. 270–285.

13 Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity.

14 Catarina Kinnvall (2004) Globalization and Religious Nationalism: Self, Identity and the Search for Ontological Security, Political Psychology, 25(5), p. 746.

15 Jennifer Mitzen & Kyle Larson (2017) Ontological Security and Foreign Policy, Oxford Research Encyclopedia of Politics, pp. 1–26.

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17 Kinnvall, Globalization and Religious Nationalism.

18 Mitzen, Anchoring Europe’s Civilizing Identity.

19 Thomas Marttila (2016) Post-foundational Discourse Analysis: From Political Difference to Empirical Research (London: Palgrave MacMillan), p. 43.

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21 Ernesto Laclau (2005) On Populist Reason (London: Verso).

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23 Laclau, On Populist Reason.

24 Glynos & Howarth, Logics of Critical Explanation.

25 Ibid.

26 Mitzen, Ontological Security in World Politics.

27 Glynos & Howarth, Logics of Critical Explanation, p. 129.

28 Ibid., p. 110.

29 Giddens, Modernity and Self-Identity, p. 61.

30 Christine Agius (2017) Drawing the Discourses of Ontological Security: Immigration and Identity in the Danish and Swedish Cartoon Crises, Cooperation and Conflict, 52(1), pp. 111.

31 Glynos & Howarth, Logics of Critical Explanation, p. 106.

32 Ibid.

33 Umut Can Adisonmez (2019) When Conflict Traumas Fragment: Investigating the Socio-psychological Roots of Turkey's Intractable Conflict, Political Psychology, 40(6), pp. 1372–1390.

34 Umit Cizre (2008) Ideology, Context and Interest: The Turkish Military, in Resat Kasaba (ed.) The Cambridge History of Turkey, (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), pp. 301–332.

35 M. Hakan Yavuz (2006) The Emergence of a New Turkey (Salt Lake City: University of Utah Press).

36 Idem (2005) Islamic Political Identity in Turkey (Oxford: Oxford University Press).

37 Ahmet Davutoglu (2001) Stratejik Derinlik [Strategic Depth] (Istanbul: Kure Yayinlari).

38 Umut Can Adisonmez (2016) Making Sense of Turkish Mainstream Media: Identity, Foreign Policy and Change, Asian Politics & Policy, 8(4), pp. 629–635.

39 Filip Ejdus (2019) Crisis and Ontological Insecurity: Serbia's Anxiety over Kosovo's Secession (Basingstoke: Palgrave Macmillan), p. 9.

40 Slavoj Zizek (2004) The Structure of Domination Today: A Lacanian View, Studies in East European Thought, 56(4), p. 393.

41 Catarina Kinnvall (2017) Feeling Ontologically (In)secure: States, Traumas and the Governing of Gendered Space, Cooperation and Conflict, 52(1), pp. 90–108. 

42 Hurriyet (2019) Erdoğan Urges All Citizens of Turkey to Unite against ‘Foreign Threats’, 22 May, Available at: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/erdogan-stresses-national-unity-against-threats-143605, accessed March 11, 2020.

43 Thomas Hobbes (1991) Leviathan [1651], Richard Tuck (edn.) (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press), p. 72.

44 David Campbell (1998) Writing Security: United States Foreign Policy and the Politics of Identity (Manchester: Manchester University Press), p. 9.

45 Hurriyet (2016) Millions Stand for Democracy in Turkey, 5 August, Available at: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/millions-stand-for-democracy-in-turkey-102510, accessed March 11, 2020.

46 Laclau, On Populist Reason; and Jakub Eberle (2019) Narrative, Desire, Ontological Security, Transgression: Fantasy as a Factor in International Politics, Journal of International Relations and Development, 22(1), pp. 243–268.

47 Kinnvall, Feeling Ontologically (In)secure, p. 94

48 Vamik Volkan (1997) Bloodlines: From Ethnic Pride to Ethnic Terrorism (New York: Farrar, Straus and Giroux), p. 48.

49 Anthony Giddens (1990) The Consequences of Modernity (Cambridge: Polity Press), p. 243.

50 Ty Solomon (2015) The Politics of Subjectivity in American Foreign Policy Discourses (Ann Arbor: University of Michigan Press), p. 16.

51 Slavoj Zizek (1993) Tarrying with the Negative (Durham: Duke University Press), p. 202.

52 Slavoj Zizek (1998) The Seven Veils of Fantasy, in Dany Nobus (ed.) Key Concepts of Lacanian Psychoanalysis (New York: Other Press), pp. 190–218.

53 Eberle, Narrative, Desire, Ontological security, Transgression.

54 Glynos & Howarth, Logics of Critical Explanation.

55 Eberle, Narrative, Desire, Ontological security, Transgression.

56 Hurriyet (2018) The Issue is about Turkey, not Me, 26 August, Available at: http://www.hurriyetdailynews.com/erdogan-the-issue-is-about-turkey-not-me-136159, accessed March 11, 2020.

57 While the year 2023 refers to the 100th anniversary of Republic of Turkey, the year 2053 will be the 600th anniversary of the Ottoman Empire’s conquest of Istanbul and the year 2071 refers to the 1000th anniversary in 2071 of the victory in Battle of Manzikert which opened gates of Anatolia to Turks.

58 Zizek, The Seven Veils of Fantasy, p. 192.

59 Hurriyet, Erdoğan: The Issue is about Turkey.

60 Zizek, The Seven Veils of Fantasy, p. 192.

61 Hurriyet, Millions Stand for Democracy.

62 Solomon, The Politics of Subjectivity, p. 17.

63 Chris Rossdale (2015) Enclosing Critique: The Limits of Ontological Security, International Political Sociology, 9(4), pp. 369–386.

64 Kinnvall, Feeling Ontologically (In)secure.

65 William Walters (2006) Border/control, European Journal of Social Theory, 9(2), pp. 187–203.

66 Eberle, Narrative, Desire, Ontological Security, Transgression.

67 Glynos & Howarth, Logics of Critical Explanation, p. 145.

68 Hurriyet, Millions Stand for Democracy.

69 Slavoj Zizek (1989) The Sublime Object of Ideology (London: Verso), p. 126.