“Only war makes it possible to mobilize all of today’s technical resources while maintaining the property system.”

- Walter Benjamin, 1936

About Ali Gokpinar

Ali Gokpinar is a Fulbright grantee and he concentrates on conflict resolution, peace building, and civil war from his home in Turkey.

Articles by Ali Gokpinar

Labour Day in Turkey: ‘proportional force’ and irresponsible leadership

Ali Gokpinar 15 May 2013

Perhaps Turkey has never used tear gas in its 90-year history as much as it has done in the last ten years.

When none of your business is revolutionary

Ali Gokpinar 26 April 2013

Pigeon-holing citizens according to their religion is part of the armoury with which the Egyptian state controls its citizens. But there is a chink in the armour.

Demystifying Ocalan’s letter

Ali Gokpinar 1 April 2013

There is a remarkable rise of banal and campaigning Turkish nationalism. A tension between competing national identities might challenge Ocalan’s rhetoric and the new democratic state.

Are they democrats?

Ali Gokpinar 20 March 2013

The AKP has not persecuted journalists, so much as rather selectively targeted certain people and groups.

The limitations of Turkish foreign policy

Ali Gokpinar 25 February 2013

The EU-Turkey accession negotiations slowed down not because Turkey was not interested but because Turkey demanded fair play in the negotiations.

Whither identity politics?

Ali Gokpinar 10 February 2013

The statements of these two MP’s reveal how identity categorization has been central to the hearts and minds of Turkish citizens.

Turkish-Kurdish lasting peace, in sight?

Ali Gokpinar 28 January 2013

The late Kurdish politician Serafettin Elci once said that this generation is the last Kurdish generation that has a chance to achieve peace.

The Saturday Mothers

Ali Gokpinar 3 December 2012

To the memory of Mother Berfo who has searched for her disappeared son for thirty years.

Three moments in Turkey’s long path to democracy

Ali Gokpinar 4 November 2012

For the first time in Turkey’s history, the top military commander stood alongside Ms. Gul and Ms. Erdogan, wives of the president and prime minister respectively, both of whom wore headscarves in the official reception at the Presidency mansion.

Remembering Maspero

Ali Gokpinar 22 October 2012

Egypt needs time, but the Maspero martyrs should not be forgotten.

Whither Turkish democracy?

Ali Gokpinar 8 October 2012

Turkey’s involvement in the Syrian civil war is not desired by Turkish civil society, but this it seems is the price you have to pay if you wish to be an economically and politically stable regional power.

Egyptian Copts’ reactions to the ‘Innocence of Muslims’

Ali Gokpinar 23 September 2012

Recently, some figures of the Coptic diaspora condemned the film and its content as they were smart enough to see how it might harm their co-religionists as well as their own diasporic claims.

Turkey and Kurdish mirror images

Ali Gokpinar 9 September 2012

Inspired by the Syrian Kurds’ recent experience, the PKK seems to have aimed at organizing a Kurdish uprising in the Hakkari and Şırnak provinces of Turkey. But do the Kurdish people support such an uprising?

Antioch: a new Tripoli?

Ali Gokpinar 26 August 2012

Social tensions in Antioch, regular and relatively peaceful host to Alawites and Sunnis, have risen since the eruption of the Syrian conflict.

Still foreign powers?

Ali Gokpinar 13 August 2012

How can we believe that the Assad regime, at the brink of falling in his own country, supported the PKK to lead such an attack? Even if we think irrationally and believe the Turkish government, how can we deny the existence of the Kurdish question?

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