Erdogan at huge AKP election rally, Istanbul, May 30,2015. Demotix/Avni Kantan. All rights reserved.The events of May–June in 2013 in Turkey were the first example of public protests that were pluralist, inclusive, non-masculine, egalitarian, and secular, yet not anti-religion. The country-wide protests in the occupied spaces and their related community activities, such as public forums in parks, were practices of horizontal politics through which different singularities communicated with and were linked to each other.
It was a first encounter between social and economic classes that had historically grown estranged in Turkey. Different subjectivities and conflicting identities managed to form temporal communities to challenge the ruling Justice and Development Party’s (AKP) neoliberal project of aggressive privatisation, gentrification, capital accumulation through dispossession, decreasing social security and job security, financialization of material and immaterial public goods, and conservative majoritarianism. But during those very same days, some segments of society attended pro-government gatherings and developed an antagonistic view towards the horizontal politics of Gezi. During those very same days, some segments of society attended pro-government gatherings and developed an antagonistic view towards the horizontal politics of Gezi.
Much ink has been spilt on the Gezi protests in Turkey. What kind of legacy they will have for politics in Turkey is still a contested issue. The question of legacy, however, cannot be addressed simply by focusing on the anti-government groups and their interactions.
