Erdoğan claims victory while supporters celebrate near Taksim Square, Istanbul. Depo Photos/PA Images. All rights reserved.“The slave begins by demanding justice and ends by wanting to wear a crown.” Albert Camus’ description of the journey taken by many a rebel is an apt characterisation of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s trajectory. Turkey’s President has gone from Islamist activist railing against his country’s authoritarian secular elites to untouchable sultan purging his enemies – real and imagined. He has become a cliché.
Erdoğan – like all strongmen – is an insecure leader with a penchant for hunting critics down.
Ece Temelkuran’s Turkey: the Insane and the Melancholy (2016) is a non-fiction account of life under Erdoğan’s Justice and Development Party (AKP). The novelist-cum-journalist traces the rise of the divisive leader and places it within the context of the republic’s contested history. This is a perilous undertaking. Turkey’s twentieth century is littered with taboo subjects, each marked ‘Handle with Care’, and Erdoğan – like all strongmen – is an insecure leader with a penchant for hunting critics down.
