Erdogan amassed power over 20 years, profiting from crisis after crisis

From mayor to legislator and prime minister to president, Recep Tayyip Erdogan rose through the ranks to Turkey’s top positions and then made them his own, moving the country closer to one-man rule over the course of 20 years.

On Sunday, Erdogan will try to secure another term as president, but only after the opposition forces him into a runoff election. That the election has moved to a second round is a sign that his grip on the country has slipped, if not broken, amid a host of problems such as economic unrest, widespread corruption and his administration’s handling of catastrophic earthquakes this spring.

But Mr Erdogan has endured crises since the earliest days of his career, including a prison sentence, mass protests and an attempted coup. Several of those episodes illustrate how he not only survived crises, but also found opportunities to consolidate power through them.

A lifetime suspension that lasted a few years

In 1998, Mr. Erdogan, then the 44-year-old mayor of Istanbul, a rising star of Turkey’s Islamist political movement, was the target of a crackdown by military-backed authorities. That year, a court convicted him of calling for religious rebellion by quoting an Islamist poem from the 1920s. He was sentenced to 10 months in prison and banned from political activity for life.

Though predominantly Muslim, Turkey was founded as a secular republic and the traditional political elites felt that the Islamists were anathema to those values.

Mr Erdogan spent four months in prison and plans a comeback despite the ban. Under a general amnesty in 2001, the Turkish Constitutional Court lifted the ban, and he soon assembled a new political party with other reformists of the Islamist movement who promised good governance and sought ties with the West.

Allies who changed the rules

Mr Erdogan’s ascent was nearly stopped in 2002 by Turkey’s electoral council, which banned him from elections because of his criminal conviction. But his fellow party members, who had forced their way into parliament, amended the constitution to allow him to rule. Mr Erdogan won office and became Prime Minister in 2003.

His government also began prosecuting some of those figures, and in 2008 accused dozens of people, including retired army generals and journalists, of attempted coups d’état. Erdogan’s allies called the process an attempt to reckon with Turkey’s history of violent infighting. Critics called it an attempt to silence secular opposition.

With voters’ approval in a referendum two years later, Mr. Erdogan redo the constitution. He said the 2010 overhaul brought Turkey closer to European democracies and broke with its military past, while his opponents said it gave his conservative government more control over the military and courts. He won a third term as prime minister in 2011.

The mall that sparked protests

Mr Erdogan was not without significant, if disparate, opposition. In 2013, protests that erupted over a proposed shopping center to replace a park in Istanbul turned into a demonstration of disaffection over many issues, including leaning toward Islamist policies and ongoing corruption.

Mr Erdogan cracked down not only on protesters, but also on medics, journalists, activists, business owners and officials accused of sympathy. Some cultural figures were imprisoned and others fled, and an atmosphere of self-censorship descended on many who remained.

As his term came to a close, Erdogan faced a problem: his party’s rules prevented him from becoming prime minister again. In 2014, he ran for another position and became Turkey’s first popularly elected president, opening his term in office with words of rapprochement.

“I want us to build a new future with an understanding of social reconciliation, recognizing our differences as our wealth and bringing forward our common values,” he said in a victory speech.

But rather than limiting himself to the primarily ceremonial duties of the scroll, he sought to maximize its powers, including vetoing legislation and the ability to appoint judges.

The transformative aftermath of a coup

Erdogan’s rule nearly ended in 2016, when a chaotic uprising involving parts of the military and members of an Islamist group that had once been his political ally sought to oust him. But he escaped capture, called on Turks to protest in the streets, and soon reappeared in Istanbul to reassert control.

“What is being committed is an insurrection,” he said. “They will pay a high price for their betrayal of Turkey.”

A subsequent purge reshaped Turkey: thousands accused of links to the coup plot were arrested, tens of thousands lost their jobs in schools, police stations and other institutions, and more than 100 media outlets were shut down. Most who became involved in the purge were accused of ties to the Gülen movement, the Islamist followers of Fethullah Gülen, the cleric Erdogan accused of orchestrating the coup while living in exile in the United States.

Within a year, Mr. Erdogan had called another voter referendum, this time on abolishing the post of prime minister and transferring power to the president, and on granting more capabilities to the role.

With his opponents under pressure and his allies revived, he narrowly won the referendum and cited the changes needed to make the government more efficient. The following year, he won re-election to another five-year term.

A blitz of decrees and growing discontent

Hours before his 2018 inauguration, Mr Erdogan published a 143-page decree that changed the way nearly every government department operated. He fired an additional 18,000 state employees and made several key appointments, naming his son-in-law the new Treasury Secretary.

The decree was just one sign of how far Erdogan has taken Turkey on the road to strongman rule. The government announced new internet restrictions and launched monumental projects, including towering bridges, a massive mosque and a plan for an “Istanbul Canal.”

Many supporters of Mr Erdogan hail efforts like these as visionary, but critics say they fuel a construction industry plagued by corruption and that has squandered state funds.

Those frustrations have spread among many Turks in recent years. While Mr. Erdogan has increased Turkey’s status abroad and pursued major projects, his consolidation of power has made some uneasy and the economy has suffered.

That dissent has loosened Erdogan’s grip on the country.

In 2019, his party lost control of some of Turkey’s largest cities – only to contest the results in Istanbul. Turkey’s Supreme Electoral Council ordered a new election, a decision condemned by the opposition as a capitulation to Erdogan, but his party also lost that second vote, ending 25 years of dominance in Turkey’s largest city.

And with his government criticized for its earthquake preparedness and response, and the Turkish economy teetering on the brink of crisis, Erdogan has continued to splurge and cut interest rates despite inflation, driving many Turks far feel gone. poorer.