Israeli Prime Minister Benjamin Netanyahu has long praised the Israeli army as “the most moral army in the world.” This is not merely an ordinary propaganda slogan; it lies at the heart of the way the Israeli state presents itself to the world. The Israeli army’s official code of values also refers to principles such as “human life,” “responsibility,” “proportionality,” and “purity of arms.” On paper, this creates the impression of a military institution that places a high value on human life, uses force with great restraint, and takes special care to protect civilian life.

Yet the morality of states and armies is measured not by the texts they write about themselves, but by what they do. The real test of an army is not what is written in its ethical handbook, but how it behaves in the field. How does it treat civilians? How does it use force? Does it turn war into an excuse for suspending law altogether, or does it genuinely limit violence? This is where the Israeli army must be judged. And at that point, the picture that emerges is utterly incompatible with the claim of being “the most moral army in the world.”

What has happened in Gaza shows with complete clarity how false that claim is. International organizations, United Nations mechanisms, and human rights reports have documented that Israel’s military operations have led to “unprecedented” levels of civilian death, massive destruction, and large-scale displacement. In Gaza, homes, hospitals, schools, shelters, and the ordinary spaces of daily life have been systematically devastated. Not merely hundreds of thousands, but nearly the entire population has been displaced. People have been denied not only safety, but the very conditions of life itself. In the face of such a reality, to continue speaking of “morality” in connection with the Israeli army is to empty the concept of all meaning.

Morality Is Measured by the Limitation of Power

Morality, and especially the morality of war, begins precisely where power is restrained. Being armed, possessing military capability, or enjoying technological superiority does not make an army moral. On the contrary, it is the powerful who are expected to restrain themselves. Even in war, children, women, the elderly, the sick, and civilians in general must be protected. Hospitals, schools, and places of worship cannot be treated as ordinary targets of war. Morality is not merely grieving one’s own losses, but recognizing that the life of the innocent person on the other side also has value.

Yet the image Israel projects to the world is the exact opposite. Today, the Israeli army appears as a force that kills civilians on a mass scale, destroys the basic infrastructure of civilian life, and condemns people to hunger, thirst, homelessness, and insecurity. Moreover, all this is done while hiding behind concepts such as “security,” “counter-terrorism,” or “self-defense.” Morality is not a linguistic game designed to legitimize violence. An army does not become moral simply by calling itself a “defense force.” Just as a person does not become honest by calling himself honest, an army does not become moral by calling itself moral.

The Condition of the Israeli Army

The present condition of the Israeli army must be assessed not only through specific battlefield practices, but through its overall pattern of conduct. The problem goes beyond isolated excesses. There is a deeper, more structural issue here. What stands before us is an approach that does not place civilian life above military aims and, at times, seems to treat the destruction of civilian life as an ordinary side effect. For this reason, the matter is not about a few mistaken operations, a few reckless soldiers, or a handful of “tragic errors.” The problem is that an entire military and political approach relegates human life to a secondary position.

This has become especially evident in Gaza. The transformation of hospitals into targets, the destruction of the health system, the extraordinarily high number of children and women killed, and the fact that people have been driven into so-called safe zones only to encounter death there as well—all this tells us a great deal about the conduct of this army. If the actions of an army effectively erase the distinction between civilians and combatants, then one must speak not of morality, but of the suspension of morality itself.

The morality of an army is measured not by the intensity of its desire to win, but by the limits it places on itself in relation to human life. Judged by this standard, the conduct of the Israeli army does not support the claim of being the most moral army in the world. On the contrary, it points to a force that has become one of the most immoral.

The Israeli State and the Collapse of Law

Nor is the matter limited to the army alone. The Israeli state as a whole is increasingly turning into a structure that erodes law and suffocates the very idea of human rights. Detention centers, prisons, interrogation procedures, and the treatment of Palestinians have become a major field of shame. Torture, ill-treatment, degrading practices, and sexual violence are among the grave issues repeatedly raised by international bodies. The mistreatment of Palestinian children within the military detention system has likewise been documented for years.

All this shows that what we are dealing with is not merely a harsh security state. The problem is larger. What is being damaged here is the very idea of law itself. If law has any meaning at all, it is precisely that it limits vengeance at moments of greatest anger and fear. If law becomes nothing more than a tool for legitimizing the anger of the powerful, then what remains is not justice, but brute force.

This is why Israel’s detention, imprisonment, and punishment regime is as important as its military practices. The true moral level of a state is revealed not only in war, but in the way it treats those under its control. The treatment of the powerless, the defenseless, and the detained is one of the most important tests of morality. And on this test, Israel cannot be said to have succeeded.

The Death Penalty and the Politics of Revenge

The passage in March 2026 of a highly controversial measure in the Israeli parliament envisioning the death penalty for Palestinians in certain cases shows how dangerous the direction of this trajectory has become. The death penalty is already deeply problematic in modern legal thought. To revive it in the context of an intense political conflict, disputed judicial equality, and the operation of military courts is not a sign of justice, but of revenge.

The greatness of a state governed by law lies in its refusal to lose its sense of proportion even at moments of greatest anger. When the state turns itself into the pure representative of the victims’ rage, it begins to erase the distinction between justice and vengeance. This is what Israel is doing today. By turning execution into a political symbol, especially in relation to Palestinians, it transforms law from a universal guarantee into a discriminatory instrument of power.

Is Israel Protecting Civilization?

Israel often seeks to present itself as a state that “defends civilization,” “stands against barbarism,” and serves as an “outpost of Western values.” This rhetoric has had a certain effect in the Western world. But civilization is not merely technology, military strength, or diplomatic support. Civilization means being able to regard human life as universally valuable. Civilization means being able to defend not only the lives of one’s own children, but also those of others. Civilization means applying law not only to oneself, but also to one’s enemy.

Viewed from this perspective, Israel today is not defending civilization so much as destroying the very ground on which civilization rests. For the essence of civilization is not unrestrained power, but restrained power. The essence of civilization is not collective punishment, but individual responsibility. The essence of civilization is not the normalization of occupation and impunity, but the rule of law. If a state continually crushes civilian life, civilization is not simply to secure one’s own safety. To protect civilization is to bind power to law and morality. Israel today is moving in the opposite direction: It is seeking to free power from both law and morality.

Worse still, a significant part of the world either remains silent in the face of this reality or continues to repeat the fable of “the most moral army in the world.” Yet perhaps the real moral crisis begins precisely here. If, in the face of destruction on this scale, civilian slaughter on this scale, and impunity on this scale, we still cannot speak the truth clearly, then the problem lies not only in Tel Aviv, but in the moral order of the world as a whole.

In the end, the real issue is not how Israel describes itself. Calling its army “moral,” describing aggression as “defense,” or cloaking lawlessness in the language of “security” does not change reality. The reality is this: Judged by its deeds, the Israeli army is not “the most moral army in the world.” On the contrary, through its brutality toward civilians, its erosion of law, and its disregard for human life, it has become one of the most immoral armies in the world—perhaps the most one of all.

The Most Immoral Army in the World yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

Yes, you didn’t hear wrong. I am a tomato. When my price goes up, I become a “national issue” on television; when it goes down, I quietly end up in your salad. And every now and then this happens, you look at my label and sigh, then you talk as if you are not buying me but “the price of tomatoes.” Sometimes you do not see me as a food item but as a moral test. As if I were a red litmus paper that brings out the good and the bad inside people.

In fact, I am an ordinary agricultural product that reaches the shelves at the end of a long journey you do not see. I am ordinary; but my story is not ordinary. Because my story is the story of risk, cost, division of labor, profit, knowledge, and human psychology. And this story is rewritten every day: one day the rain is late, one day hail hits, one day diesel prices rise, one day demand suddenly jumps. While you stop by the market on your way home and ask, “How much are tomatoes today?”, I am already carrying ten different decisions, ten different risks, ten different expenses on my back.

From history to the present

First, a small history lesson. I was once branded as “poisonous.” In Europe, in my earliest days, instead of being put on the table, I became an ornamental plant in gardens. Some of my relatives really were toxic; but what determined which of us was harmful and which was edible was not a committee decision. People tried, failed, sorted, improved, and developed me. The bad ones were eliminated; the good ones were selected. Behind my becoming “edible” lay not command-and-control but trial and error, curiosity, and thousands of small observations from everyday life. Knowledge did not descend from a center; it came out of life.

The process that brings me to your table today works with the same logic: someone takes risk, someone bears cost, someone works, someone carries the shrink (the loss), someone builds coordination. And for this chain to run, everyone must survive. The name of survival is, most of the time, profit. Faces sour when profit is mentioned; but when there is no profit and the shelves become empty, those same faces sour even more. I call this “profit phobia, scarcity therapy.” Sometimes a person’s medicine is thought; but people who do not like thinking choose scarcity as a kind of teacher.

When I was on my branch, I was romantic. The moment I was picked, I began to become economic.

Seeds are bought. Fertilizer is bought. Pesticide is bought. Water and electricity are spent for irrigation. The tractor runs; diesel burns. Workers arrive; they carry crates, hoe, and harvest. When the farmer makes an investment decision, he also signs a contract with the sky: a contract that begins with, “In case frost hits, hail falls, disease spreads, floodwater comes…” The signature under that contract is renewed every year. Because agricultural life is not only labor; it is a contract signed with uncertainty.

But the real issue is the gap between where I am produced and where I am consumed. The producer in the field does not always have direct access to the city. Not every farmer has a cold-storage facility, a truck fleet, a wholesale-market entry card, or contracts with big supermarket chains. In most cases—especially at harvest time—there is a need for cash: paying workers, fertilizer debt, diesel debt… So every farmer wants to turn the crop into money quickly. This is exactly where the actor you call the intermediary appears. You think, “If there were no intermediary everything would be cheaper,” but the intermediary is sometimes not only an “intermediary”; at the same time, he is a financier, a logistician, a warehouse operator, and a risk taker.

Let’s say I was sold in the field for 6 lira. The first collector who buys me (in some places called a commission agent, in some places a trader, in some places a wholesaler) takes me. This person brings crates to remove me from the field, organizes workers, arranges a truck. Sometimes he goes around several fields in a single day; sometimes he makes me wait until he has gathered enough quantity within one or two days. Even this waiting is costly: the sun hits, humidity changes, the risk of cracking increases. And let me tell you the truth: waiting in the field is not romantic. I like waiting on my branch; waiting in a crate feels like punishment.

Then comes the small warehouse. In the small warehouse, sorting is done. Those that look “nice,” like me, are separated; those that look “a bit tired” are left behind. Because you only see the “nice” one on the shelf, you do not see the cost of sorting. Yet sorting is essentially a quality-control activity. Quality control means labor. Labor means cost.

A portion of the sorted product shrinks (loss). Shrink is sometimes natural decay, sometimes crushing, sometimes selectiveness. The moment you say, “I want a flawless tomato,” you increase the shrink rate. When the shrink rate increases, the cost of the tomatoes that survive rises. This sentence may sound bitter, but it is true: the demand for flawlessness produces cost.

After the small warehouse I pass to a bigger warehouse. In this bigger warehouse, more product accumulates. It accumulates because transport, especially intercity transport, needs scale. It is expensive to set off with a half-loaded truck. The accumulated product is, on the one hand, seen as “stock,” but on the other hand it is “transport efficiency.” So the aim of waiting is often not “to sell at a high price” but “to transport at a reasonable cost.” Of course, some foresee prices will rise and wait. You get angry at that too. But you often forget the risk of that waiting: if prices do not rise, they lose. If the product spoils, they lose. Waiting is not a free game.

Then the truck journey begins. I am filled into crates. Stacked. Back to back. I was the one being crushed in the bottom crate. My cousins on top were aristocrats; I was a lower-class tomato. Life on the bottom layer of a crate is harsh: weight above you, rot next to you, a road ahead, and behind you an official shouting, “Hurry up!”

The truck shakes for 600 kilometers. The road is not only distance; the road is cost. Diesel burned. The driver’s labor, insurance, rest time, maintenance, tires, depreciation… highway tolls, bridge fees… All of these are the lines written onto me before you tell the cashier, “What is this!” Moreover, the truck also has an opportunity cost: while the truck is doing this job, it cannot do another job. You assume “this transport job will happen anyway,” but a truck’s days are limited, a driver’s hours are limited. A limited resource produces cost.

We arrived in Istanbul. At this point I enter a new world: the wholesale market. The wholesale market is like the vascular system of fruit and vegetables in a city. The wholesale market itself has operating costs: allocation of space, rent, labor, security, cleaning, taxes and fees. Products turn fast in the wholesale market; but the faster they turn, the higher the risk of shrinking is. Because speed requires attention. Attention requires labor. Labor requires cost.

After the wholesale market, some products go to the depots of big chain supermarkets. These depots have a cold chain. The cold chain is not merely a “luxury”; sometimes it is “the brake on rotting.” Cooling consumes energy. When energy becomes expensive, the cold chain becomes expensive. When the cold chain becomes expensive, the cost is reflected in the product price. Sometimes the answer to “Why are tomatoes expensive?” is not in the tomato itself, but in the electricity bill that keeps it cool.

Some products go to neighborhood markets, greengrocers, small retailers. And there, costs do not end: stall rent, daily spot fees, staff, bags, spoilage… You touch a tomato at the market and say, “hmmm.” Your touch itself creates cost: every touch, every squeeze, every “let me see” tires a tomato a little more. A tired tomato spoils sooner. A spoiled tomato becomes shrink. Shrink raises the price. So my fate in the market is sometimes in your fingertips.

Meanwhile, what we call demand is not a fixed stone; it is wavy. Demand rises before holidays. When schools open, household consumption changes. You see a menemen scene in a TV series, and the next day there is a “menemen crisis.” (I’m joking… but not completely.) When demand rises, the price rises. When demand falls, the price falls. What you call “morality” is, most of the time, a “wave.”

And there is the effect of weather events. Hail hits, production falls. A greenhouse floods, the crop is gone. Disease spreads, yield drops. If there is too much rain, cracking increases. If there is too much heat, softening increases. In short, I am a product that talks with the weather. The price of a product that deals with the weather is as changeable as the weather. Since you do not get angry at the weather, you get angry at me. I am not as powerful as the weather; it is easier to take it out on me.

Finally, Istanbul. Shelf. Light. Label: 25 lira.

At exactly that moment, ideology rains down on me. I suddenly stop being a “vegetable” and become a symbol of “social justice.” My price is counted, on the one hand, as proof of “the high cost of living,” and on the other hand as a document of “merchant immorality.” Meanwhile I stand silently on the shelf, under my label, and I say to myself: “If only you gave me a microphone so I could speak.”

And one day, you did.

Right here—where my price turns into a label—you usually look for “one single cause.” Because the human mind likes simple stories. “This happened, so it is expensive.” Yet I am not a single-cause thing; I am an equation in which many causes are stacked on top of each other. What makes me expensive is sometimes diesel, sometimes hail, sometimes labor, sometimes just the season.

Speaking of seasons: there is my summer-tomato state and my winter “greenhouse child” state. In summer, the sun is more generous; production increases; costs loosen relatively; and I often become cheaper. In winter, heating, lighting, cover, maintenance, disease risk, and energy cost increase.

A winter tomato is not, as you think, “the winter version of the same tomato”; it is a labor-intensive product that has survived under harder conditions. You want the same quality, the same look, the same continuity; but you do not want the same cost. This is where the argument begins.

And there is another truth the urban eye misses: my price sometimes rises, but the farmer does not become rich. Because the farmer often hears the price signal late. On the day the price rises, the producer may already have sold his crop. Or when the price rises, the producer may have no product in the field because hail hit. So the logic “tomatoes are expensive → the farmer got rich” is not always correct. Sometimes the opposite is true: if tomatoes are expensive, something went wrong; and the bill of what went wrong often comes out of the producer first.

At this point let me open a parenthesis and return to the “intermediary” issue. Hating the intermediary is easy, because the intermediary is in front of your eyes. The farmer is far away; the truck is far away; the warehouse is far away. But the intermediary is a face in the city. When you see a face, blaming becomes easier. Yet the person you call the intermediary often does these jobs: he combines the product (collects), separates quality (grades), balances the market by spreading over time (holds), builds logistics (moves), takes the spoilage risk (carries shrink), organizes sales (distributes). Each of these activities is costly. If you call all of it “immorality,” one day there will be no one left doing these activities. That day tomatoes do not become cheap; they simply become unavailable.

Once there were people who dreamed of an “intermediary-free economy.” “Let the farmer sell directly!” they said. Nice idea. But can the farmer send a truck from Antalya to Istanbul every day? Can he build warehouses? Can he invest in the cold chain? Can he go around thousands of retailers in Istanbul one by one and collect payment? If he does these, the farmer stops being a farmer and becomes a logistician, warehouse operator, marketer, collector. Some can do this; but not everyone can. Division of labor exists for exactly this reason: so not everyone does every job, and each job is done in the best way.

And there is this strange expectation: you want tomatoes to be there all the time, and you also want the price to never change. “Every day, every hour, everywhere, tomatoes at the same price.” This is the comfort demand of modern life. Comfort produces cost. To make something continuously accessible, you hold stock, build warehouses, plan transport. This system has a cost. If you want “continuity,” you must accept that the price reflects the “continuity cost.” Otherwise, continuity will one day inevitably break.

Your relationship with the tomato also carries a strange duality: on the one hand you say “let it be very cheap,” on the other hand you say “let it be the best.” There is often tension between very cheap and the very best. Wanting the best tomato while wanting the cheapest price is, in a sense, a demand for “free perfection.” There is no free perfection. If there were, someone would interpret it as “hoarding,” too.

In short, my price does not fit into a single sentence. My price is the result of thousands of small nodes in a network. When you do not see the network, only the label is visible. When the label is visible, anger becomes visible. When anger is visible, a TV program is made.

And there is also the outside world. Sometimes there is abundance in one region and scarcity in another. Sometimes exports become attractive; sometimes imports come onto the agenda. Exchange-rate moves, freight costs, waiting at the border… even these touch my price indirectly. You say, “Tomatoes are local; what do we care about the exchange rate?” But I am transported on roads, I consume energy, I go into packaging, sometimes I am fed by fertilizer and chemicals. If part of these inputs depends on abroad, exchange-rate volatility echoes on me too. A tomato is not “just a tomato”; it is the combination of many inputs.

In the television debate

So the night of that program in which I could reach a microphone came.

9:00 p.m. A debate program on a news TV channel. The lower ticker: “WHY ARE TOMATOES 25 LIRA?” The control room deliberately chose red text: red is my color, but also the color of alarm. “Attention! Tomato!”

The studio set is also classic: a consumer representative, a “free-market critic,” and an economic commentator who likes speaking with charts. The host makes his face serious; seriousness brings ratings on screen. When the screen becomes serious, it is assumed that reality has become serious too.

The consumer representative begins:

“Citizens cannot buy tomatoes. Isn’t there profiteering here?”

The free-market critic gets excited:

“How does a tomato bought for 6 lira in the field become 25 lira in the market? This is exploitation! The chain of intermediaries is crushing the citizen!”

The chart economist draws circles on the screen with his hand:

“We can explain the difference with chain margins: logistics, storage, shrink…”

The host asks in a dramatic voice:

“But is there not a moral dimension to this?”

At that moment, as a tomato on the shelf, I suddenly feel like the material of a morality lesson. Being the material of a morality lesson is not easy. Because material cannot speak. Material cannot defend itself. Material cannot say “one moment.”

But I did.

I called the control room. They picked up the phone. The host smiled:

“Apparently we have a tomato on the line. Go ahead?”

“Good evening,” I said. “I am a tomato.”

Laughter in the studio… Laughter is good; but sometimes it completely blocks thinking, or at least delays it.

“Look,” I said, “my price is not a certificate of guilt. My price is the summary of that day’s supply, demand, risk, and costs. If production fell, if diesel rose, if storage costs increased, if shrink grew, I rise too. I am not a being that lowers its price out of shame.”

The consumer representative asked, with good intentions:

“But people are really struggling. What will we do?”

“That question matters,” I said. “But do not look for the answer in me. Income policy is another topic. Support mechanisms, social assistance, tax arrangements… these can be discussed. But suppressing my price by decree does not permanently relieve people; it only removes me from the shelves.”

The critic immediately jumped in:

“What if we set a ceiling price? Say, 15 lira!”

I smiled (again, metaphorically) and answered:

“Try it. You might succeed for a week. Then you will watch me vanish. Because if you cut the signal, you do not remove the problem; you remove the information. A ceiling price either pushes quality down, or pushes supply away, or creates a black market. Tomatoes do not like to be heroes in a price-control drama.”

The economist tried to add:

“Price is information…”

“And that,” I said, “is exactly what I am trying to tell you.”

Then I turned to the moral question:

“If you want to talk about morality, talk about waste too. Talk about the tons of food thrown away. Talk about the hands that squeeze tomatoes for pleasure and then complain about shrink. Talk about the expectation of ‘the best’ at ‘the cheapest’ price. Morality is not only about the trader; morality is also about the consumer and about society.”

The host attempted a closing:

“So, dear tomato, what is your final message?”

As we come to the close, I added one more sentence. Because my concern is not to tell you a comfortable tale like ‘the market solves everything.’ My concern is to break the habit of seeing price as an enemy. “Price,” I said, “is a news bulletin. It shouts: ‘There is scarcity here,’ ‘Costs are rising here,’ ‘Risk is increasing here.’ If you silence the news, the event does not disappear; it only remains in the dark.” Then I produced a list of suggestions; tomatoes sometimes have to-do lists too:

“If productivity in production rises, I become cheaper. If transport becomes efficient, I become cheaper. If storage technology improves, shrink falls, I become cheaper. If competition rises, margins thin, I become cheaper. If waste declines, I become cheaper. But none of this happens by ‘getting angry at the label.’”

And one last complaint:

“When you label me as ‘excessive,’ you are actually labeling labor you do not see. The driver’s lost sleep, the worker’s overtime, the warehouseman’s electricity, the farmer’s risk… And then you ask, ‘Why does no one want to produce?’ Sometimes the answer is hidden in you.” The ticker changed:

“Tomato in the studio: ‘Price is information.’”

The program ended. I got off the chair. The staff put me back into a crate. The cameras moved on to another agenda.

What the price says

While leaving the studio, in the corridor, a cleaning worker looked at me, smiled, and whispered: “I wish everyone spoke as clearly as you do.”

And I said to myself, “I wish everyone saw a little before speaking.” Because my whole concern is not to teach you economics; it is to make invisible labor visible. You do not have to love the price. But do not judge it without listening to the story it tells. Behind a label there is often a map of the whole country’s logistics. And yes… the one crushed in the bottom crate was still me.

Inspired by Leonard Read’s piece: I, Pencil.

I, Tomato: The Tragicomic Adventure of the Tomato from Field to Table yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

However, the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991 fundamentally transformed the international system. The disappearance of the bipolar ideological confrontation also created a new intellectual space in which the policies of the United States could be evaluated more independently. During the Cold War, many of America’s actions were interpreted within the framework of the struggle against communism. Once that framework disappeared, observers began to scrutinize whether the United States truly acted as a consistent defender of democracy and human rights, or whether these values were often invoked selectively to justify strategic interests.

In the decades following the Cold War, the United States has frequently justified its foreign policy by referring to universal principles such as democracy, human rights, and freedom. American leaders regularly argue that these values form the moral foundation of international order and that the United States has a special responsibility to defend them around the world. Yet when American foreign policy is examined in practice, a significant gap emerges between rhetoric and reality. This gap has led many observers to conclude that the United States often operates according to a pattern of double standards in its international conduct.

Selective Alliances and Strategic Interests

One of the most visible examples of this inconsistency can be observed in the Middle East. The United States maintains close political, military, and economic relationships with several governments in the region that cannot be described as liberal democracies. Countries such as Egypt, Jordan, and several Gulf monarchies have long enjoyed strong American support. These relationships include extensive military aid, security cooperation, arms sales, and diplomatic backing in international institutions.

Yet the political systems of many of these states fall far short of democratic standards. Political opposition is often restricted, elections are limited or tightly controlled, and civil liberties are frequently constrained. International organizations and human rights groups regularly document concerns regarding political repression, limits on press freedom, and restrictions on civic participation in these countries.

Despite these issues, the United States continues to regard many of these regimes as strategic partners. The explanation usually lies in geopolitical calculations. Control over key waterways, access to energy resources, regional security cooperation, and counterterrorism initiatives all play major roles in shaping American policy. As a result, political systems that might otherwise be criticized for democratic deficiencies are often tolerated—or even supported—when they align with American strategic priorities.

This pattern suggests that democratic principles are not always the decisive factor in determining American alliances. Instead, geopolitical interests frequently take precedence. Authoritarian governments that cooperate with Washington may receive diplomatic protection and financial assistance, while similar regimes that oppose American influence are treated very differently.

This selective approach creates a credibility problem for American foreign policy. When democratic values are emphasized only in certain contexts, they begin to appear less like universal principles and more like political tools. In the eyes of many observers around the world, this undermines the moral authority that the United States seeks to claim as a defender of freedom.

Sanctions, Pressure, and the Politics of Isolation

The contrast becomes even more apparent when examining American policy toward countries such as Iran and Cuba. For decades, both nations have faced extensive economic sanctions, diplomatic pressure, and political isolation from the United States. American officials frequently justify these measures by citing the absence of democratic governance, the suppression of political freedoms, and violations of human rights.

There is no doubt that both Iran and Cuba have political systems that attract serious criticism from advocates of liberal democracy. Restrictions on political opposition, limitations on civil liberties, and centralized political power have all been widely documented. Yet the argument raised by critics of American foreign policy is not that these governments should be immune from criticism. Rather, the criticism centers on the inconsistency with which democratic standards are applied.

If democracy and human rights were the primary criteria guiding American policy, then similar standards would presumably be applied across the board. However, as previously noted, the United States often maintains cooperative relations with governments that exhibit comparable or even more severe democratic shortcomings. This discrepancy leads many analysts to conclude that the promotion of democracy is often secondary to broader strategic considerations.

The case of Iran illustrates this tension particularly clearly. Iran has been subjected to extensive sanctions, diplomatic pressure, and periodic military confrontation with the United States. These measures are frequently justified on the grounds of both security concerns and the Iranian government’s internal political structure. Yet critics argue that similar concerns about governance and political freedoms rarely provoke comparable responses when they arise in states that are strategically aligned with Washington D.C.

Cuba provides another longstanding example. Since the early 1960s, the United States has imposed an economic embargo on the island, arguing that the Cuban government’s political system violates democratic norms. Over the decades, this embargo has become one of the longest-running sanctions regimes in modern international politics. While American policymakers frame the policy as a defense of democratic principles, critics note that numerous non-democratic governments around the world have maintained close ties with the United States without facing comparable economic penalty.

The result is a perception that American foreign policy distinguishes sharply between “friendly authoritarianism” and “hostile authoritarianism.” Governments that align themselves with American geopolitical objectives may be tolerated despite democratic shortcomings, while those that challenge American influence may become targets of sanctions, diplomatic isolation, or even military pressure.

This pattern reinforces the argument that the United States often operates according to a logic of interest rather than a consistent commitment to universal values. From a realist perspective, this may not be surprising. International relations have always involved calculations of power, security, and strategic advantage. States rarely base their policies purely on moral principles. Nevertheless, the United States frequently presents its foreign policy as morally grounded in the defense of freedom and human rights. When actual policies appear inconsistent with that claim, the discrepancy becomes particularly noticeable.

What Should the USA Do?

In conclusion, the global role of the United States continues to be shaped by a complex mixture of ideals and interests. The language of democracy, freedom, and human rights remains central to US political discourse and foreign policy rhetoric. However, the practical application of these values often reveals significant inconsistencies. Strategic alliances with authoritarian regimes, combined with severe sanctions against other governments accused of similar shortcomings, create a pattern that many observers interpret as a double standard.

This does not necessarily mean that the United States alone behaves in this way. Most states pursue policies that reflect their national interests. Yet the United States occupies a unique position in the international system. Because it frequently presents itself as the leading defender of democratic values, its actions are judged according to a higher standard. When those actions appear selective or inconsistent, the credibility of its moral claims is weakened.

Ultimately, if democracy and human rights are to function as genuine universal principles rather than instruments of geopolitical strategy, they must be applied with greater consistency. Otherwise, the gap between rhetoric and reality would continue to fuel skepticism towards US foreign policy and the ideals it claims to defend.

Double Standards of the United States of America yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

Translated by professional translator and lawyer Leyla Aliyeva

To read in Turkish: “Yine Yeniden Yeni Dünya Düzeni”, https://hurfikirler.com/yine-yeniden-yeni-dunya-duzeni/

Picture ENOT-POLOSKUN/iStock

Once Again: The New World Order yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

While explaining this story in different sources, I would like to mention the concepts of ‘‘Absolute Justice (Adalet-i Mahza)’’ and ‘‘Relative Justice (Adalet-i İzafiye)’’ in this article.

Relative justice (adalet-i izafiye) means imperfect, incomplete justice. Absolute justice (adalet-i mahza) means perfect, complete justice. The right of a single individual in the absolute justice cannot be violated even if there are general interests. While relative justice and absolute justice are being discussed, the subject turns around and definitely comes to the discussion of public interest. Because the rights of individuals are ignored or violated because it is often against the public interest. Such a thing is unthinkable in absolute justice (adalet-i mahza). The right of an individual is neither less nor more than the public nor the right of another individual; it cannot be sacrificed. This topic is rather deep and very hard to come to a conclusion.

When I was thinking about this story and these two concepts, the Mary and Jodie case, also known as Siamese twins or conjoined twins that lawyers know and often discuss about, came to my mind, and I wanted to put this case at the basis of this article. (2)

Mary and Jodie are Siamese twins born conjoined. If they are not separated with an operation, both of the babies will die in a few months. When they have the operation Mary will definitely die, and Jodie will be able to live a normal life.  Even though the doctors decided to start the operation as soon as possible, the Catholic family refused the operation, saying that this is the will of God. Upon this, the doctors asked the court for a determination decision in order to perform the surgery. Although the local court determined that the surgery should be performed, the family appealed the decision. However, the Supreme Court of United Kingdom rejected the appeal request, found the decision of the local court correct. Thus this case, which was seen in the 2000s, opened the door to many discussions.

In summary, the fundamental questions discussed in this case are ‘‘In whose interest is this case?’’, ‘‘Are Mary and Jodie separate individuals?’’, ‘‘Is Mary’s right to live one day less important than Jodie’s right to live longer?’’. From the doctors’ perspective, when the surgery is performed, there should be no liability. Despite the family’s decision to reject the operation, the decision to perform the operation was made within the ‘‘best interests, legal interests’’ discussion.

In this case, the judges of the Supreme Court of United Kingdom, although proceeding by different paths, reached the same conclusion and decided that the surgery should be performed. The judges also stated that the twins should be separated for the sake of Mary’s physical integrity and dignity, as they are two separate individuals. This surgery is in Jodie’s best interest according to all 3 judges, but it is not in Mary’s best interest according to the other 2 judges expect one. Still, separation surgery should be performed to ensure Mary’s body integrity.

One of the judges stated that Mary slowly killed Jodie and that the surgery was self-defense, another stated that the surgery was not about Mary’s death but about her body integrity, and another stated that there was a state of necessary.

On the other hand, the judges did not find it right to make a value comparison between the two lives. According to the judges, this comparison is not mandatory for this case.

At this point, the words of one of the judges regarding this incident, ‘‘the lesser of two evils should be preferred’’ touches upon a subject that has been thought about and discussed for centuries within the framework of the concepts of relative justice (adalet-i izafiye) and absolute justice (adalet-i mahza).

This issue also found a place in the laws and principles written in the Mecelle-i Ahkam-ı Adliye (Mecelle) commission, which convened in the Ottoman Empire to update and unify the law as a result of the modernism debates. In the Mecelle, which is actually unfinished, article 29 says:

“The lesser of two evils is chosen.” (Mecelle article 29)

This rule, that is, if it is necessary to make a choice, the rule that the least bad among the bad ones should be chosen, while it has a place in the ancient rules, it can also be included in modern legal texts today. In fact, as a reflection of this rule, even some individual rights that cannot be violated can sometimes be violated. For example, the state’s expropriation of an individual’s property is an example of this. Or, the unlawful evidence described by the principle of ‘‘the fruit of the poisonous tree becomes poisonous”, which is one of the most basic criminal law principles, cannot be taken as a basis. An exception to the non-justice rule in the German doctrine has generally appeared as ‘‘unlawful evidence can be evaluated if the social benefit in revealing the crime is more important’’ to be used in terrorist crimes.

On the other hand, there are also many people who reject the principle of ‘‘the lesser of two evils’’ in principle, such as Arendt. The main basis here is that the evil is evil and should not be preferred.

Another example where this issue is discussed is the ‘‘Trolley Problem’’. Rather, there are those who prefer ‘‘the lesser of two evils’’ on this issue, which is discussed on the moral-ethics axis.

Nowadays, legal professionals must develop and explore ways to achieve better while implementing existing, legitimate law. Just as in the Mary-Jodie case in 2000, we should think about what we should do in the matters that may appear at any time, we should be able to ask the right questions, discuss the basic principles while reaching the conclusion accompanied by logical and consistent answers, and investigate ways to make absolute justice even more applicable. (3)

Lawyer Haldun Barış, April 2023

Turkish to English translation: Feyzanur Öner

• ‘‘And ‘remember’ when David and Solomon passed judgment regarding the crops ruined ‘at night’ by someone’s sheep, and We were witness to their judgments.’’ Al-Anbiya, 78

‘‘We guided ‘young’ Solomon to a fairer settlement,’ and granted each of them wisdom and knowledge. We subjected the mountains as well as the birds to hymn ‘Our praises’ along with David. It is We Who did ‘it all’.’’ Al-Anbiya, 79.

• When we were students, we discussed the Mary-Jodie case in detail in Sociology of Law course at Ankara University Faculty of Law. Saim Üye was the teacher of the course. You can access the teacher’s article on the subject, which I also benefited from for this article, from the following link: https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/download/article-file/398602
• In this article, I wanted the concepts of relative justice (adalet-i izafiye) and absolute justice (adalet-i mahza) come to our minds in the context of the story in the Qur’an, Mary-Jodie case and the principle of ‘‘the lesser of two evils is chosen’’, rather than reaching a conclusion.

Should The Lesser Evil Be Chosen? yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

The reason for my use of the term ‘liberal thought’ rather than ‘liberal ideology’ is that I have little sympathy for the idea that liberalism is an ideology in the classical sense. At least, I do distinguish liberalism from hard ideologies such as socialism, fascism, Islamism, etc., which are based on complete truths that must be transmitted and imposed on society from top to down, and which consider that a right and a duty for the state to do so. If liberalism is to be called an ideology at all, it must be emphasized that it is a soft and incomplete ideology, and as such it must be distinguished from hardline and completed / total ideologies.

As such, liberalism is based on a set of instrumental values, not a final set of values. This means that the values that liberalism espouses are the framework values that are essential for a peaceful and prosperous common life. The natural consequence is that in a place where liberal thought prevails, everyone can live as he or she wishes, provided that the equal rights of others are respected.

But the area in which liberal thought is at its weakest is in international relations. In other words, liberalism lacks an international policy proposal. Although liberal thought is shown to be the owner of idealist theory among the realist and idealist approaches to international relations, this cannot be seen as a complete mirroring or overlapping of the two. Idealist theory fits liberalism in part. But that is in theory. What happens in practice? In my opinion, in practice, realist policies on the basis of the balance of power and the perception of national interests are predominant.

In parallel, we have the problem that liberal individuals and organizations, especially those with a global interest, appeal to liberal principles and values when evaluating other countries and states, but either completely ignore or gloss over the issue of evaluating their own country’s foreign policy on the same basis. Most liberal individuals and organizations in the United States can be cited as an example. However, we see that they adopt this attitude mainly towards another power, Israel.

Unfortunately, in discussions among liberals (classical liberals, minarchists, anarcho-capitalists) in various parts of the world, or in public statements made by these groups, some individuals and organizations take very contradictory positions that throw liberal values out of the window. While some liberal individuals and organizations are vocal, others remain silent and do not show their true colors on this issue. In the face of Israel’s brutal aggression against Palestine, some liberal individuals and organizations publicly and strongly support Palestine, while others support Israel. Quite a few individuals and organizations remain silent and try not to show any color. Of course, it can be said that this situation in the world also applies to Türkiye. This issue deserves to be highlighted separately.

Israel’s Occupation

The main issue to be addressed is Israel’s position. Although Israel appears to be carrying out its relentless and ruthless attacks in response to the recent HAMAS raid, the story did not begin on October 7, 2023, the date of the raid; it goes back much further. However, those who seek to justify and rationalize Israel’s actions in Gaza prefer to ignore this fact and rely on three main arguments to justify Israeli aggression. First, they argue that Israel is not an occupier because there was no previous political authority in the territories it occupies. Second, that the Jews owned the land long ago but were expelled from it, and therefore it is their historical right (and, some argue, the promise of the land to the Jews in their holy book, the Torah) to take it over completely and establish an independent state. The third argument is that on October 7, 2023, HAMAS carried out a ‘brutal attack’ on Israeli territory, almost exclusively targeting civilians, which gave Israel the right to take revenge and bomb Gaza, as it is doing today. Israel must respond to this attack and fight HAMAS, which is a ‘terrorist organization’. Others, unable to slow down, express the idea that this is an existential struggle not only for Israel but for all Western civilization.

Are these theses true or false in terms of historical facts and liberal thought? Why are they true or false? Let us consider them one by one:

Was there no Palestinian state?

As is well known, the region dwelled for a long time under the rule of Ottoman Empire. This was largely a period of peace and tranquility for the region. After the collapse of the Ottoman Empire and the British domination of the region, the Mandatory Palestine was established by a decision of the Entente Powers and officially recognized by the League of Nations in June 1922. This state lasted from 1920 to 1948. If things had gone as usual/ regular, this state would have gained its independence from Great Britain and would have appeared at the world stage today as an independent state. In fact, the Mandate had its own political existence. The permits issued to Jews who wanted to immigrate to the region and the coins minted in the name of the administration are signs and results of this fact. Similarly, the state of Palestine appears on the maps of the time.

Palestine’s misfortune first came in the 19th century, when, contrary to popular belief, it was decided to adopt the land as the homeland of the Jews in a process initiated not by Jewish Zionists but by Christian Zionists and continued by Jewish Zionists. This led to the immigration of Jews from many parts of the world to the region. Thus, the Jewish population began to grow. However, the land was still predominantly Palestinian and the majority of the population was Palestinian. Despite all the immigration efforts, by the end of World War II, the Jewish population and Jewish-owned land in the region was very small. Britain’s withdrawal from the region caused the already established and active Jewish terrorist organizations to change direction and target Palestinians. The terrorist activities carried out by these organizations aimed at expelling the Palestinians from the region and eventually began the journey that led to establishing the State of Israel. Based on this, it would not be inappropriate, unfair and wrong to say that Israel is a power that was pioneered by terrorist organizations acting in accordance with the goals of Zionism.

There was a state – a political authority – in the region that existed under the name of Palestine, but even if such a state never existed, most of the people who lived there were Palestinians, and their land and homes were privately owned. The expansion of Israel effectively meant that these areas of private property were attacked, liquidated and made Jewish by means and methods that were contrary to morality and justice. It was also an attack on the right to life of the people through the invasion of private property. Therefore, it is inconceivable that a line of thought that truly values human rights, and especially private property, would support Israel’s behavior. In such a case, either the theory is wrong, or the people who claim to adhere to the theory are betraying it…

Historically occupied lands?

The second thesis used to justify Israel’s existence and its treatment of the Palestinians, as emphasized above, is that Jews lived in the region thousands of years ago, but were expelled from these lands by the dominant powers of the time. Therefore, these lands actually belong to the Jews. This thesis is supported, at least in the eyes of some, by a religious claim. The Torah, the holy book of the Jews, claims that the land in question was promised to the Jews. This view is shared, for example, by American evangelical Christians and religious Jews who give Israel endless and unlimited support.

In many places and times in history we see cases of occupation and exile. This shows us that human beings are not angels, and that at times great injustices have been committed. But how far back in time can we go when we try to redress injustices? Will going back too far help to redress injustices or will it lead to new ones? This is the real question that needs to be discussed. In other words, how far back is reasonable, moderate, and feasible? We can draw on the insights of Allen Buchanan in Secession (Westview Press, 1991), who has done excellent work on these issues.

According to Buchanan, going back thousands of years to redress injustices is both impossible and wrong.

It is impossible because in many cases it is even difficult to determine the true extent of the case and the perpetrators. It is also possible that efforts to redress injustices may create new injustices, radically and irrevocably altering the status quo. Therefore, in efforts to address past injustices, it is important to consider whether or not there are witnesses to the injustices – that is, people who were alive at the time of the injustices – and whether or not there is a vivid and widespread historical record of the event…. In many cases that means that we can go back at most three or four generations in terms of time.

It is wrong because if we accept that presence in some lands thousands of years ago gives communities of the same descent the right to claim those lands, and if we develop policies based on that, the world would be turned upside down. For example, Indians could claim that most of the United States is theirs. Therefore, as Allen Buchanan points out, it seems to be reasonable to go back three or four generations at the most. And that makes Palestine legitimate, not Israel. Because the Palestinian case is still going on, some of the people who lived through the first expulsions and massacres are still alive, and the new case means that time extends to the next three or four generations…

Another question is how much credibility should be given to the religious references. The credentials of any religion are essentially a matter for its believers. For those who do not believe in the Torah, these claims have no meaning or value. Zionist Jews may claim that the land they occupy belongs to them, and that they are therefore not occupying it, but rather bringing it into conformity with the commandments of the Book. However, this view is only meaningful and valued by them. Moreover, in today’s world, it is not possible to legitimize the occupation of land by appealing to theo-political arguments alone. Then, for example, the religious and historical significance that Muslims attach to Jerusalem can also compete with this claim…

Is HAMAS a terrorist organization or a resistance movement?

The third thesis of Israel’s supporters is that HAMAS is a terrorist organization and should be fought like any other terrorist organization. This is a manipulation of the concept of terrorism. The US and Israel do not hesitate to call any organization they don’t like as a terrorist organization. They even believe that they have a monopoly on deciding who is terrorist or not. For example, while Türkiye is in an existential struggle with the terrorist organization PKK in Türkiye, Syria and Iraq, the United States of America does not see the extension of this terrorist group in Syria and Iraq, PKK/YPG, as terrorist and cooperating with it as an ally in the name of fighting another terrorist group, ISIS. This attitude shows USA’s double standards in its view of terrorism in the clearest way.

Is HAMAS a terrorist organization? Israel and its supporters answer to this question ‘yes’ without hesitation. However, it is very difficult to say that HAMAS is a terrorist organization. HAMAS is a political party. It was born out of the Palestinian Authority’s inability to govern effectively and the Palestinian people’s despair and hopelessness that their homeland was going to be liberated from Israeli occupation. HAMAS was born as a result. It participated in the elections and was successful. HAMAS enjoys great popular support not only in Gaza but also in the West Bank. It won 4 of 5 West Bank cities in 2005 municipal elections and a parliamentary majority in 2006 legislative elections.

The October 7 attack and the use of violence against civilians by HAMAS can of course be criticized. However, one cannot ignore the fact that there is intense disinformation about it. For example, the claims that 40 beheaded babies and participants in a music festival near the Gaza border were massacred by HAMAS turned out to be Israeli disinformation. Moreover, when the whole story is considered – what has happened since 1948 and what Israel has done and continues to do – it can be said that the HAMAS attack was a response to Israeli terrorism rather than an attack in itself.

Let us not forget that Israel pursues a policy of occupation and annihilation not only in Gaza, but everywhere Palestinians live. In addition to the massive territories it has acquired through wars and expulsions, it has displaced Palestinians and confiscated their lands through a policy of salami slicing. Therefore, HAMAS’s attack is an ‘attack’ on the occupiers of people’s occupied lands, not on lands that are legally and morally recognized as belonging to a state.

In fact, Israel was sneaky and quite successful until the recent HAMAS operation. So much so that the fact that Israel is an occupying and lawless entity was almost completely forgotten. It had already occupied most of the Palestinian territories and settled the Jews there. In order to liquidate the rest, it followed a policy of salami slicing, moving forward in small steps. The HAMAS ‘attack’ and Israel’s brutal response put the reality of what Israel is and what it is trying to do back on the world’s agenda, perhaps never to leave it again…

From a liberal perspective

From a liberal perspective, Israel is clearly in the wrong. In addition to the points made above Israel has a long-standing practice of trampling on all human rights and freedoms, in the heat of conflict it violates many rules, many of them derived from liberal thought. Collective punishment, for example, has been an Israeli policy for decades. This policy has now emerged in Gaza, but traditionally the entire family of someone believed to have committed a crime is punished by demolishing their home. Likewise, civilians, especially children and women, are not accidentally killed in Israeli attacks, they are deliberately slaughtered by Israel. In our time, the mortality rate of children in wars is about 8%, while in Gaza it is 42%. Israel uses phosphor bombs which are forbidden by international law and very harmful to humans. Israel also deliberately kills journalists. The number of journalists killed so far is over one hundred. Israel also arrests and detains minors in the occupied West Bank. It tries them in military courts, not in civilian courts like Israeli citizens, and sentences them to prison…

All these practices are contrary to liberal theory. Therefore, for liberals to support Israel is to betray the theory they claim to embrace. No one who is aware of liberal theory and has the power and ability to read and interpret life based on its elements would or could support Israel.

* Prof. Dr. Atilla Yayla,

School of Humanities and Social Sciences, Medipol University,

Founding Member of Association for Liberal Thinking.

The Palestinian-Israeli Conflict in Terms of Liberal Theory yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

It cannot be denied that Karl Marx was a diligent intellectual, a productive writer who wrote a lot, and an activist who tried to set up revolutionary organizations. He was a figure who wrote in many areas, no matter whether he was competent or not in them. He had no other job in his life that he did as successfully as writing. Marx, like many thinker, pondered on the problems of his time. He developed envisagement and predictions about the future. However, having brilliant wit and a sharp pen is not always enough to develop consistent and accurate theses. The writers who fail to recognize the characteristics of social thought, the capacity limits of human beings and human groups, and the differences between the world of human relations, institutions and the physical world, can set the bar too high to reach and make serious mistakes, like Marx…

As we well know many factors play a role in social thinking, theory development, and writing activities. The main factors are the social characteristics of the period, dominant movements of thought of the time, the task or mission the writer has assigned to himself/herself, and the mission that others have assigned to him/her. In fact, these are often more important than the author’s own ability and the research and thinking method he/she adopted. The influence of all these are naturally reflected in Marx’s life and work.

Karl Marx was a typical 19^th-century philosopher. He was a man of the era in which it was step by step witnessed that the industrial revolution changed people’s destiny and the positivist understanding of science invaded the world of social thought especially with regard to method and outcomes. The characteristics and mind patterns of his time were inevitably reflected in Marx’s thoughts. He was very pessimistic in the short term and overly optimistic in the long term. He approached to the social world as if he was approaching to the material world. According to Marx, there are social laws governing the human world similar to natural laws. These laws are economic in nature. The current state and the future of the world are determined by the relations of production (the type of property ownership plus mode of production) in a dialectical process. The discovery of these laws is possible; however, such a discovery is not an ordinary work that can be achieved by everyone. Only a philosopher like Marx who believes that he is an exceptionally talented thinker with almost divine qualifications could understand and formulate them. Once this work is achieved, the inevitable future (determinism) could be seen or directed (revolutionary activism).[3] Such an understanding of these main points led Marx to exaggerated claims and great prophecies. Although in 1883 there were few men that could be counted on the fingers in his funeral when his dead body was buried, soon after 30 years, Marxism became a stream of thought that stormed through the world. The communist phantasm, which Marx and Engels said was circulating in Europe in the Communist Manifesto, came true in the early 20^th century, not when Marx was alive but after his death.

Marxist ideology left its mark on the 20^th century. The 20^th century was a complete age of Marxism (socialism, communism) in many ways. However, the collapse of Marxism was spectacular as much as its rise was. The elements of the collapse of Marxism are not only limited to the despotic socialist regimes that adopted Marxism as their official ideology, and constructed political and economic systems on the tenets of Marxism. Marxism had collapsed as a theory much earlier. The theoretical collapse naturally occurred before the practical collapse, but it was not sufficiently noticed because of the cold war and the fact that most of the academic-intellectual circles were under some sort of Marxist occupation. Almost all the important prophecies and historical explanation of Marxism proved wrong. The working class was not driven into misery. Profit-margins did not proceed in a way that would lead to capitalist collapse, as he had predicted. The middle classes did not disappear. Marxist regimes produced not material abundance but scarcity and could not provide people with their most basic needs. Instead of equality and justice, inequality and injustice became the sign of Marxist regimes. It was learned from the Marxist experiences that the areas of civil liberty, which Marxism did not care about theoretically at all, and Marxist regimes violated lavishly, was more important and functional than Marxism predicted. Briefly, Marxism was wrong, produced starvation, misery, and tyranny, and eventually collapsed practically, albeit with delay.[4]

However, the collapse of Marxist prophecies, theses, and large (nationwide) Marxist political and economic structures did not reflect on the intellectual world as much as it did in the political world. There have been few changes in the ideological map of power in the academic and intellectual world. Many Marxists still continue to believe in Marxism. Why? Why did these people stick to a collapsed theory and they still do so? The claims that “neo-liberal” ideas dominate in intellectual circles do not reflect the truth. At least in terms of number and ruling power, those who still dominate are Marxists and those who roam with them. Why? It is this strange and frightening situation that needs to be explained.

Leszek Kolakowski is an important thinker that we must turn our eyes on in an effort to answer this question. Even Kolakowski’s short life story shows this. Kolakowski, born in Poland in 1927, witnessed Nazi persecution during his childhood. After liberation, he joined the Polish Communist Party in 1945, which he thought was an anti-fascist party. However, his commitment to truth, human dignity, and freedom made it impossible for him to stay in the communist ranks. He was soon charged with “deviating from the Marxist-Leninist ideology” for his criticism of the socialist system in Poland. After a speech on the “October Revolution” in 1966, he was expelled from the party with routine ceremonies reminiscent of those in Orwell’s famous 1984. A lynching campaign was launched against Kolakowski in state-controlled media. Kolakowski was also expelled from the university on charges of “instilling youth ideas that go against the country’s official view”. He went into exile in 1968. He taught at major Western universities and eventually settled in Oxford. He became one of the biggest inspirations and supporters of the solidarity movement in Poland which brought down Polish communist regime. Throughout his academic and intellectual life, he accomplished many important works and won many prestigious awards. As this summary of his intellectual past shows, there are justifiable reasons for Kolakowski to be among the authors who should be referred first when trying to answer the question “Why is Marxism still popular amongst academics and intellectuals?”

Roger Kimball is also looking for an answer to the same question in Kolakowski’s works in a different but similar context in one of his articles that I benefited from while writing this article.[5] As he emphasized, Kolakowski both experienced Marxism by living in a communist regime and created a masterpiece on Marxism as a top-notch expert. Kolakowski is a great but little-known writer. The reason why he is not known as much as, for example, Jacques Derrida, Michel Foucault or even Richard Rorty is that he is not a man of the left-wing. However, it might be said that no socialist writer knows Marxism as much as Kolakowski does. The main work of Kolakowski is Main Currents of Marxism: The Founders, The Golden Age, The Breakdown (1500 pages). In his book, the thinker makes an in-depth analysis of the essence of Marxism. His insights help us to grasp Marxism better, understand why Marxism collapsed, and explain why Marxism is still popular in academic and intellectual circles.

Lord Acton, the English philosopher and historian of freedom, said that what a social theory is against does not mean much by itself and what matters is what that theory advocates.[6] Kolakowski contributes to this finding by showing that while evaluating a grand social theory (or ideology), it does not suffice to consider only its theoretical ideals and goals; it is also necessary to put its methods to achieve its ideals and goals on the analysis table. Evaluations about Marxism are mostly, if not only, made in terms of its expressed ideals on paper and its long-term goals, but its actual status and realized results are constantly neglected. It can certainly be said that Marxism has a privileged position among all ideologies in this respect and has no desire to share this privilege with other social theories at all. Regardless of its intention and claim, the Marxist doctrine, according to Kolakowski, develops the formula to transform the society into a giant concentration camp (“Gulag society”), demanding the abolition of private property and full state control over the market. This point is extremely illuminating. The importance of private property and the free market can never be overstated. Indeed, many libertarian writers emphasized that revoking the right to private property of individuals would mean revoking their humanity and turning them into things. The same authors also pointed out that the abolition of the free market is the shortest way to barbarism.[7] However, those who regard private property and free exchange as the source of all kinds of evil ignore these warnings and seek to abolish private property. In Marxism, they find a safe shelter and a ground where they can discover additional intellectual ammunition to use in intellectual warfare. Then it would not be an exaggeration to say that those intellectuals and academics who oppose private property are likely to turn to Marxism and stay there. In other words, opposing private property is an obsession that almost ensures adherence to Marxism despite all its fiasco.

Another reason why intellectuals adhere to Marxism is a romance or a state of mind and soul that, like a brain virus, causes them to close their minds to material facts and information that accumulate like a mountain. In the age of positivism and childish optimism, when it has not yet been practiced as a political and economic model on a large scale and thus has not revealed its results, a person’s fascination with Marxism is a phenomenon that may not be excused but certainly explained. Who does not want to live in a heaven and benefit the most of its infinite blessings! Who does not want all kinds of injustice and poverty to disappear! Of course, no one. However, if adherence still persists to a theory that deepened and generalized the problems and evil that it aimed and declared to eliminate, and created the most oppressive political systems in history, then something might be causing to close, so to say,  the doors of reason, mind, and heart tightly in favor of that theory. We can find a typical example of this mind and heart-closing behavior in the story of how Kolakowski’s Main Currents of Marxism published in France. It was unthinkable to publish Kolakowski’s three-volume work, written between 1968 and 1976, in Poland under communist regime. Therefore, the book, which was secretly introduced into Poland through off-the-record ways, was only legally published in 2000 in that country. In contrast, only the first two volumes of the book were published in “free France”. These two volumes were telling the story of Marxism from Marx to the death of Lenin. The third volume, which was addressing Stalinism and its various forms, including the New Left thinkers such as Louis Althusser and J. P. Sartre, could not be published. The reason was that publishers who were afraid that this volume would cause anger among French leftists did not want to take risks. The closed mindedness of French intellectuals to these facts and different ideas was repeated at different scales in many other countries.[8] Thus, socialists continued to keep their faith in Marxism by ignoring the events, facts, and information that refuted orthodox socialism and exhibited the brutal face of communist regimes.

While one set of neglected cases was the hunger, misery, and inequality created by socialism, another set was massacres. Marxism was the womb of the most widespread and brutal massacres ever seen in the countries where it dominated. Unfortunately, cruelty and massacre are evils that are not rare in human history. However, no era of history has seen mass murder on the scale that Marxist regimes committed. The logic, dimensions, and consequences of these mass murders were addressed by Kolakowski, like many other writers, in many articles and studies. From communist party leaders to civil war heroes, from ethnic minorities to peasants who wanted to protect their property at all costs, from university students to aristocrats, millions of people were brutally killed in the name and for the sake of Marxist dreams and ideals, with an “egalitarian” manner that excluded no segments of the society. However, information about these murders fell on deaf ears and blind eyes of intellectual circles in the West, and Marxists always managed to find new ways to refresh their belief in Marxism.

Another reason for the attractiveness of Marxism is, not surprisingly, its collectivist and utopian nature. The real strength of Marxism as an idea always resulted from its collectivist and promising character, not from the material foundations of its theses or its conformity with reason and logic. When Marxism was born, it promised a new world, and it still does.[9] Marx’s statement that “philosophers have only interpreted the world so far, the point is to change it” is an expression of this approach and it strikes at the heart of the stargazer intellectuals who are incapable of changing themselves but not shy of demanding for the complete renewal of society. Marxism’s labor theory of value and theories about the so-called cyclic crises of capitalism, the value of the proletariat, etc. are only particulars and each one is meaningful only to the extent that it helps change and transform the world.

Marxism gains an irresistible attraction when a scientificness is added to its new world promise that is identified with heaven on the earth. In other words, with this element, the intellectuals who “fall into the clutches” of Marxism are surrounded in every respect and in the strictest sense. Let us parse the basics of the picture again. Heart first: Pain and hunger should disappear, inequalities should end. (Okay! Who would not want?) Then science: Societies have immutable laws like natural laws. (Oh, how beautiful!) Then the chosen men: Only gifted intellectuals like (in fact only) Marx can discover these laws. (Whoever does this, we thank him/her on behalf of humanity) These laws push societies in a certain direction, as things are pulled by the gravity towards the center of the earth. (This is our destiny. What a beautiful destiny!) These laws are scientific and do not change at one’s sweet will. (Meaning ​​we will all be socialists and eventually we will live in a socialist world.) So human-will cannot resist them. (Bow to the inevitable) And here is the ideal society and world. The heart eventually met mind and science, and the chosen man completed the picture. We stay on target: Heaven on earth. The end of history. There is no way beyond. Who would not charmed by this picture?

Do not be in a hurry to hit on the answer by saying “No one can resist the temptation of this picture!” This picture does not impress everyone and does not equally affect those it impressed. For example, workers do not care much about this wonderful picture. Educated people and those who are proceeding in the education life (students) (petty-bourgeois, in Marxist terminology) take the lead among those who are enamored of this picture. In other words, Marxism is always popular among educated people almost everywhere in the world, but not among workers. The main reason for this is that, in its purest form, Marxism is easy to understand, believe, and follow for educated people. For this convenience, Marxism, according to Kolakowski, is similar to Freudianism, Darwinism, and Hegelianism: philosophy of “A key that fits every door.” A process that explains all aspects of human life, manages everything, and provides an opportunity for a universal explanation. An easy way to solve all human problems.  A world, where conflicts between people do not occur, where we can realize our human potential without competition, and where famine disappears. A communist utopia. A place that does not exist but will be created by Marxism. With this easy nature, Marxist theory serves utopian dreams and bewitches educated people who dream of a new world. Indeed, as Kolakowski says, Marxism is the “greatest fantasy” of the Twentieth Century. It blocks any effective potential rejection from its possible opponents by posing itself as science. However the main feature of Marxism attracting the educated people is that it promises an effortless good life by addressing human needs. As Kolakowski expresses the power of influence achieved by Marxism is due to its almost prophetic, fantastic, and irrational elements rather than its supposedly scientific character. Marxism is a doctrine of blindfold trust. Marxists thinks that a universal abundance awaits us around the corner. Almost all prophecies of Marx and his followers have proved wrong, but this does not disturb the faithfulness of the believers any more than the failure of religious prophesies disturbs that of radical religious sects. In this sense, Marxism performs a sort of religious function and its usefulness is of a religious nature. However, it is a cartoon and a false religion, because it presents spatial liberation as a scientific system, which (even) religious mythologies do not claim to be like.

Another feature of Marxism that makes it difficult or even impossible for some, to get rid of or to discard it is its polylogism. Marxism claims that the thought of a human being is shaped, in fact definitely determined, by the class he/she belongs to. Most of the Marxist intellectuals firmly believe in this claim, although they themselves usually constitute the greatest denial of it. If this is so, each thinker looks at events from his/her own class window. All of these are subjective perspectives, except Marxism. Only Marxism constitutes an objective and scientific perspective. So Marxists impose their ideological concept wordbooks on everyone without intending or realizing that they are doing so. It is impossible to argue with a Marxist with widely accepted concepts of social thought-science. Even if Marxists seem to use these concepts verbally, they attach special meanings to them, and those who are unaware of the Marxist jargon do not or cannot notice it. This method and jargon lock Marxists up in Marxism. It prevents them from getting light from outside and condemns their mind to darkness. In a sense, Marxism prohibits Marxists from stepping out of Marxism. Therefore, most of Marxists who are in doubt flutter inside their cage, rather than refusing the paradigm and feeling eased. He/she follows the command “You have been Marxist, stay Marxist.”[10] In connection with this, it would not be an exaggeration if we say that Marxism prohibits thinking about what will happen or how things will be run in the social life of the future Marxist system or model. Marx did not want his disciples to think about the basic features of life in the future socialist and communist world. He did not write much on these issues either. He saw socialism as a critique of capitalism. And his followers followed his footsteps. What will happen when the prophecies of Marxism come true and the socialist and then the communist system is established? How will economic life be arranged? Who will make the production and consumption decisions? Who will be in charge of making investment decisions? How will people’s different opinions and beliefs be reconciled? All these and similar questions/issues did not concern Marx. Marxists too are not anxious about them. Consequently, the future Marxist world has been left completely in a vacuum. Marxists either fled away from this issue completely or vaguely filled their personal imaginations and hopes into their personal understanding of Marxism. Thus, every individual Marxist had the opportunity to establish a separate and happy world in his/her mind.

The easy-promising and utopian character of Marxism completes its network with two things. First, Marxism produces a strong subculture in society. Marxists create their own jargon, fashion, and style. This culture includes slogans, symbolic words, and general formulas as well as ambitious academic studies. Second, it creates a neighborhood that is narrow within the general society but comparatively wide and tightly-knitted within the intellectual circles. A person who believes in Marxism consorts with his/her fellow intellectuals in Marxist intellectual circles. Emotional ties and stakeholder relations, as well as the idea companionship, develop within these circles. If you write a book as a Marxist, your comrades buy, praise, and promote it. They give rewards to your work so that you can in time make a fame. They also provide an environment of socialization. This subculture is complemented by ostracizing (in a sense, from the community) those who “misinterpret” the ideology or reflect a skeptical and questioning attitude towards the basic elements of faith. As age advances and Marxism occupies more of the mind cells, it becomes harder to resist the domination of the neighborhoods (neighborhood pressure). Getting old makes it difficult to restore the life or create a new circle of friends when the paradigm changes; the closed mind cells make understanding and perceiving alternative ideas an insurmountable task, an unnecessary and risky burden.

One of the most effective ways for Marxism to be attractive is not just to inject the ideas and hope that all human needs will be met equally, effortlessly and forever; It also resorts to the tendency of the banditry of human kind. Nowadays, Stalin and Stalinism are not very popular, but many Western intellectuals had praised Stalin and Stalinism in their past. They praised such a terrible mass murderer and his efforts to dominate the people that recognized no limit known to humanity. Violence and brutality created by Marxism are not an accident happening to Marxism, but an integral part of it; a natural result of what the ideology demanded. Marx never believed in democracy in the meaning of controlled, participatory, and limited government after the age of 25. He argued for the dictatorship of the proletariat. In 1906, Lenin wrote what Marx meant by this: “Dictatorship is boundless power based on force, not law.” Lenin said that this concept is a “scientific” concept and added that it means authority, which is not obstructed by law and bound by any rules in any way and is directly based on violence. Such an understanding of political power is called as despotism in political theory. In 1917, Lenin had the opportunity to actually show what this type of authority he previously described on paper would mean. In this system that institutionalizes the limitless authority, as observed by Kolakowski from inside, any criticism of the system was considered as a counter-revolutionary activity (namely: crime) which requires punishment ranging from imprisonment to execution at the discretion of the misgiving by the central or local representatives of the authority (party center administrators or local party and police chiefs). In fact, Marxists are neither inventors nor pioneers of this understanding. It was the French Revolution and Robespierre that created this terrible mentality. Robespierre praised “violence and its manifestation,” leading the period of terror following the French Revolution. He glorified the use of terror and said: “If the source of the popular government in time of peace is a virtue, its sources in revolution are at once virtue and terror. Terror without virtue is fatal, and a virtue without terror remains powerless. Terror is nothing more than prompt, severe, and inflexible justice, therefore it is an emanation of virtue. It is not so much a special principle but a consequence of the general principle of democracy adapted to the most urgent needs of our country.”[11] Since then, we know that terrorism is an integral part of revolutionary transformation and utopian thought. Lenin and other Marxists followed the footsteps of Robespierre, institutionalized terrorism, and perfected the machine of terror. In 1922, Lenin wrote: “Courts should not ban terrorism but formulate its underlying motives and legalize it as a principle in a way that leaves no doubt.” This is the understanding that creates the Gulags and paves the way that makes potential Stalins a real Stalin.

The thesis that Marxism’s attractiveness for intellectuals stems from its appeal to the embedded tendency of violence in human nature may seem paradoxical at first sight, especially when considering that in the Marxist jargon attractive terms like peace and brotherhood are generously employed. When we get rid of the influence of slogans and take a closer look at the essence of Marxism and what the intellectuals find in this essence, it is understood that there is no paradox. Marxism is already an ideology that sees violence as a legitimate and necessary tool. As Roberts points out, there is no humanist inside Marx. Marxist concept of freedom is to negate spontaneous or individual autonomy. This means that society is absolutely free (saved) from autonomous forces – a freedom that will come by means of the ability of society to control its own destiny. As Roberts rightly cites, Marx’s rejection of goodwill among different classes of society and his view that violence can be used as an effective mediator between different class interests led logically to Leninism and Stalinism.[12]

Revolutionary intellectuals are the ones who do not accept people and human societies as they are and have projects to transfer them completely and eternally. Marxism is a strong refuge and a good guide for those intellectuals who like the idea of social engineering. For this reason, every intellectual who has a revolutionary transformation project meets, sooner or later, Marxism, and some of them easily anchor on Marxism or use Marxism as a stop and then slide to other totalitarian directions. The example of the former is the Marxist writers we know, and the latter is the fascist philosophers. Marxism is the most advanced one of revolutionary theories that legitimate violence, but the mainspring of all revolutionary transformation theories is the same. Robespierre, Lenin, and Hitler wanted to change human beings and society from top to down. This crazy desire of authoritarian, despotic leaders corresponds to exactly what revolutionary intellectuals wanted to do: the desire to recreate new peoples and societies. However, revolutionary intellectuals, inevitably, are aware of their limitations. No new human and new society can be created by developing a theory on the paper. It requires using extensive violence and a well-organized machine of force that will operate perfectly. Political leaders, namely states, are the ones who are in the position to have the ability and capacity to use, if they see a need, unlimited violence and to control the machine of force. Therefore, intellectuals are attracted by the political leaders whom they see having the light of creating a new human and a brand new society, as the butterflies are attracted by the light. They make gain from this in two ways. First, they try to use power as a subcontractor in the realization of their community projects. Secondly, they believe that the political power will do what is necessary to reward them by acting differently from the society that denies the reputation and material gains they believe they deserve.[13]

The desire to create a new person and a new society makes these passionate persons see the use of excessive violence in all forms justifiable, legitimate, and necessary. Violence is the easiest and most spectacular way of exhibiting power. The ruling person who believes that he/she has a good project for a perfect human-society in mind does not want to be prevented from using violence in any way. This means that power is used in accordance with the instantaneous and arbitrary perceptions and decisions of the ruling power. This requires that power is not bound by and subject to rules. So communism, which institutionalizes violence as a political tool, belittles the law. Kolakowski points out that in Marxist understanding law can give terrible punishments for minor crimes without being specifically totalitarian; the characteristic of totalitarian law is that it uses formulas like Lenin’s: People can be killed because they express opinions that can objectively serve the interests of the bourgeoisie. This means that the state can kill anyone, any time it wishes; there is no such thing as law; the issue is not that the criminal law is too harsh, but that it does not actually exist, although supposedly existing. This contemptuous attitude towards law is the feature that distinguishes ordinary authoritarianism from totalitarian despotism.

The arbitrariness of the communist regime is a consequence of the ambition to fully control life. This is the natural feature of all totalitarian regimes and it is imperative that those in power will inevitably feel because of the project of creating a new human and a new society. Lenin once put it very clearly in terms of the communist regime by saying that that socialism is ultimately about “keeping account of everything”. In the Soviet Union, everything was subject to regulation from top to bottom. The only important thing was the top-down dictations from the party. In this sense, Marxism is the name of the system in which everything is reduced to the question of expediency and it is only power that calls the tune. In the Marxist mindset, things have no inherent value in themselves, and whether they have value or not is determined by whether they are useful for achieving communist goals. It is the party officials that will decide this. There can be no such thing as impartiality or indifference for a communist because there is no such thing as an independent and objective value. Nothing has an intrinsic value, because everything gets its value from its function within the impersonal utopia machine.

Naturally, human life has no value from in this understanding. Therefore, totalitarian regimes never hesitated to kill human beings in millions.[14] The loss of people’s lives was not a problem for the leaders of the totalitarian systems. Stalin said the death of a person is a tragedy and the death of a million people is a statistic. However, what Stalin neglected was that there was no such thing as an individual according to the communist logic. Likewise, according to this understanding, there is no such thing as independent judgment whether in science, law-judgment, art or aesthetics. According to Marxists, art and literature are not human activities performed according to their own sake and their own rules; they are tools that should be used for arbitrary and variable purposes of the Party. In 1905, Lenin wrote: “Down with literary supermen! Literature must become part of the common cause of the proletariat, a cog and a screw of one single great Social-Democratic mechanism set in motion by the entire politically-conscious vanguard of the entire working class.

Marxists legitimize to kill thousands even millions by asserting that eventually full and eternal happiness will be achieved. Not only this, but also mass exiles, isolation camps, slave labor, and police terrorism appear in Marxist regimes. Marxism will create such a world where natural beauty will combine with industrial welfare in this world. People who have been freed from the alienation of the division of labor will pursue the desired professional or pleasure activity in any part of their lives or even of their days. Not scarcity but abundance will be the basic truth of economic life. What a bummer that some violence will be necessary to achieve all these beautiful things! After all, it is necessary to break the eggs to make an omelet!

The more attractive the promises of Marxism are, the less convincing explanations with regard to how these promises will be achieved are. However, for some reason, Marxist believers are only concerned with what Marxism promises and neglect how and whether it will have these wonderful promises come true. Perhaps the most important source of the prolonged attractiveness of communism, according to Hollander, is the “capacity of people to separate goals from tools, good intentions from bad results, ideals from realities, and theory from practice”.[15] This might be a general human feature, but it is Marxism that makes the most use of it. This leads to the neglect of questions that should be asked to evaluate any system when it comes to Marxism-socialism. However, no system can be subjected to a complete and descriptive evaluation without answering these questions. For example, is there a guarantee that in a socialist society, production will exceed that in capitalist society in quality and quantity? Which production style will make this possible? How will basic economic decisions be made in a socialist society? Can the giant bureaucratic device, which is inevitably to be created, make the necessary decisions inclusively, accurately and fast enough? Even if it can, will it be able to make them applied? We must not assume that the problems are specific to socialist systems. The same problems will also exist in a communist society, which is expected to coincide more heavily with heaven on earth. Just pointing out a problem here underlined by Murray Rothbard is enough to show what the main problem will be in a communist system. Communist society is theoretically a society where private property rights are completely eliminated and the all the properties are transferred to society. However, the disappearance of private property (suppose it  happened!) does not eliminate the need to manage the property. Every society faces this problem and has to solve it, albeit in different ways. In a society where private property is essential, individuals manage their property. In a socialist society, where the property is supposedly socialized, a giant bureaucracy rules property in the name of the society(!). But who will rule the property in the communist society where ownership disappeared? No matter how much the theory ignores, the problem to manage the property will not disappear. And since it will not be desired to return to private property, the socialist model, which is a model of bureaucratic domination, becomes permanent, not temporary. Socialist despotism lasts until it reaches the inevitable breakdown.[16]

However, this ancient problem is ignored in socialist theory. Those who think that private property underlies all kinds of human problems therefore find theories that reject private property attractive, and Marxism is the most developed one of all these theories. In fact, the sympathy for the idea to abolish private property needs to be analyzed in many respects. There is no doubt that an important reason to oppose private property is jealousy, although mostly it is not admitted. The question “Why others have it, not us?” necessarily affects human behavior. The misconception here is the assumption that if something belongs to nobody then it belongs to everyone. As proven by historical cases, the amount of things that can be owned in where everything belongs to everyone inevitably decreases and the situation of everybody worsens.

Another reason for the attractiveness of Marxism among the intellectuals is the associations created in minds by the determinism that is intertwined with Marxism’s claim to be scientific. According to Marxist theory, the unchangeable, precise laws discovered by Marx govern human societies and history. These laws show that the future of humanity will inevitably be communism. It is like water flowing down. There can be no objection to the direction of the flow of water. Let alone the fact that this belief leads to a difficult problem of how to explain explain the existence of very radical, activist, life-sacrificing Marxist movements that attribute to history an aim and a direction, the reflection of this belief in the context of our subject is the appearance of Marxism like the army of  an ideology leading to the victory. If the victory of Marxism is inevitable, it would not be wise to stay out of the intellectual army fighting for Marxism. Who would want to be in the ranks of defeated armies? If all currents opposite to Marxism will eventually bend the knee to it, it will be smarter and safer to stay in the ranks of the victorious army. It is for this reason that intellectuals who accept dialectical materialism as the only or best way to read history appear to anchor on Marxism.

Of course, loyalty to Marxism without the need for any explanation and legitimization, such as some young people around the age of 20 exhibit, who are wandering in the radical youth movements, is not easy for those mature people, except in exceptional cases. The old generation, who has reached the age of sixty in 2000s, has already passed through the roads that present-day youths have been passing. They became aware of the persecution (Gulag, state terrorism, and starvation) caused by socialist regimes, even if it was hearsay. However, there must be an explanation for their adherence to Marxism. In this framework, a quite useful but immoral way is to distinguish between real socialism and ideal socialism and to justify real socialism by accusing real socialism, to say that, as some do, it was capitalism, not socialism, that collapsed in the late 1980s and early 1990s. However, as I said, this is a morally problematic attitude. Marxists monopolized the real-ideal distinction, just as they made scientificness an inseparable part of their socialist ideology, denying it to liberalism and conservatism. No socialist writer realizes that fascism can also be divided into real and ideal fascism and that all the evil of fascism can be loaded into the real one and thus idealist fascism can be cleaned and justified.

In addition, those who escape from the events and facts that are difficult to explain and try to save socialism by naming collapsed socialism as real, not ideal, socialism are very stingy in explaining what is wrong with real socialism. What do those who defend ideal socialism and criticize real socialism oppose in real socialism in the name of ideal socialism? To the state ownership on things? To extremely centralized political? The absence of political pluralism and competition? To the being trimmed of civil rights and freedoms? To the victimization of individual to the collectivity? If they explain these and similar issues, they can put their case better. However, we have not heard much said by socialist ideologues so far. Socialists continue to criticize capitalism at full speed and leave what the socialist society and socialist life will be like to the imagination of people. This prevents socialists from making serious self-criticism and rectifying their mistakes. Those who attempt it are condemned and even terrorized. For this reason, Marxists continue to adhere to Marxism.

One reason for Marxists to still adopt Marxism in the former socialist countries and, in part, in countries that have never been fully socialist, is the economic performance of the former socialist countries and cartelization. Some of these countries reached a relatively stable democracy and a functioning market economy, while others stagger under the economic and political models that are neither fish nor flesh. Failures in this second group are often charged to capitalism.[17] In fact, some old people in these countries miss the “good old days”. It is clear that some of the “former” socialist countries are not doing well in some areas, but there are many reasons for this and some of them are have its roots in the past. For example, the reason why privatization in Russia created an oligarchy is the socialist political structure dominated in the country for decades. When the Soviet system collapsed and searches for the transition to the market economy and democracy began, the most advantageous ones were the most organized ones, and the most organized ones were those in the Soviet Communist Party ranks. When the system collapsed, the former communists became new oligarchs, and political power and economic power were again intertwined. So a kind of mafia order emerged. However, this was the product of the sediments of socialism rather than being the product of capitalism. Marxist intellectuals, both in the former socialist countries and those in other countries, could not and cannot still see or do not want to realize the fact. The political and economic culture they have prevents them from grasping the essence of the matter because they think that a market economy can be built with top-down instructions like a command economy.

The fact that intellectuals in countries that did not switch to full socialism have never had the full socialist experience also plays a role in their adherence to Marxism.[18] In fact, socialism is an extreme form of statism which always exists to this or that degree in almost every country.[19] But socialist intellectuals cannot diagnose this, and they suppose socialism can only exist in a country if it is fully implemented. Thus, Western Marxist writers do not know what socialism means in practice if they have not visited a socialist country and spent some time there. This makes it easy to stick to Marxism.[20] Intellectuals visiting a Marxist country are often shocked by the level of suppression and poverty. For example, visits to Cuba might give visitors interesting impressions in this regard.[21]

Finally, because Marxist intellectuals insist on staying within Marxism, they do not put the questions they ask about other systems (such as capitalism) to socialism and therefore cannot see the contradictions in Marxism. For example, they question the morality of capitalism but do not explain on which moral ground and why socialism should be preferred. It is assumed that the subjection of capitalism to moral criticism will automatically prove that preferring socialism will be a moral act. Likewise, it is not explained how the practice of socialism will be.[22] Marxists do not see the contradictions in Marxism either. One of the most typical examples of these is the mismatch between the minimal state, which is supposed to exist in a socialist society, and the economic planning that lifts markets and is supposed to achieve everything in the markets. If there will be a high degree of economic activity, the coordination of economic resources is needed. If the market, namely the institution of ownership of individual investors and producers and the decentralized decision-making process, is not allowed to do this, the market is inevitably replaced by bureaucracy. This leads to a tremendously concentrated political power and the birth of a class of political-ideological concessions.[23] But, let alone seeing this theoretical contradiction, Marxists ignore the actual facts and continue the intellectual and activist journey within Marxism.

Let us ask before finishing the article: Marxism has not lost its popularity so far, but is there any probability that it will do so in the foreseeable future? Actually, I am not optimistic about this to happen. The factors that make Marxism popular in academic and intellectual circles so far, some of which I have tried to address in this article, are unlikely to disappear in the short term. Another question mark is about where those who gave up Marxism will go. I guess the answer depends on one’s way of moving away from Marxism and the alternatives he/she has. There is no guarantee that anyone who gives up Marxism will turn to a worldview that is not totalitarian like Marxism. When we look at the intellectual picture in Turkey, we can find some clues about what might happen. If those whose minds are shaped by the patterns of Marxism cannot fulfill a philosophical rejection, they probably try to fill the vacuum in their mind created by the failure and collapse of Marxism with an approach that offers a pattern similar to that of Marxism. Therefore, former Marxists’ not shifting to new (say micro) totalitarian grounds, as well as an increase in the number of those who gave up Marxism, will depend on the performance of liberal and individualist philosophy in criticizing Marxism in the coming years.

* This is a revised version of my article “Marksizm Niçin Hâlâ Popüler?” Liberal Düşünce, Vol. 16, n. 61-62, Winter-Spring 2011, pp. 7 – 22

[2] For interesting examples of how Marxists maintained their commitment to their failed ideology despite the great collapse in 1989-1991, see: Paul Hollander, Reflections on Communism Twenty Years after the Fall of the Berlin Wall, Cato Institute, Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity Policy Analysis, November 2, 2009, n. 11, p. 12

[3] For details of this summary of the character of Marxism, see The Economist, “Marx’tan Sonra Komünizm”, Transl. Atilla Yayla, Liberal Düşünce, v. 9, n. 33, Winter 2004, pp. 49-54

[4] For a small but enlightening article about why the basic views of Marxism are wrong, see David Gordon’s “Marxism Unmasked”, which is a review of Ludwig von Mises’s Marxism Unmasked: From Delusion to Destruction (Foundation for Economic Education, 2006), http://mises.org/daily/3323 (Access date: 3.12.2010).

[5] Roger Kimball, “Leszek Kolakowski and the Anatomy of Totalitarianism”, The New Criterion, June 2005, pp. 4-11.

[6] Lord Acton, “Nationality”. This classic article was first published in The Home and Foreign Review in 1862. The article is available at: www.mtholyoke.edu/acad/intrel/history/acton.html

[7] For a very influential explanation of this fact not only at the national level, but also through social groups with observations and analyses, see: Timothy Sandefur, Cornerstone of Liberty: Property Rights in 21st Century America, Washington, D.C.: Cato Institute, 2006. A part of this book, “Why Property Rights are Important?”, which is particularly important, was translated to Turkish by Şeyma Akın and published; “Özgürlüğün Köşe Taşı: 21. Asır Amerika’sında Mülkiyet Hakları”, Liberal Düşünce, v. 14, n. 53-54 (Spring 2009), pp. 23-64.

[8] Let me give you an example from Turkey. The famous analytical Marxist writer Jon Elster’s Understanding Marxism, was offered to a prominent leftist publishing house for publication after its translation was completed. The publishing house refused to print the book on the ground that “it could harm Marxism.” The book was released to Turkish readers by Liberte Publishing House.

[9] We naturally evaluate socialism by looking at its performance in officially socialist countries. However, in fact, socialism has a record in almost every country, depending on the degree of its domination especially in economic policies. I will not say this is being neglected most of the time; what needs to be said is that this is often not noticed at all. However, socialism appears in not socialist (supposedly capitalist) countries partially and people fail to understand its results, even they attribute them to capitalism. This point should also be kept in mind and further research should be conducted on the subject. For such a study about India see: Suraminathan S. Anklesaria Aiyar, Socialism Kills: The Human Cost of Delayed Economic Reform in India, Cato Institute Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity, Development Policy Briefing Paper, December 21, 2009, n. 4. This study indicates that it costed much for India to adopt socialist economic policies after independence in 1947. The author claims that if the economic reforms that started in 1991 (with the rejection of socialist economic policies) had started ten years earlier, the lives of 14.5 million children in India would have been saved, 261 million Indians would have learned to read and write, and 109 million would have been free from poverty. We learn from this study that the Nobel laureate Indian Economist Amartya Sen has previously voiced a similar claim in terms of women’s deaths: (Amartya Sen, “More than 100 Million Women Are Missing”, New York Review of Books, December 20,1990).

[10] Jeffry A. Tucker, “Marxism Without Polylogism”, http://mises.org/daily/3677 (access date: 03.12.2010)

[11] Jonah Goldberg, Liberal Faşizm, Transl. Enver Günsel, İstanbul: Pegasus Publishing House, 2010, p. 421.

[12] Paul Craig Robert, “My Time with Karl Mark”, The Independent Review, v. VIII, n. 4, Spring 2004, p. 588.

[13] It is a sad but interesting issue that intellectuals love authoritarianism and provide theoretical support to despots. Two sources are particularly enlightening in this regard: F. A. Hayek, Kölelik Yolu, Transl. Turhan Feyzioğlu – Yıldıray Arsan – Atilla Yayla, Ankara: Liberte Publishing House, 2009 ve James A. Gregor, Mussolini’s Intellectuals, Princeton and Oxford: Princeton University Press, 2005.

[14] See: Stephane Courtois et al., Komünizmin Kara Kitabı, Transl. Bülent Tanatar et al., İstanbul: Doğan Kitap Publishing House, 2000. Anne Applebaum’s Gulag (Transl. Ufuk Demirbaş, Ankara: Arkadaş Publishing House, 2008) is noteworthy as the history of this famous concentration camp of the Soviets (publication year of the original version is 2003).

[15] Hollander, ibid., p. 22

[16] Every socialist model is doomed to collapse. Whether socialism is established in a country or around the world, it does not change. By acting in a little Marxist way, it can be said that this is a material imperative. According to Mises, if Soviet socialism did not collapse earlier, it was because not the whole world was socialist. The Soviet socialist administration followed and imitated the West in, for example, pricing and product development. If the West was socialist, the socialist model would have collapsed more quickly. In this context, it should not be forgotten that Gorbachev was not a traitor or a capitalist agent who wanted to destroy Soviet Communism, but a sincere communist who desired to save the system. See: Yuri Maltsev, “Introduction”, in Requiem for Marx, ed. Yuri Maltsev, Alabama: Ludwig von Mises Institute, 1993, pp. 7-31. For a very detailed source about political violence and domination in communist countries, see: Paul Hollander (ed.), From Gulag to the Killing Fields: Personal Accounts of Political Violence and Repression in Communist States, ISI Books, 2006. For how opponents were silenced in Soviet Russia see: Vitaly Shentalinsky, Arrested Voices, New York: The Free Press, 1996.

[17] Hollander, ibid. p. 22. For the latest situation in Russia and the reasons why the Russian state turned into a mafia state with bureaucrats, businessmen, and politicians, and current predictions about the future of the country see. The Economist, “Dealing with Russia” and “The State of Russia: Frost at the Core”, December 11^th, 2010, p. 14 and pp. 25-28.

[18] Hollander, ibid., s. 22

[19] See: Footnote 9

[20] There are resources about economic and social life in socialist countries, although insufficient. Some of these are academic and some are novel. Nobel laureate Herta Müller revealed in her novels the brutality and ugly face of the socialist system in Romania. Her novels are Yürekteki Hayvan (Telos Publishing House, 2009, second edition) and the Tilki Daha O Zaman Avcıydı  (Telos Publishing House, 2009, second edition) published in English and translated into Turkish. Müller’s Nobel Prize for Literature in 2009 increased interest in her works. One of Andrey Platonov’s novels, Çevengur, tells the drama of people who spend their lives for the sake of the socialist utopia, and Çukur tells the effects of socialist economic practices on individual lives. Many of these books is being printed by leftist publishers in Turkey. Interestingly, such books are sometimes described as “strange” in the reviews of book magazines and supplements. The following sources can be read for the actual situation in socialism: Raul R. Gregory, The Political Economy of Stalinism, Cambridge, Cambridge University Press, 2004. For an important review that analyzes Marxism from a classical liberal and libertarian perspective see: Yuri Maltsev (ed.), Requiem for Marx, Auburn, Ludwig von Mises Institute, 1993.

[21] About the situation in Cuba, one of the last socialist countries, see. Yoani Sânchez, Freedom and exchange in Communist Cuba, Cato Institute: Center for Global Liberty and Prosperity Development Policy Briefing Paper, June 16, 2010, n. 5; about life in North Korea bk. Kongdan Oh ve Ralph C. Hassip, North Korea Through the Looking Glass, Washington, D.C.: Brooking Institution Press, 2000.

[22] Jeremy Shearmur, “Popper’s Critique of Marxism”, Critical Review, 1986/1987, Winter, p. 69

[23] Shearmur, ibid., p. 70. However, some writers, who are outside the socialist tradition, wrote various works on how life will be in socialism. An interesting one is Eugen Richter’s Picture of the Socialistic Future (Freely Adapted From Babel) (General Books). The book was first published in 1893 and depicted scenes from future socialist life. George Orwell’s famous Animal Farm is an allegory that tells the inevitable degeneration of the socialist system in the example of Soviet Russia. An interesting novel about the impossibility of socialist society and the inevitable transition from socialist society to capitalism is Henry Hazlitt, Time Will Run Back, Auburn: Mises Institute, 2007 (First published in 1951, its original name was The Great Idea). For crimes committed by states against humanity, including those of the socialist states see. Ralph Raico, “The Taboo against Truth”, http://mises.org/daily/4322 (first published by Liberty, September 1989) (access date 07.06.2010).

Why is Marxism Still Popular in Academic and Intellectual Circles? yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

Turkish Grand Assembly had been founded on a pluralist base in 1920, however after the independence war the foundation of Turkish Republic in October 1923 had launched a new political system. The new politics via the Republican elites after 1925 had been established on a single party system which eliminated civil political traditions, ignored the plurality of the society. The Republican governors of the single party regime based the official ideology mainly on nationalism which suppressed other national identities as well as individual identities; on laicism which destroyed religious freedom; and statism where freedom of entrepreneurship and property rights were violated. Whenever the politics had opportunities to untighten the boundaries, the civil and military bureaucratic interventions restricted freedoms. After the peaceful transformation to a multi party system in 1950, the bureaucratic tutelage did not let the civil political culture flourish; and the mother of Turkish coups occurred in 1960 that cruelly ended up with the execution of the Prime Minister Adnan Menderes of Democratic Party who had been democratically elected. This coup had been the main start of the establishment of the unique bureaucratic tutelage system in the world history. The civil, political and economical field had been dominated and surrounded by the bureaucracy while somehow a masked open democratic system was on the scene. Even if Turkey had experienced high quality performed democratic elections, unfortunately political parties had not been provided with full democratic control of the regime so as to reform and expand freedoms. Elected governments could only deal with some superficial political actions such as basic economic activities, building urban roads, however they were prevented to interfere in security, foreign policy, and to act to reform neither the legal system nor the economic system.

The unique bureaucratic institutions bounded the hands of democratic governments while an attempt to reform had faced unrelated reactions. Those reactions were reflected as threats to the unity, the secular feature of the regime. However, reactions hindered the fear of losing the power of controlling the system undemocratically. Meanwhile this system had created economic benefactors who enjoyed protectionism and subsidies, as economic freedoms and prosperity were suppressed. Those business circles had been spokesmen of this regime and the official ideology. So called civil actors, academia, privileged elites had been benefactors and spokesmen of this regime hindered by fine sayings such as for the sake of modernism, secularism, and development- as all had remained on paper.
The economic liberalization reforms after 1990s by Turgut Ozal of the Motherland Party, brought up new economic actors making business and accumulating capital free from subsidies; and those economic actors nourished new civil society actors, as well as new civil media circles. Liberalization even to some extent changed the course of the society; and backed new political elites who had the opportunity to challenge the old Republican elites and the privileged circles. That has been the AK Party which was the result of those reforms and civil and economic changes back from 1990s.

AK Party which came into power in 2002 made significant political and economic reforms while the interconnectedness between the democratic system and the civil people had expanded where the openness, accountability had been on way to infuse in the system and transform the bureaucratic structure via democratic demands. Those demands forced initiatives in Kurdish problem, Alevite problem, on the rights of non Muslims and moreover in economic liberties. However there has been a strong bureaucratic resistance all through out reforms regarding membership to European Union and others. The Kurdish matter had had a core value in this bureaucratic tutelage system. Threats to unity had been an ideal excuse to resist democratization and liberalization. Nonetheless AK Party had recognized that resolving the Kurdish problem is not only the key to open the system but also a path to bring peace, prosperity and interconnection among the people of the region. Opening the system meant to challenge the military and civil bureaucracy concerning military, foreign policy, security and intelligence.

At the time of the changes after 1990s, Turkey’s civil life had met with a group of a religious community which dealt with education and charity on the surface. However in the 20-30 years of time this group lead by a so called religious leader F. Gulen preferred to control the civil and military bureaucracy via secret strategies instead of going to competitive politics; as it had been clear that there was no reason to be in political government to have the power. Civil circles came to better understand the hindered aims and kept some distance. Nonetheless there had been unexpected cruel actions…

AK Party’s attempt to dissolve the bureaucratic tutelage system crashed with the resistance of the unaccountable, irresponsible bureaucratic power. Gulen’s group had established an extensive power over particularly intelligence, military, foreign policy and communications bureaucracy, which was not limited to other bureaucratic institutions, covered up with civil educational and charity activities.

AK Party’s attempt might be reflected as to gain more power, that should be said that this is a democratic political and a legitimate one. A liberal democrat view could only look for democratic legitimate actors to keep responsible with their actions so that civil economic actors can push for more reforms to limit the state, and expand freedoms. The recent happenings particularly starting from 2012 which also coincides with the initiative to resolve the Kurdish problem is the dissolution of the ever strong Turkish bureaucratic tutelage system.

Every other reaction of Gulenist groups was responded by the high election results supporting AK Party in spite of any other democratic deficits in this period.

The cruel 15 July 2016 coup attempt had been an historical moment for the Turkish people. Unlike the silence and incapacity to resist the coup and the execution of the democratically elected actors in 1960, this time in 2016 there had been civil people of Turkey, who had enjoyed the openness, the enormous economic gains, the prosperity and the democratic change; and moreover the hope for more, committed to uphold the real power by their hands. People of Turkey would like to democratically control the system, they would like to change the power democratically when they don’t favor, do not want a change by armed forces or bureaucratic forces. The cruel night had witnessed the glorious resistance of civil people to the tanks and armed forces along with the resistance of President Erdogan and the other political actors unlike the ones in the past.

This has been a zero point. Turkey has a way to go to establish a strong pluralist, democratic, open system.

To understand the unique bureaucratic establishment intensively and extensively; to differentiate various factors, actors and events from each other at particular time periods; hereby in his book titled The Glorious Resistance of Turkish Democracy Prof. Atilla Yayla proposes in depth analysis within a historical political perspective. Yayla is an academic whose professional life along with his civil endeavors have been devoted to better understanding of the philosophical foundations of a free, just and prosperous society in human history. Moreover, he has been an intellectual entrepreneur acting to nourish new generations and support new intellectuals to expand the queries of a civilized, free, plural society.

As an academic and intellectual entrepreneur Atilla Yayla preferred the bureaucratically unprivileged path to support the political legitimacy; to continue to criticize constructively civil political actors for the opportunities to transform the structure; and to heavily invest in intellectual fields which will prevail for long run and influence the political climate eventually.

Under the eternal light of the glorious resistance on July 15, 2016, this book provides a distinguished perspective to get involved in the political spectrum of Turkey and to develop a further insight to analyze the political, economic and legal requirements for liberty, justice and peace in Turkey as well as in the geographically, and culturally related regions.
May 2018

* Preface, July 15: Glorious Resistance of Turkish Democracy, Atilla Yayla, Liberte Publications, 2018.

Pic: Elif Öztürk Özgöncü/AA

Tribute to the Glorious Resistance of Turkish Democracy yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

The attitude of the West in general against July 15, 2016, coup attempt in Turkey was really upsetting. Governments of the EU countries and USA kept away from giving a clear and strong support to Turkey’s democratically elected government during and aftermath of the failed coup attempt. On the coup night representatives of Western  governments waited to speak out until it became clear that the coup attempt would  fail and Erdoğan administration would go on to reign in Turkey. Even after months the West hesitated to take a really democratic stance. What caused this disappointing  attitude of the West? In this short article I will try to search the reasons behind West’s historic, shameful, and discrediting failure.

Why and how did the West fail?

In the days following July 15 coup attempt in Turkey many commentators, including President Erdogan, stated that the West had betrayed its values during the July 15 coup attempt by not giving a clear and timely support to Turkey’s democratically elected government. It is indeed difficult to say that all these criticisms are not founded on strong grounds. This attitude strongly harmed the democratic credibility of the Western world and proved that the West is not immune to violate so called Western values. I will not dwell in whether the Western values are really western values or whether it is correct to define them as such as they are different topics that call detailed analysis. However, if we are to use this definition than we cannot blame the criticisms that the West betrayed its own values.

The West likes to consider and present democracy as its own exclusive masterpiece with all its rules and institutions. It is ready to strike at any part of geography in this framework. However, it is important to note that their reaction towards the coup attempt in Turkey makes one question the sincerity of their belief in democracy. In fact there are many events in history that proves that the West is not loyal to democracy, as they want us to believe. If we are to look at recent events, the Arab spring is a perfect example. Most Western countries supported the coup and dictatorial regime of Sisi in Egypt rather than supporting the elected democratic leader Mursi.

There has been a merciless attack on Erdoğan by the Western academia, media and government for some time. Before the coup attempt in Turkey, the Western media were already making comments on a probable coup attempt and trying to justify it. A typical example of this is the some articles penned by Michael Rubin, who is an expert in a neo-conservative think tank called American Enterprise Institute (AEI). In one of his articles, which was first published in the AEI website months before the coup attempt and then appeared in other places such as Newsweek, Rubin mentions about a probable coup attempt in Turkey. However, the writing was not in the form of a warning, but rather a hope and even an open support to a probable ongoing plan.[1] The same person tried to justify the coup by explaining why Erdogan deserved it. According to him Erdogan was paranoid and was scared that his presidential complex was going to be bombed. The West was going to support the coup under the condition that coup plotters would turn the country into a democracy.[2] According to Rubin the secular army would no longer watch Erdoğan and will act in the name of democracy and secularism.[3]

There was a coup attempt like the one Rubin had foreseen, or in this case hoped. But everything else was refuted. An attempt to bomb the presidential complex was not paranoia, it actually happened. The coup was not planned by secularists as he hoped, but by the members of a religious cult. If the coup was successful a religious totalitarian regime would have been established on the name of “moderate Islam”. The coup plotters’ B plan was to deprive the country from a central power and to create a conflict between various authorities that would send Turkey into chaos.

Almost none of the Western countries, including USA and EU member states, showed an open and clear support to a government in Turkey that had been democratically elected nor strongly condemned against the July 15 coup attempt. In the first hours of ongoing coup attempt the foreign minister of the USA did not mention supporting democracy and elected government, but rather emphasized on “peace and stability”. The same USA waited for the country’s power balance to be clear, and confirmation of the loss of the coup before making a second statement. The EU countries put on a worse show in the name of democracy. It did not show the same attitude towards the coup attempt and aftermath of the coup in Greece and Spain.[4]

What was more embarrassing for them was continuing this attitude even after the coup was eliminated. This was not only visible by the leaders of the country, but also in the so-called civil media institutions as well. During the conflict hours in Turkey, the head of a USA think tank claimed, similarly to FETO, “Erdogan was a megalomania that put the country in conflict. Who would miss him?” On the 21^st of July the BBC published a report titled “Recep Tayyip Erdogan: Turkey’s Ruthless President” that aimed to justify the coup. An article written on the 18^th of July by a Turkish writer in New York Times had the title “Erdogan’s followers are like sheep, they do whatever he tells them.” The same newspaper confirmed that Gulen was behind the coup, but instead of condemning him, the culprit and victim changed places and Erdogan’s management was associated with the Nazis. The Guardian claimed, by quoting Gülen that the coup attempt might be “a show directed by Erdogan”. The Daily Telegraph of London titled its coup article “Coup in Turkey: the military considers itself as the protector of the secular regime and constitution”. A lot of Western media published verbal and written interviews with Fetullah Gülen, which aimed to present him as other worldly, a calm and humble preacher who had nothing to do with this bloody coup attempt. We can show just how undemocratic and uncivilised their country governments, media organs, experts and journalists are with a single comparison. How would the West feel if there was the probability that a new Hitler had attempted a coup against the government in Germany and newspapers and journalists in Turkey wrote that Germany had deserved it? How would the USA react if the Turkish media had stated that the USA deserved the 9/11 attacks and invited the country to be compassionate to Al Qaeda and Bin Laden, or carry out interviews with Bin Laden and give him the residential rights in Turkey?

It is obvious that the EU countries and the USA failed in their test of democracy by not condemning the coup attempt and the culprits enough and at the right time, or failing to support democracy. Then we may ask, why? Why did the West tread on their values and not show their support to Turkey during this stage? Why were they so upset that the coup was unsuccessful? These can be answered with a few factors explained below.

1. National Interest Precluding Over Principles

The Western countries and especially the USA claim that their foreign policy principles are based on the spreading and protecting of democracy.[5] However, empirical studies show that this is rarely the case. The West always keeps their national interest above any principle. That is why their values sometimes becomes a tool for their national interest, thus they can abandon their values and democracy for national interest and partner with undemocratic governments. There are many examples of this including France’s relation with Algerian dictators, who purge Islamic opponents; The USA’s relation with anti-democratic South Korea in the past and current relation with Saudi Arabia, which has no respect for human rights, and its constant support to dictator Sisi during and after the Egyptian Coup against democratically elected Mursi government. This list can go on with examples like the close relationship between Germany and anti-democratic Iran.

All these show that it is not human rights and democracy that define the foreign policies of the Western countries, but national interest. While they ignore the dictatorship regime that ignore basic human rights and freedoms of countries with which they hold tight relationships, they do not hesitate to destabilise or support those who try to destabilise democratic countries that defy the policies of the Western world. The civil society organizations that are funded by the Western states might try to manipulate every level of the society into their ideology and opinions.

Failing to condemn the July 15 coup attempt on time and avoiding to support the democratic government has once and for all proven that the West prefer their national interest more than moral values and democracy. This has not slipped the Turkish people’s attention and it will never be forgotten.

2. Fear of Terrorism Based on Islam

Terrorism first emerged as a systematic method in the West after the French Revolution and spread across the world. In the establishment of communist and fascist administrations of the West terror was widely used. So namely, the West is not foreign to the idea of terrorism or its practices. Despite this, for the last years the West insists of referencing terrorism with Islam.

During the start of the millennium, the West formed a strong connection between Islam and terrorism through al-Qaeda. Currently ISIS is embodied as such. However, instead of keeping the terrorist accusations and criticisms limited to this organisation, the West spreads this concept and identifies it with almost all Muslims and Islam. They sometimes tend to present the war on terror equivalent to war against Islam and Muslims. What is more the formation of organisations such as al-Qaeda and ISIS are still unclear and it does seem that they might have been originated by the secret services of some Western governments.

The West also has an important role in the current downfall of Iraq and especially Syria. The US’ false justification of the Iraq invasion with fake documents and Syria’s preference of dictatorship over a Muslim tendency regime was effective in terrorist organisation’s invasion of the majority of Syrian land. Another peculiarity is that the West considers religiously referenced organisations as terrorists and attacks them, but fails to define secular organisations that carry out the same deeds as such.

Ever since the beginning of 2010, the West sees Turkey as a country that supports ISIS. This is not because Turkey is supporting the organisation, but because it refused to fight against ISIS in the name of the West and carry their burden on its shoulder. As such, in one of his speeches Obama complained how Turks failed to use “their wide army to fight against ISIS”.

3. Presuming That Turkey is Ruled by Radical Islam

Most Westerners believe that Turkey is governed by radical Islam and that Erdogan is a radical Islamist who wants to turn Turkey into an Islamic state. The FETO network that carries false, corrupt accusations to its Western allies feeds this claim. In return, the West presents and defends Fetullah Gulen as a moderate, democratic, civil religious leader.

However, the reality is completely opposite. Whether you like his policies or not, whether he is right or wrong, Erdogan is a leader that has gained power through democratic elections and thus can only be dethroned through elections by the people. AK Party management has been the pioneer of centring Turkey, breaking bureaucratic guardianship, giving Muslims and non-Muslims their rights, producing various media outlets, developing freedom of expression, returning the usurped foundation goods of the non-Muslims, giving equality to the Kurds etc.

On the other hand, FETO is a totalitarian structure that manages with a steel discipline, works behind closed doors, forms a parallel bureaucracy within the state, controls every area of life of its members, and does not hesitate to use violence. However, Gulen is aware of the West’s fear of radical Islam and Islam referenced terrorism and uses it. As such, during the interviews he gave to the Western media after the coup attempt, he presented himself as a representative of moderate Islam and stated that he was prepared to help the West in this line.

The West, which refuses to see the real position of the subjects, believe that by supporting Gulen against Erdogan they are fighting against radical Islam, while failing to realise that they are actually supporting radicalism. In fact, the existence of AK Party government and its activities that is what prevents the radicalisation of Islam among Muslims and the spread of ISIS in the country.

4. Turkey’s Desire to Pursue an Independent Foreign Policy

Turkey’s economy has tripled in the last 15 years and this has, in return, affected nearly all areas of social life. As it became richer and stronger, it started to attract the people around the area with common historical and cultural heritage.

The country that became financially richer began to work towards an independent and multi-dimensional foreign policy. This began to disturb some countries, especially the USA. Until recently, Turkey was not able to form, or contribute to forming a foreign policy in a regional scale. The regional policies were determined by the West, in accordance to their national interest, and Turkey was expected to follow and serve it. The terms “national interest” and “America’s good friend” in the American jargon are the symbolised version of this attitude.

Turkey is now less dependent on the West and wants to play a bigger role in determining the foreign policy. For this, it is trying to move towards a multi-dimensional foreign policy and increase the indigenousness rates in the defence industry to strengthen the country’s national defence. In the cases where their national interest does not coincide with the West, it becomes obstinate and adds conditions. This turn of events makes the west extremely uncomfortable and thus they hope that Erdogan loses power in whatever way possible.

5. Unidimensional Flow of Information to the West

The situation in Turkey and the current events are transferred to the West via two channels: FETO and PKK. FETO presents Turkey to the West as a radically Islamic country that supports terrorism, and is ruled by a dictator who has taken away all democratic rights and freedom. The FETO groups in almost all the countries are carrying out lobby activities via the media, civil society groups and government bureaucrats. PKK’s lobby groups are also on the same line. It is seen that fanatic and prejudice writers such as Michael Rubin are all parroting FETO’s theories and claims.

Turkish civil society groups do not have the ambition, or sufficient source and skill to transfer the correct version of the incidents and events in the country to the Western counties. The international information networks, mainly the state’s ministry of foreign affairs, were either partially under FETO control or did not work at all, or worked against the state. Thus it is very difficult for the West to receive correct and sufficient information on Turkey and form Turkish policies based on the information.

Failures in Turkey

There was a social agreement against the  July 15 Coup attempt in Turkey. There were people of all ideologies in this agreement particularly from AK Party and MHP ranks. An important number of people from CHP also fought against the coup. The HDP alignment also showed support against the coup even if the party rulers didn’t. Other parties that were not represented in the parliament such as Saadet Partisi, Hak-Par and Hüda-Par firmly opposed the coup as well.

On the other hand, there were groups that did not oppose and in fact gave direct and indirect support to the coup. We have to write about them for record. The foremost group of supporters were the radical leftist groups. The people’s resistance on the July 15 once again proved that the left did not love the citizens as they are, but the idealised and characterised citizens of their own ideology. The leftists who are addicted to revolutions either ignored the July 15 revolution or demeaned it.[6] For example, leaving aside the radical leftists, even the Birikim magazine group, who were considered more moderate and democratic, did not show an open attitude against the coup. Whereas if the leftist groups had gone against this coup and prevented it, they would have written many legends and heroes that would have been told for many generations to come.

Some liberals also failed to openly condemn the coup due to their Erdogan hatred and adopting an ahistoric position. Even if they did condemn it, it was very subtle and did not focus on the culprit. Their ignorance of the Turkish people started during the May-June 2013 Gezi revolts and reached its peak during the 17/25 December 2013 events. They decided to side with the illegitimate in the conflict between the legitimate and illegitimate. Through incorrect rendition of liberal values, they thought and presented the idea that a totalitarian structure’s struggle was the struggle for freedom, democracy and rule of law. They considered a totalitarian monopolist, exclusivist group, which organised within the state, used state status, authority, and equipment, as a power that would balance the elected government. They contributed to the image that FETO was trying to draw about Erdogan, the government and Turkey. They accused their peers, who did not think like them, of depending on the government to writing and thinking for profit. Even though the information and documents on the reality of FETO increased each day, they still refused to leave their position on the night and aftermath of the coup. By directly or indirectly supporting the coup they managed to successfully add the terms “coup supporting liberals” and “coup lover liberals” to the liberalism dictionary⁷.

Conclusion

As it is obvious the West has lost huge prestige among the Turkish citizens by not giving timely, sincere, and sufficient support to democratically elected government against July 15 2016 military coup attempt of the Gulenist gang. No reason can excuse this upsetting attitude. This failure of the West will never be forgotten. The Turkish peole will feel no indebt to the West for its democracy and not surprisingly many Turkish citizens are to tend  to think that Turkey is a democracy not due to  West’s help but despite  the West.

Endnotes

[1] Michal Rubin, “Will There Be a Coup Against Erdogan in Turkey?”, http://europe.newsweek.com/will-there-be-coup-against-erdogan-turkey-439181?rm=eu.

[2] Michael Rubin, “Why the coup in Turkey could mean hope?”, http://nypost.com/2016/07/15/why-the-coup-in-turkey-could-mean-hope/

[3] Michael Rubin, “Erdoğan Has Nobody to Blame for the Coup but Himself”, http://foreignpolicy.com/2016/07/15/erdogan-has-nobody-to-blame-for-the-coup-but-himself/

[4] Hazal Duran, “Failed Coups and Their Aftermaths: European Examples”, http://thenewturkey.org//failed-coups-and-their-aftermaths-european-examples/

[5] To see that the claim that American foreign policy depends on democracy is baseless and wrong look at James L. Payne, “Making the World Safe for Muddle: The Meaning of Democracy in American Foreign Policy”, The Independent Review, v. 13, n. 4, Spring 2009, p. 601-610.

[6] Tarkan Zengin, “Halkın devrim yapmasına öfkelenen sol”, Star-Açık Görüş, 14 August 2016.

Why did the West Fail to Condemn the July 15 Coup Attempt of Turkey? yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.

Juncker’s praise to Castro is obviously motivated by his collectivist background but there is a worse matter with him. He looks like suffering from a deep confusion and it is not only him but most of other EU technocrats look confused too. And this is not only affecting them but EU’s future too.

People hardly mention about what a huge failure it was for EU administration to make Brits take a Brexit decision. However, it was a mass and Europeans have slowly started to recognize it. Britain’s concerns and demands have not taken into consideration since EU administration sees the union as a club that acts on its own interests and when the time comes, that can break its own rules. However, EU was not established on that spirit. It has never meant to be a mechanical organism that when a country becomes a fit-shape, it can be the part of. EU has been a peace project above all and when this very first principle was noticed to be broken, the organization has lost its spirit. Noone saw that making Brits to take the decision of staying in the EU was much more important than EU procedures or bureaucratic accuracy. Maintaining relationship with UK within the EU perspective should have been the biggest concern beyond all details because EU was exactly for keeping countries attached to its fundamental purpose.

I remember Mr. Juncker said before, the US President-elect Donald Trump should learn how the EU works. The point Juncker is missing is that nobody needs to learn how EU works. It is just people need to learn what EU is; and what EU is obviously very much different than what Juncker imagines. After his long-time political experience, it looks like he needs to learn how the world works.

And now he is adding one more mistake to his career with being reckless to Turkey’s EU membership negotiations. He wants Turkey to decide whether they want to be a member or not. And he seems to be really convinced that it is that easy to make that decision. Is this how he thinks the world works? What would happen if Turkey went to referendum and decide to put an end to membership negotiations? What would that cost to Mr. Juncker? More importantly what would that mean to the future of EU? A European nation is being threatened with deprivation of privileges of club membership? Juncker should understand that if it is a club membership that we are talking about, then we need to admit that people are free to look for alternative clubs with better privileges and they don’t get criticism out of it. However Turkey obviously doesn’t see it as a club. They see themselves as a natural part of Europe and well deserved candidate of EU membership. That’s why they have been there since the beginning and have been trying over generations.

Juncker keeps the record of the longest term democratically elected prime minister in power and it must be in his best knowledge that bureaucrats suffer from fish bawl effect. Their lack of vision helps to show matters risk-free but not for so long. When matters change after all, bureaucratic motivations start to become troublesome but nothing more.  They cost a lot to politicians and the people. Thus, they are needed to be taken under control. If European political leaders do not run the show again, EU bureaucrats seem to cost much to Europe. And Turkey looks like the next deficit.

EU Means More Than Juncker Can Imagine yazısı ilk önce Hür Fikirler üzerinde ortaya çıktı.