It can be said that after pastor Brunson was convicted of terror charges, and his release after the court took the time he served into account suspended the remainder of his time, a disappointment emerged in the public opinion. This is natural. If we consider the stance of Turkey against the U.S. and the powerful support of the public opinion, the current psychology is natural and humane. If people didn’t have this psychology then that would be unusual. We need to see similar disappointments about the issues like the Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK), the Fetullah Terrorist Organization (FETÖ) and the financial attack against Turkey as natural too. Because the public think that Turkey is subjected to multi-directional attacks and they are standing with their country, as they were also doing in the Brunson case. In an environment where there is too much sensitivity, these kinds of disappointments are a sign of normality because they are real. Of course, the reactions of FETÖ supporters or the reactions caused by obstinacy need to be analyzed in another context.
In our culture, there is a tendency to keep incidents and ideas secret from the public. We can define this tendency as top-down. Although these kinds of attitudes are considered as a legacy of the Westernization process over France, we can find similar examples of this in our history. The top-down Westernization made notions like top-down rule, enlightened despotism and Jacobinism parts of our lives. These notions are often used to describe the practices of the Republican era and considered to be a distinguishing characteristic of that age. This characteristic is also shown as one of the reasons for the limited success of the Republican modernization.
It was with President Erdoğan that for the first time in 2009 this Jacobin approach was abandoned. Although we see examples of this approach in the process that started with the republic protests, 2013 was a turning point. The broad-based and unorganized influence of public opinion over politics started with the opposition with the Gezi Park protests.
The Gezi protests were a product of Jacobinism of organized structures and constituted a continuation of the trauma which was the result of the Westernization process. Both Erdoğan’s rallies after the republic protests and the rallies after the Gezi protests are compared in terms of the participants’ level of education. Those who followed the events closely will remember the comparisons made between the two sides’ level of education.
It is remarkable how modern ideologies and new religious movements are similar in terms of Jacobinism. Especially the surprising similarity of the characters idealized by the two sides’ organized structures reminds us of the necessity to have new ideas about public opinion, society, individual, groups, religion, and ideologies. Of course, here we need to talk about ideas that are unique to Turkey. Because Jacobinism is the reason for the existence of ideologies and new religious movements which disregard the local dynamics.
Since 2013, the fact that public opinion has started to play an important role, and the promotion of this role by authorities is an important development. The temporary disappointment we are experiencing today after pastor Brunson’s release after he was found guilty, is a result of this process. If this incident occurred back in the old days, we would see reflections of indifference in the public opinion toward the issue. However, now we are facing the immediate reactions of the public opinion. There may be different opinions about whether this is a good thing or not. Because we are talking about a participation which politically bears some risks. But there is no doubt that this is a new way of dealing with politics. Also, it is obvious that these immediate reactions may turn into opportunities for the great politicians. Because we can see that this kind of development may pave the way for accountability.
Hence the statements of Erdoğan in Kayseri on Oct. 13, 2018, are important: “I know there are some issues disturbing your conscience in the fight against FETO.” We can see the contrast between accountability and Jacobinism in this statement. We can also regard the calmness of Erdoğan as a reflection of this new way of dealing with politics. Erdoğan’s statements on the terror corridor established in the east of Euphrates thanks to the U.S.-Israel cooperation while there are multi-directional attacks on Turkey’s economy, can be also evaluated in this framework. It is something remarkable for a politician to be backed by the public opinion.
