Turkey's political crisis echoes 1997 'post-modern coup' as Erdoğan consolidates power
Turkey's current political crisis under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan mirrors the 1997 'post-modern coup' that ousted Islamist Prime Minister Necmettin Erdoğan's mentor, Necmettin Erbakan. Erdoğan, who rose to power in 2002 after defeating the military's influence, now faces a similar dynamic as he deploys state resources to dismantle opposition, including the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu. The government's strategy, supported by nationalist MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli, aims to fragment the opposition amid economic crisis and shifting alliances.
Turkey's current political crisis under President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan increasingly mirrors the 1997 'post-modern coup' that forced Islamist Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan to resign, analysts say, as Erdoğan deploys state resources to dismantle the opposition.
The 1997 intervention, known as the Feb. 28 process, saw the National Security Council (MGK) designate political Islam as the country's top threat. President Süleyman Demirel secured Erbakan's resignation by exploiting the ambitions of True Path Party (DYP) leader Tansu Çiller, who had promised to support Erbakan but instead sought the premiership. Demirel then tasked rival Motherland Party leader Mesut Yılmaz with forming a government.
Erdoğan, Erbakan's former student and then-mayor of Istanbul, won the Nov. 3, 2002 election with his newly founded AK Party, capitalizing on public backlash against both the military's pressure and Erbakan's perceived passivity. He defied the military's 2007 e-memorandum with a blunt "Mind your own business" response, a move that consolidated his power.
To counter the secular establishment, Erdoğan allied with Fethullah Gülen's movement, opening state institutions to its members through the Ergenekon trials. That alliance collapsed after the 2016 coup attempt, which Erdoğan blamed on Gülen's network. Following the failed putsch, Nationalist Movement Party (MHP) leader Devlet Bahçeli, previously a fierce Erdoğan critic, became his ally after securing a 50%-plus-one electoral threshold guarantee in the 2017 constitutional referendum. Gülenists in the bureaucracy, judiciary, and education were gradually replaced by MHP loyalists.
Erdoğan's electoral dominance cracked in the 2024 local elections, when the main opposition Republican People's Party (CHP), under new leader Özgür Özel, defeated the AK Party for the first time in 47 years. Facing an economic crisis compounded by the Russia-Ukraine war and the Israel-Gaza conflict, Erdoğan shifted to a "B-plan" of using state resources to fragment the opposition, according to analysts.
That strategy has included the arrest of Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, a charismatic CHP figure, as part of a broader crackdown. The government has deployed psychological smear campaigns and media manipulation, echoing tactics used during the 1997 process. Some analysts compare the current situation directly to the Feb. 28 era, when the military assumed politics would comply instantly with its demands.
Erdoğan's B-plan relies on continued support from MHP leader Devlet Bahçeli. The opposition includes CHP leader Özgür Özel and Ankara Mayor Mansur Yavaş, whom some analysts see as a potential future threat to Erdoğan. The government's strategy aims to isolate the CHP by breaking its electoral cooperation with the pro-Kurdish DEM Party and encouraging splits within the CHP itself, including a possible new party led by former CHP leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu.
"The political environment in a way resembles the days of Feb. 28, when it was thought that politics would snap to attention at whatever the military said," the analysis notes. "It is not sustainable. The party that was defeated and divided on Feb. 28 has been in power for a quarter century."