In the latest presidential elections of Turkey, which was realized on August 2014, Selahattin Demirtas, the co-leader of pro-Kurdish ethnic party HDP, got 9,76% of the votes. Compared to previous...Show moreIn the latest presidential elections of Turkey, which was realized on August 2014, Selahattin Demirtas, the co-leader of pro-Kurdish ethnic party HDP, got 9,76% of the votes. Compared to previous elections, this meant fifty percent increase in votes of the party. Thus, the main problem of the thesis is that in Turkey, considering the vote limitation of an ethnic party in a historical context, how could the noticeable rise in votes of HDP’s candidate Demirtas could be explained? The thesis will argue that there are several factors which contributed to the success of the HDP. First, for the last few years Kurdish political movement has been following a new strategy with which the party abandons Kurdish ethnic party claims and aims to become a party of Turkey, with increasing democratic modernization emphasis. Second, Gezi movement which occurred in 2013, showed the societal base of leftist movements in Turkey. Democratic modernization of HDP was in line with the ideals of Gezi movement and Demirtas successfully used the discourse of Gezi, whereby he enhanced the electorate base of his party. Lastly, the absence of 10% election threshold had an important role in voting behavior of the electorate and this factor had positive influence on the vote share of HDP.Show less
In late January 1996, Greece and Turkey were literally hours from conflict after the landing of a helicopter with Turkish journalists on one of the two rocky islets in Northeastern Aegean Sea which...Show moreIn late January 1996, Greece and Turkey were literally hours from conflict after the landing of a helicopter with Turkish journalists on one of the two rocky islets in Northeastern Aegean Sea which are known in Greek as Imia and in Turkish as Kardak. Turkey’s intentions to dispute the Greek sovereignty of those islets led to the biggest crisis between the two countries after the Turkish invasion to Cyprus. The mediation of the US finally brought the deterrence of the war which was really close as Greek and Turkish troops had gathered on the islets and close to them. The fact that there was political instability in both countries at the time of the crisis creates a big question that is still to be answered: where the reasons of this crisis political? Domestic problems sometimes lead to external conflicts and the probability of the existence of a relationship between the domestic unrest mainly in Turkey and incidentally in Greece and the Imia/Kardak crisis still remains vague. This research will try to clarify the reasons of the Imia/Kardak crisis and to examine whether the diversionary theory of war has an application in it or not. Through the analysis of this theory and the description of the political situation in both countries we will try to come to a conclusion about the political dimension of this crisis.Show less
