Intertwined and Contested: Green Politics and the Environmental Movement in Turkey

In: Südost-Europa: journal of politics and society, Band 63, Heft 3, S. 440-466

Abstract

"Late industrialization as well as political polarization and the rule of military regimes resulted in the belated onset of an environmental movement in Turkey. Environmental movements and green politics developed almost concurrently in the 1980s, while their major events and actors were intertwined. The first green party was established earlier than many countries, in 1988. This first party was short-lived, but afterwards, in the 1990s, green politics contributed to the development and diversity of the environmental movement, which increasingly distanced itself from green politics. The second green party was established in 2008. There are many political and generational differences between the two Turkish green parties. Their main similarity is that neither fulfilled the eligibility criteria for entering the elections. Also, the existing ten per cent electoral threshold has been discouraging. Therefore the most indicative deficit of Turkey's green politics has been its lack of an electoral challenge." (author's abstract)