On 31 May the KFG co-organises a public talk together with Kornelia Sammet's project Worldviews of Unemployed People. Zafer Yilmaz will present a lecture on The Authoritarian-Islamic Populism, Islamisation, and Politics of Welfare in Turkey at 08:15 p.m. at Café Alibi (Bibliotheca Albertina, Beethovenstr. 6).

Turkish democracy is currently experiencing one of its most crucial crises since the failed coup in mid-July 2016. Right after the declaration of the State of Emergency, the government started a comprehensive restoration process which found its repercussion in public administration, civil society and regulation of public space. Meanwhile, the government initiated a constitutional amendment, which was ratified with a referendum on April 16, 2017, to clear the way for building a new political system based on the dominance of a super president, who would widely control state and civil society. Rather than bringing this desired “stability” or institutionalizing normal functioning of a parliamentarian democracy, it appears that these measurements have just been targeting the promotion of regime changes by altering the institutional configuration of state power and suppressing oppositional political activity. The presentation aims to discuss how the authoritarian Islamic populist project of the AKP, which very much depends on the friend and enemy dichotomy, has been complemented by a legal-institutional transformation after the coup attempt and how this process has been part of an ongoing attempt to escalate the Islamisation of society. Additionally, the role of the social policies both in the construction and sustenance of authoritarian-Islamic populist project will be evaluated so as to shed light on how these policies have been contributing to building the desired political community to consolidate newly emerging regime.