Democracy isn't characterised only by the vote, but also by liberal values. We call it liberal democracy.
I'm from Romania btw and until 1989 we've had communism / stalinism. Guess what - we had votes then too. It was all arranged of course, party members didn't dare going against the dictators, everybody was dancing on the same music, etc.
In other words, everything is up for vote except for the liberal values that make democracy work. Without those liberal values, you don't have a democracy.
And to put this in perspective: you cannot claim that a popular vote is legit without freedom of speech, because in that case people can be coerced or manipulated by those in power, without the opposition being able to fight back at all.
How many people has Erdogan imprisoned? You also cannot attest the legitimacy of the vote when you don't have separation of power in the state, because you no longer have a functioning judicial branch.
All famous autocrats in history achieved power through popular support.
But here's where it actually hurts: it's easy to vote an autocrat into power, it's hard to vote him out.
Turkey's economy will suffer, tourism is already going down the drain, other countries will slow down trade with Turkey due to political instability. Erdogan, like all populists before him, will end up pushing more and more nationalistic messages, blaming the Occident for his own fuckups, threatening with conflict because that's what populists do when they lose support.
Either way, I'm fairly confident at this point to say that Turkey is no longer a democracy.
No, that's a common misconception.
Democracy isn't characterised only by the vote, but also by liberal values. We call it liberal democracy.
I'm from Romania btw and until 1989 we've had communism / stalinism. Guess what - we had votes then too. It was all arranged of course, party members didn't dare going against the dictators, everybody was dancing on the same music, etc.
In other words, everything is up for vote except for the liberal values that make democracy work. Without those liberal values, you don't have a democracy.
And to put this in perspective: you cannot claim that a popular vote is legit without freedom of speech, because in that case people can be coerced or manipulated by those in power, without the opposition being able to fight back at all. How many people has Erdogan imprisoned? You also cannot attest the legitimacy of the vote when you don't have separation of power in the state, because you no longer have a functioning judicial branch.
All famous autocrats in history achieved power through popular support.
But here's where it actually hurts: it's easy to vote an autocrat into power, it's hard to vote him out.
Turkey's economy will suffer, tourism is already going down the drain, other countries will slow down trade with Turkey due to political instability. Erdogan, like all populists before him, will end up pushing more and more nationalistic messages, blaming the Occident for his own fuckups, threatening with conflict because that's what populists do when they lose support.
Either way, I'm fairly confident at this point to say that Turkey is no longer a democracy.