Resistance under confinement: resilience of protests and their limits in authoritarian Turkey

Mert Arslanalp and T. Deniz Erkmen

Third World Quarterly, 2025, vol. 46, issue 2, 170-192

Abstract: In this paper, we examine the relationship between the process of autocratisation and protests, and argue that scholarship on electoral autocracies should not only focus on major protest cycles but also examine ‘ordinary’ protests to understand how social and political actors resist and push back against autocratisation. Using an original dataset of protest events from 2015 to 2021, we analyse the transformation of protests in Turkey as it experienced gradual but significant autocratisation. We discuss two mechanisms through which autocratisation might affect levels, actors and repertoires of protesting: first, via increasing repression; and, second, via the policy choices of the authoritarian regime. Our findings indicate that protests continued even under the state of emergency in Turkey, but with significant changes in levels and repertoires of protesting. The protest scene was dominated by protests using tactics that rely on a small number of individuals and are contained in their spatial reach and disruptiveness. This research underlines the importance of examining ordinary protests to analyse how autocratisation transforms protests, using original data from local sources.

Date: 2025
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DOI: 10.1080/01436597.2024.2355163

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