Democracy

Sacramento (Special to Informed Comment) – Who is a public intellectual? What role should they play? Searching the internet yields several answers. Alan Lightman’s The Role of the Public Intellectual offers a thoughtful discussion of different visions of the public intellectual and their role and responsibilities. I have opted for a broader description, but with […]

Authoritarianism

Rogues’ Gallery: Trump’s Trials on Sedition and Racketeering Parallel those of Brazil’s Bolsonaro and Pakistan’s Musharraf

Juan Cole

Ann Arbor (Informed Comment) – Donald John Trump’s indictment in federal court for sedition and in state court for racketeering are both legal means of sanctioning him for trying illegally to overturn the results of the 2020 election. Although he is the first president to be criminally charged for such a crime (or at all), […]

Corruption

Top 5 Things to Know about Fulton County charges of Racketeering against Trump

The Conversation

Anthony Michael Kreis, Georgia State University | – An Atlanta, Georgia, grand jury indicted former President Donald Trump on Aug. 14, 2023, charging him with racketeering and 12 other felonies related to his alleged attempts to overturn his 2020 election defeat in the state. Eighteen of Trump’s allies and associates, including former Trump attorney Rudolph […]

Authoritarianism

What Happened To Democracy in Turkey?

Waging Nonviolence

Umut Özkırımlı ( Waging Nonviolence ) – Despite initial skepticism regarding the results of the November 2002 general elections — which saw the decimation of the incumbent coalition and veteran politicians by the newcomer Justice and Development Party, or AKP, and its leader, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan — Western pundits soon hailed Turkey as […]

Democracy

On June 25, LGBTQ+ groups will March through the Streets of Istanbul, Turkey, despite Threats of Violence

Global Voices

Undertones: Turkish citizens rethink what democracy means Is democracy in the ballot or on the streets? Written byCivic Media Observatory Posted 15 June 2023 15:41 GMT This story is part of Undertones, Global Voices’ Civic Media Observatory‘s newsletter. Subscribe to Undertones. Welcome back to Undertones, where we analyze media narratives from around the world. This […]

Democracy

Can Lebanon Finally elect a President who will Lead it out of its Economic and Political Morass?

Habib Badawi

By Habib Badawi Beirut (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Lebanon may be a small country of some four million citizens with a land area a little less than that of Connecticut, but it plays an outsized role in the geopolitics of the Middle East. Its upcoming presidential election on June 14th therefore has wide […]

Democracy

How did Turkish President Erdoğan Survive the Strongest Challenge Yet?

Marc Martorell Junyent

Munich (Special to Informed Comment; Feature) – Recep Tayyip Erdoğan won the elections in Türkiye. Again. In power for two decades, first as prime minister and then as president, Erdoğan and his Justice and Development Party (AKP) secured a relatively comfortable victory over Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu in the runoff election held on May 28. Kılıçdaroğlu, the […]

Democracy

In a post-election Turkey, the country remains divided on political lines

Arzu Geybullayeva

Written byArzu Geybullayeva ( Globalvoices.org) -Showing up at a polling station, as one of the two presidential candidates, in a country-wide election with a pocket full of cash may not occur to leaders of democratic countries, but in Turkey, that is what the newly re-elected President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan did on May 28. The incumbent […]

Elections

What Erdoğan’s Reelection means for Turkey’s Political System, Economy and Foreign Policy

The Conversation

By Ahmet T. Kuru, San Diego State University | – Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has been reelected as president, ensuring that his term as leader of Turkey will extend to a quarter century. The electorate returned Erdoğan to power in a runoff vote on May 28, 2023, with 52% of votes. But with 48% of voters […]