[allendale]

Elections matter. When the Turkish Islamists defeated the secularists in the 1990’s they proceeded promptly to dismantle the political reforms of Ataturk. The civil service and the military was purged of secularists and they were replaced with reliable Islamists. The secularists lost because they were enthralled with European Social Democracy. Capitalism was greatly hindered by a huge non productive bureaucracy, taxes and endless regulations. Only the urban elite and political insiders really prospered. The rural masses remained poor and uneducated. Hence the Islamists were able to come to power and the ruination of the country commenced.

[Czech_Occidentalist]

The secularists lost because they were enthralled with European Social Democracy.

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It’s easy to see why the Turkish elites chose Social Democracy. What can you build conservatism in Muslim countries on? Western conservatism is directly or indirectly based on Christianity. In Muslim countries you have no relevant number of Christians and you can’t build any civilized form of conservatism on Islam (unless you can bring the Mutazalites back).

I suppose the Turkish elites could have chosen classical liberalism/libertarianism, but this movement was very much in the minority among Western intellectuals in the 20th century and was never electorally successful unless aligned with conservatism.

I’ve read that the cause of the rise of the Turkish Islamists isn’t ideological, but demographical - the people in Anatolia have had more babies than the people in Rumelia. Apparently, the Turkish elites were unable to secularize the Anatolians through government schools and lost the fight.