Gezi Park Crisis

Abstract

The objective of this article is to evaluate the Gezi Park incident which started on 28 May 2013 and continued until the end of June in terms of crisis management. The reasons why a civil opposition act that started against the decision taken by the government regarding the environment transformed into a serious crisis due to an unmanageable process by the government will be questioned. The reasons for the incident and why it could not be prevented will be evaluated from the perspective of crisis management. Problem areas focusing especially on crisis communication during the crisis management process, the effect of messages given by the administrators along with the use of disproportionate force in deepening the crisis along with the lessons learned from the crisis will be evaluated. The most important factors that transformed the events starting with representation problem into a crisis have been communication problems and the disproportionate force used on the protesters. Turkey should develop a proactive approach in crisis management and should develop permanent solutions to solve the communication problem. The study is important since this was the first time that an environmentalist action transformed into a social movement causing a serious crisis in a country like Turkey.