Privatization as a Hegemonic Process in Turkey

Abstract

This paper explores the privatization of state owned enterprises in Turkey as a function of an alliance of diverse social forces composed of market-oriented capital groups, mainstream media, national bureaucracies, and government officials. It highlights that these actors emerged in the post-1980 period because of dramatic transformations in Turkish society and the economy initiated by the process of neo-liberal globalization. The unification of diverse identities and interests around the strategy of further integrating with the global economy were crucial in the recent acceleration of the privatization process in Turkey. The paper also shows that market-oriented social forces sidelined resistant groups through a discourse that emphasized that privatization would bring material and other benefits to all and that the alternatives were worse. Such a communicative process played a crucial role in generating consent/hegemony for privatization in the 2000s.