The democratic crisis in Türkiye is transforming into a security crisis

For years, discussions about TürkiyeThe democratic decline of democracy has largely been confined to the language of human rights, constitutional law, and domestic politics. International observers viewed the erosion of democratic institutions as a troubling but primarily internal issue; a challenge that Turkish citizens face within their own political system.

Those days are over and a darker chapter has begun.

The democratic crisis in Türkiye has evolved into something much larger. This now becomes a security crisis whose implications go far beyond our borders. What is happening today in Türkiye should not only worry those who care about democracybut also those who care about the long-term stability of Europe, NATOthe Black Sea region, the Eastern Mediterranean and the Middle East.

The reason is simple: Turkey is too strategically important to become politically unstable.

Turkey today faces deep political and economic disarray: the government of President Recep Tayyip Erdogan, after seizing a large part of the state apparatus, is trying to eliminate the last significant democratic alternative while society sinks deeper into economic difficulties, social frustration, loss of confidence in public institutions and distrust of the future.

Over the past year, Erdogan’s government has intensified an unprecedented campaign against the democratic opposition. This assault on democratic choice accelerated after the Republican People’s Party (CHP), the main opposition party, won a historic municipal victory in 2024, becoming Turkey’s main political force for the first time in decades. As a result, the government increasingly turned to judicial intervention rather than political competition.

The most visible target has been the mayor of Istanbul, Ekrem Imamoglu, our presidential candidate and President Erdogan’s most serious challenger, arrested in March 2025 on the basis of absurd and politically motivated allegations and who now faces a sentence that is not measured in years, but in millennia.

Since 2025, around twenty CHP mayors and hundreds of municipal agents have been incarcerated without final conviction and all subject to pre-trial detention. We responded to this attack by mobilizing citizens in massive rallies across the country, bringing together millions of people far beyond our partisan lines.

Most recently, a court invoked the extraordinary doctrine of “absolute nullity” to cancel the 2023 CHP convention, remove me as the party’s elected leader, and reinstall the previous leadership that lost the convention and was discredited after 13 consecutive electoral defeats. Basically, it is about placing Turkey’s largest opposition party under judicial control – with the apparent cooperation of figures willing to accommodate Erdogan’s blueprint for the Turkish political order. Whatever the name given to this system – one-party rule or one-man government – ​​its governing logic is the same: eliminate any significant adversary and replace the real opposition with a managed and compliant opposition.

Democracy is about preserving credible avenues by which citizens can peacefully change governments. When these avenues disappear, political frustration does not disappear with them. It builds beneath the surface until it erupts.

If Erdogan succeeds in dismantling a meaningful opposition, for the first time in modern history, Turkey will face deep popular discontent, a serious crisis of legitimacy, and the absence of a meaningful institutional mechanism through which citizens could peacefully demand political change.
This is not just a scenario of authoritarian consolidation. This is a scenario of profound instability.

History teaches a consistent lesson: political systems do not become stable when alternatives disappear; they become stable when citizens believe that peaceful change remains possible. The Soviet Union, the Shah’s Iran, the Eastern Bloc and much of the Arab world all seemed stable during the Cold War – until they suddenly weren’t. Systems are often most fragile, precisely when they seem most indisputable.

Turkey’s strategic importance makes this danger particularly acute: as guardian of the Black Sea, NATO’s second-largest military power and the crossroads of Europe, Eurasia, the Middle East and the Eastern Mediterranean, its role in migration, energy and regional security means that democratic collapse would not stay within its borders.

History also shows that governments facing domestic instability and declining legitimacy often externalize their crises. Foreign policy confrontation, militarized rhetoric, and geopolitical adventurism become substitutes for democratic consent and economic success that they can no longer ensure. Under such conditions, foreign policy crises are presented as questions of national survival.

As the leader of Turkey’s main opposition party, I firmly believe that our country can become one of Europe’s most valuable partners and, ultimately, a full member of the European Union at a time when Europe is building a new security architecture. But lasting partnerships require democratic legitimacy.

A country cannot indefinitely serve as a pillar of regional stability while dismantling the democratic foundations that support internal stability.

If current trends continue, Turkey risks becoming something unprecedented in NATO history: a strategically indispensable member that no longer functions as a democracy, while millions of its citizens are increasingly dissatisfied with a political and economic order that they have no democratic and peaceful way to change. This would not simply be an internal crisis. This would be a major security challenge.

The democratic struggle we are waging will shape not only Turkey’s democratic future and the stability of one of the most strategically important countries in the world, but also the security of our region, Europe and NATO. Democracy and stability cannot be separated for long. The outcome could set a precedent with consequences far beyond our borders, encouraging either democratic renewal or further authoritarian consolidation in a region already under immense tension.

Özgür Özel is the leader of the main opposition party in Türkiye and a deputy from Manisa province.

The opinions expressed in this article are those of the author.

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