In Turkey it will be tight for Erdogan, but in Germany he would win. What is behind its popularity among German Turks?
On May 14, not only Turks in Turkey, but also Turkish citizens around the world will choose their next president and their new parliament. Likewise in Germany, where the largest Turkish diaspora lives. In its last migration report – and that was five years ago – the Federal Office for Migration and Refugees (BAMF) counted around 2.8 million people with a Turkish migration background.
About half of them still have Turkish citizenship. From April 27th to May 9th, voters can cast their votes in the 14 Turkish diplomatic missions in Germany. Consul General Turhan Kaya told DW that he could not give any details about the election process because the approval process with the German authorities was ongoing.
The Turkey election is considered completely open: this time, the long-time ruler President Recep Tayyip Erdogan could actually lose. His challenger is Kemal Kilicdaroglu, a politician from the Kemalist-secular CHP, who is supported by a wide spectrum of politics and society.
Erdogan’s strong base in Germany
In the vote in Germany, however, Erdogan and his AKP party can count on a clear victory.
Metin Sirin has lived in Cologne for 43 years. He worked at the Ford plants for four decades and was an active trade unionist. Sirin voted for Erdogan before and wants to do it again this time, as he told DW: “In the last 20 years, my sympathy for the AKP has grown.”
“People of Turkish origin in Germany disproportionately vote for Erdogan. That is the reality,” explains Yunus Ulusoy from the Center for Turkish Studies and Integration Research (ZfTI) at the University of Duisburg-Essen. In the 2017 constitutional referendum, around 63 percent of Turks in Germany voted for Erdogan’s plan, while his success in Turkey was just under 51 percent. The successful referendum transformed Turkey from a parliamentary system to a presidential system. In the 2018 presidential elections, 64.8 percent of the German-Turkish vote went to Erdogan, who received significantly less approval in Turkey with 52.6 percent of the votes.
Incidentally, the trend abroad is not everywhere the same as in Germany. For example, in 2018 Erdogan received just 17 percent of all votes in the United States, 21 percent in the United Kingdom, 35 percent in Iran and 29 percent in Qatar.
German-Turkish Election Split
In Germany, the voting behavior of the Turks earned some criticism. Among other things, the German-Turks were accused of inconsistency: How could one vote for the Social Democrats or the Greens in this country, but in Turkey for the Islamic-conservative AKP?
For Metin Sirin, this is a very rational voting decision, even a sign of how open the conservative Turkish voters in Germany are to a change and how little fanatical they are: “People naturally vote for the party that represents their interests. You have to see that positively.”
Political observers take a similar view. “Of course, as a foreigner, you also look to see which party is close to you. The question used to be: the CDU or the SPD? At that time, the Turks were mainly workers and the SPD, with its international orientation, was also closer to the conservative Turks than the conservative CDU,” analyzes integration researcher Ulusoy.
Fascination Türkiye
The first Turks to come to Germany were mostly people from rural, conservative Anatolia. “When people emigrate, they develop the values that they bring with them. Their conservative-religious positions are preserved again, especially in the diaspora,” explains Ulusoy.
An important factor in the decision of AKP voter Sirin is Turkey’s development under Erdogan’s leadership. In areas as diverse as health, transport and defense, the development of his home country makes him very happy. He compares today’s Turkey with Germany at that time: “When we came here, we were fascinated by Germany. The authorities, the hospitals, the highways were truly amazing. We were always sorry that we couldn’t see anything similar in Turkey. However, over the past 20 years, we have seen that our hospitals and highways are up to world standards.”
Sirin explains that consular services and rights for Turks living abroad also improved significantly during the Erdogan era. That means a lot to Turks living abroad. For example, he mentions military service, from which one could “buy oneself free”. “This is a great achievement that the AKP has to thank for. That’s why they have my support.” Since 2014, Turks have also been able to vote in Turkish diplomatic missions abroad, which was previously not possible.
Demonization versus belonging
Ulusoy criticizes that many Germans didn’t even try to understand the voting decision of the conservative Turks. One can judge this voting behavior “ideologically or scandalize it”, but also try to understand what drives the voters.
In addition, the German public is focusing on the Turks, observes the integration researcher. “Are there only German Turks who vote in their home country? Of course not. Italians living abroad also have the right to vote. A right-wing populist government came to power in Italy and no one knows how Italians voted in Germany. Nobody was interested in it.”
Erdogan seems to be filling a gap left open by the German state: “After 60 years, politicians still find it difficult to clearly identify with these people and say to them: ‘You belong to this country, regardless of whether you BioNTech founders or possibly started some riots as young people on New Year’s Eve. Even if you have made missteps, you are with us.’ But that’s exactly what Erdogan says: ‘No matter where you are, no matter what nationality you have, you belong to us.'”
The sociologist Dr. Sabrina Mayer sees it similarly. “Erdogan found it easy to appeal to sections of the people of Turkish origin who longed to be valued because of their Turkish origin,” the professor from the University of Bamberg told DW. Due to the policy of the federal government, the German-Turks could “not develop a feeling of belonging to German society”. dr Mayer points out that naturalization for people of Turkish origin was not simplified for a long time, in contrast to other immigrant groups such as the German-Russians.
voting behavior and defiance
“Factors like this mean that young people in the third generation in particular vote for Erdogan out of defiance,” says Ulusoy. Cologne AKP voter Metin Sirin confirms this: “In recent years, conservative people have been excluded from German political parties because of Erdogan. This is a very sad development. This exclusion naturally triggered a reaction. At some point, people started to support Erdogan precisely because of this.”
Regardless of the outcome of the election on May 14, Sirin from Cologne uses his right to vote and the fact that he is politically represented: “Although I have lived in Germany for 43 years, I am not even allowed to vote in local elections here. It’s an exclusion and makes me sad. But Turkey gives us the right to vote. I am proud that I can have a say in something for our citizens.”
Author: Burak Unveren
