Commercial media, the military, and society in Turkey during failed and successful interventions

Abstract

As widely observed by scholars, a marked change in the interaction between military and society in Turkey took place during the 1997 February 28 Process, which differed drastically from the military's behavior toward society during earlier interventions and attempts from 1960 to 1980. A prime factor in this change seems to be the advent of commercial media, leading to important changes in information control, greater oversight from society on the actions of state and military elites, and the internalization of consumerism among Turkish citizens, the results of which extend even to the foundational assumptions underlying the Ergenekon indictments, which address allegedly subversive activities spanning from 2003 to 2008. © 2010 Taylor & Francis.