Turkey’s prime minister argues that the “same forces are behind Turkey and Brazil’s protests”. I believe he is right, although he probably didn’t mean it that way.
A Fistful Of Euros
European Opinion
Turkey’s prime minister argues that the “same forces are behind Turkey and Brazil’s protests”. I believe he is right, although he probably didn’t mean it that way.
The unions didn’t show during the Brazil protests in a significant way. People no longer look to them so much as vehicles for social change. This together with pseudo-left elements that are more nationalist in tendency than anything else has created a power vacuum. The ironically named Workers Party has been moving increasingly to the right.
Predictably corruption is part of the drift. For example a huge vote buying scheme or mensalão resulted in the convictions of high ranking officials.
The emergence of an economic “elite” in Brazil with many millionaires and billionaires is part of the capitalist dream scenario and as has been the case elsewhere has utterly failed to address many core challenges facing society – notwithstanding overly hyped social programs intended to make entry to the middle class more widely accessible.
In Turkey there is also a power vacuum – the opposition to Erdogan is very weak. So it’s not surprising that in both countries the vacuum has been filled in the streets.