Political Parties and Grassroots Clientelist Strategies in Urban Turkey: One Neighbourhood at a Time

Ark-Yildirim C.

SOUTH EUROPEAN SOCIETY AND POLITICS, cilt.22, sa.4, ss.473-490, 2017 (SSCI) identifier identifier

  • Yayın Türü: Makale / Tam Makale
  • Cilt numarası: 22 Sayı: 4
  • Basım Tarihi: 2017
  • Doi Numarası: 10.1080/13608746.2017.1406431
  • Dergi Adı: SOUTH EUROPEAN SOCIETY AND POLITICS
  • Derginin Tarandığı İndeksler: Social Sciences Citation Index (SSCI), Scopus
  • Sayfa Sayıları: ss.473-490
  • Anahtar Kelimeler: Clientelism, political patronage, local networks, urban politics, AKP, CHP, MACHINE POLITICS, ARGENTINA, ECONOMY, NEOLIBERALISM, MODEL
  • İstanbul Üniversitesi Adresli: Hayır

Özet

Both principal Turkish political parties make extensive use of patron-client networks, but in very different ways. The CHP relies on competing local brokers and synchronous vote buying. The AKP is at the centre of a network of public and private funding turning social policy to clientelist ends. Socially anchored AKP activists link the party to voters, allowing it to target social assistance for political advantage and take credit for improvement in local conditions. The case presented in this paper provides a natural experiment suggesting that this distinction is an important explanation for the AKP's electoral success in low-income urban areas.