Democratisation, but for whom?

After years of conflict, a peaceful Newroz was celebrated in Diyarbakır, and polls indicated that 65 per cent of the population supported the peace process.

Yet, paradoxically, the Prime Minister was equating the right to abortion with the Roboski massacre.

Turkey was breaking new ground in many areas but remained entrenched on one issue: women's sexuality, the sanctity of the family, and sexual orientation.

After the State Ministry for Women and the Family was closed down, Heinrich Böll Stiftung Turkey invited gender activists for a meeting. Then, it decided to organise an international conference on family to address the discussions emerging from that roundtable.

That year's conference explored the possibility of an alternative family model.

The year 2013 witnessed the rebellion of those left on the margins of Turkey’s path over the past ten years, whose voices were silenced and ignored: the urban middle class.

At the forefront of this rebellion were LGBTIQ+ individuals, who, amidst the clouds of pepper spray, were asking:

"Where are you, my love?"

1 - Social media... On one hand, it provides space for individuals and communities to organize and democratizes information. On the other hand, it can facilitate the spread of disinformation and sometimes harmful content. We organized this conference in 2013, right after the Arab Spring, when these issues were still very current. (hbs) 2 – Those were the years when rapid and uncontrolled urbanization in Istanbul began to suffocate and overwhelm its inhabitants. Ecumenopolis was a film about the longing for parks and green spaces and the realization that concrete was not the epitome of civilization. We supported several screenings of the film. İmre Azem) 3 – The unlawful demolition of a park, activists defending it, police violence, and subsequent mass demonstrations: the Gezi Park protests, though later criminalized by the state, were the most widely attended peaceful demonstrations in Turkey's recent history. (Reuters) 4 – Claudia Roth, then a Greens MP, sought refuge in the Divan Hotel after being affected by the tear gas used by the police during the demonstrations. (hbs) 5 – The first tweet of the Heinrich Böll Stiftung Turkey office. (hbs) 6 – In 2013, following Abdullah Öcalan's call, the PKK began to withdraw. The ban on using the letters x, w, and q in the public sector was lifted, and the headscarf ban in parliament was abolished. Peace and democracy were still seen as a close possibility. (Star Haber)