The Condition of the Working Class in Turkey

Labor under Neoliberal Authoritarianism

Editors Çağatay Edgücan Şahin and Mehmet Erman Erol joined by contributors Cosku Celik, Ertan Erol, and Elif Hacısalihoğlu

A comprehensive new study that uncovers the real story of working-class struggle in Turkey

Decades of neoliberal authoritarianism have propelled Turkey into crisis. Regime change, economic disaster and Erdogan’s ambition to impose ‘one-man rule’ have shaken the foundations of Turkish political life. This presentation will look at the historical and current outcomes brough about by the authoritarian, militarized civil life for Turkish workers. What will be the long term consequences for workers in Turkey?

Moving beyond the headlines and personalities, this book uncovers the real condition of the working class in modern Turkey. Combining field research and in-depth interviews, this book offers cutting-edge analyses of workplace struggles, trade unionism, the AKP’s relationship with neoliberalism, migration, gender, agrarian change and precarity, as well as the Covid-19 pandemic and its impact on workers. This volume also brings together a broad range of Turkish activists and scholars who consider what the dynamics and contradictions of working-class resistance against Turkey’s neoliberal authoritarian regime have become; worker self-management, organized labor, and class struggles in rural areas are examined.

Çağatay Edgücan Şahin is an Associate Professor of Labor Economics at the University of Ordu, Turkey. He has published various books including Human Capital and Human Resources: A Critical Approach (2011).
Mehmet Erman Erol is a Postdoctoral Researcher at the University of Cambridge, UK. He has contributed to journals and books on Turkish & Middle East political economy and labor market restructuring.
Cosku Celik (York University, Visiting Assistant Professor). Her chapter entitled ‘The Making of the Rural Proletariat in Neoliberal Turkey’
Elif Hacısalihoğlu (Trakya University, Turkey, Assistant Professor). Chapter ‘A View of Precarization from Turkey: Urban-rural Dynamics and Intergenerational Precarity’
Ertan Erol (Istanbul University, Turkey, Assistant Professor) Chapter ‘Burden or a Saviour at a time of Economic Crisis: AKP’s ‘Open-Door Migration Policy’ and its Impact on Labor Market Restructuring in Turkey

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