Space and the emotional topography of populism in Turkey: The case of Hagia Sophia

Commentators on Turkey talk about “Turkey’s populist turn”. During the past decade, the country’s president Erdoğan and his ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) have been reversing the steps towards democratization Turkey had been taking and gave an end to the peace process with the country’s Kurdish movement. Yet, Erdoğan and his party have been winning elections by arguing they have been restoring sovereignty to the Turkish people while eroding democratic institutions. This article takes a look at the handling by Turkey’s government of the recent (re)conversion of the Hagia Sophia museum into a mosque in order to better understand how Erdoğan’s populism has been resting on the utilisation of emotionally saturated space to theatrically win victories over “enemies” and restore “injustice” and create a sense of momentary vindication among its constituency without challenging the very authoritarian structures he and his party have been blaming all along.