Not Prevented from Drinking but Compelled to Hide the Cup: Discursive Governance of Alcohol Consumption in Turkey

• In Event: Populism and Discursive Governance

Abstract

On August 1996, a navy general ordered a glass of famous Turkish spirit, rakı, to protest the lack of alcoholic beverages in an official reception at the prime minister’s residence. Refah Party (Welfare Party), a political party with an Islamist pedigree, had come first in the legislative elections; and its leader was the prime minister of the coalition government. The incident had been a sensation as it suggested the Islamists would put bans on several habits which they deem incompatible with the religion; and, that the hardline secularists especially the army commanders would react harshly. On March 2018, a photograph taken in a restaurant showed a group of TV series actors hiding their drinking cups under the table while posing. This paper explores how the attitudes towards alcoholic drinks changed and self-censorship emerged through the discursive governance without actually banning its sale and consumption during the AKP (Justice and Development Party) period. In fact, the government gradually adopted policies to discourage alcohol consumption by levying additional taxes on the beverages and sales permits, prohibiting its serving in the restaurants and cafes belonging to the governmental institutions; and banning its sale after 10 pm. The policies apparently did not influence the actual level of consumption. According to the World Health Organization data, Turkey has always been ranked among the countries with low level of alcohol consumption in the period from 2000 to 2018; with a slight drop from 1.54 lt in 2000 to 1.49 lt in 2018 (WHO Global Health Observatory data repository). This might not even be a real decline as home-made drinks have become increasingly common with the increasing prices. The salient change however manifests itself with the tendency to avoid drinking in public social events or trying to conceal as much as possible. This makes us think that it is rather a tacit acceptance that alcohol consumption has become to be seen as a deviant and improper behavior while studies show that it was considered as a private matter just a few years ago (Gökarıksel and Secor 2015). Relying on the systematic analysis of the AKP leadership’s public speeches on alcohol; and findings from the separate focus groups, one set with participants who had been university students in the 1990s, the other set with those born in late 1990s (who have not witnessed the governments before AKP since adolescence), the paper aims to show how the government norms on alcohol use shape the public attitudes if not the behavior.

Authors

• Hasret Dikici Bilgin, Istanbul Bilgi University

• James Foley, Glasgow Caledonian University