On Political Suffering
Unpacking the word 'seferberlik'
I am by no means an expert on military strategy, but in following the war in Ukraine, I’ve benefitted from Michael Kofman's coverage, especially his writing and podcasts on War on the Rocks. In a podcast episode recorded soon after the success of Ukraine's Kharkiv counteroffensive, Kofman was reflecting on how the Russian leadership likely saw the conflict right now. This is right about 27 minutes in:
Russian political leadership has clearly been under the impression that in the long term, they're winning this war, that they could eventually - you know, Putin I think believes that they could grind the Ukrainian military down over time. And the big reason for that that is - yes - leaders of great powers tend to be chauvinistic, but also, they believe that they have tremendous latent power, because of the country that they're running, they have a lot of resources, manpower, materiel, industry, and that it's more of a contest of wills. Right? So as long as they'll persevere, they'll win.
Kofman continues to say more about that idea, but let's stop there for a second.
"Tremendous latent power" perked up my ears. The world may not quite consider Turkey a "great power," but Turkey still considers itself one. The idea that the country has immense reservoirs of untapped energy is very prominent in Turkish political life.
The relevant Turkish term here is "seferberlik." It comes from the Arabic "safar" which means a journey or long march, and the Farsi suffix "-ber" modifies the word to mean to carry or to bear something. In its contemporary usage, it directly corresponds to "mobilization" in Western languages. So the news on Russia right now is of "seferberlik" or “partial seferberlik.”
There’s more to seferberlik though. The term is broader, almost encompassing any kind of temporary suffering, either physical, spiritual or economic, for a national goal of some kind. The implication is also that it is through these temporary, extraordinarily strenuous efforts that nations tap into their “latent power.”
I think this idea has come to the forefront of the political sphere of late. That’s why I’d like to examine seferberlik in its everyday usage today. Below are a few occurrences I’ve plucked from my personal archive of news clippings.
The first is a tweet from Alpaslan Durmuş, who served as the head of Talim ve Terbiye Kurulu (TTK), the board in the Ministry of Education that designs Turkey’s educational curriculum. Durmuş was appointed to the position on August 2016, soon after the July 15 coup attempt. The government had declared a state of emergency to purge people it thought might be loyal to the putschists, but things quickly escalated (as they do in these situations). Durmuş, it turned out, was appointed to take advantage of this situation and make the educational curriculum radically more Islamist.
He failed. Durmuş was very unpopular in the ministry, and his reforms met with stiff resistance (yes, even in at the zenith of Erdoğan’s power). He was let go in 2019, when a new education minister came in. Here’s part of his tweet chain after his resignation:
My translation:
“We received these orders as a result of the process that unfolded on July 15 and implemented them as “seferberlik orders.” In light of these decisions, we could not have remained indifferent to the values in which we believe, and we didn’t.”
One could make a plausible case that defending against the July 15 coup was an act of seferberlik, but Durmuş is thinking of a much broader time window here, in which the coup attempt was the opening of an era for a nationalistic push across all areas of life.
My second example comes from the big man himself. Here is Erdoğan on january 14, 2020, doing his weekly parliamentary group meeting:
Every citizen whose door we do not knock on, whose hand we do not shake, whose heart we do not win over, is our deficit. Our party headquarters, our parliamentary group, our city, county and town branches must enter into a spirit of seferberlik and work 24 hours a day, 365 days a year without interruption. Only in this way can we preserve the AK Party’s quality as the people’s party and grow stronger.
This isn’t technically seferberlik, it’s the spirit of seferberlik. The country is not in a state of emergency, but his group of people need to work as if it is. They must tap into that spirit and let it drive them into superhuman feats of electioneering.
There isn’t necessarily anything unique about this kind of language. The democratic election campaign is a kind of proxy war, and staff motivation matters a great deal. More than that though, this passage makes me think of the world of business. Erdoğan here sounds like a CEO in charge of a company that has established a near-monopoly and has now become complacent. The company has lost a big contract in 2019 (the local elections) and now the boss is telling the troops to get moving or go home.
This seferberlik then, is part of Erdoğan’s own “hustle culture,” his version of burning the midnight oil, going the extra mile, googling that life hack. Erdoğan of course, leads the hustle, famously micromanaging his teams and power napping between events. As he likes to say, “he who runs out of love does not tire” (aşkla koşan yorulmaz).
The danger - and what I think is happening - is that the hustle becomes a shortcut. As in the world of business, the bosses sometimes don’t want to make the tough decisions, so they push it down the ranks. Erdoğan believes that he is a world-historical figure who does what he feels is critical for the greatness of the nation, and if the electoral math doesn’t add up with that, the little people just aren’t working hard enough.
The problem of course, is that you can’t hustle your way through a pandemic and 180+% inflation. Erdoğan has shed about 10 points in the polls since early 2020. He is throwing around some money to ease the pain, and calling on people to “be patient” but I think reality is catching up.
My third quote is from Alev Alatlı, who might be the closest thing the Erdoğan government has to a court philosopher. In this 2018 interview, she was reflecting on the emerging world order, arguing that if the presidential system manages to fix “the problem of merit,” (what Western observers might call corruption. More here) then “the 21st century will truly be that of the Turks, God willing.” She explains thusly:
These arrangements are not things that one government, one ministry, nor a civil society organization nor a religious sect can handle on their own. Let me speak more openly: there is no “I’ve done it and it works” nor “this is the best that can be done.” It requires a common effort, fine adjustment, and commitment on the level of seferberlik. When one speaks of seferberlik, competent [ehil] cadres are of vital importance. I hope that this time, it becomes possible to assemble cadres that “do what is required” and do not take refuge in the excuse of “I did all I could.” May God lend his affection and aid to the president [yar ve yardımcısı olsun].
What’s interesting about this one is the scale and purpose of the seferberlik. As a political regime, “New Turkey” is about ascending the rungs of the geopolitical hierarchy. The people running it are cognizant of the country’s inefficiencies, and like anyone else, they are frustrated by their own limitations in achieving progress. Seferberlik is the state of overcoming that friction and realizing one’s potential. Alatlı is saying here that if the country learns to tap into its “tremendous latent power” at will, rather than in times of emergency (as Russia might have to now), it will have the power to transcend its inefficiencies and rise to meet its destiny.
Note also, how Alatlı says “this time,” hinting that the country could have tapped into this energy at various points in recent history, but failed to, and fell behind. Seferberlik is the force that saved it from being destroyed entirely, and perhaps a preemptive seferberlik, she suggests, could allow it to leap forward.
I could produce many more examples. In the last few months alone, the government has called up a “seferberlik of exports,” calling on firms to increase their exports, and a “seferberlik against inflation,” (sometimes just throwing together several pugnatious terms “the total seferberlik struggle again inflation” [enflasyona karşı topyekün mücadele seferberliği”]). Balıkesir apparently has a special seferberlik pasty. I expect to hear the word more often in the coming months.
Revanchist nationalism is a hustle culture. You’re behind and you know it (technologically, economically, culturally etc.) but because you are who you, eventually you’ll just power through this and seize your destiny.
What concerns me is what it says about the self-perception in our countries. Even if a country like Turkey lives by the highly dubious goal of “catching up” with the winners of modernity, why should this require what is essentially a permanent state of emergency? What does that say about how we see ourselves in this world? Is the Western “head-start” (by ill-begotten gains) so insurmountable? Are we really so inadequate? I think that’s part of what makes up the difference between aspiration and revisionism. One is forward looking, the other is backwards-bending.
But let’s get back to the Kharkiv counteroffensive. I guess Russia is approaching that point now where seferberlik is no longer a metaphor (it is barely softened with the word “partial”). The Russians now have to tap deeper into that famous ability to suffer.
Here’s Kofman again, continuing where he left off above, reflecting on the Russian belief in its latent power after the Kharkiv counteroffensive:
I think an event like this is very much likely to shatter that illusion. It's very clear that the Russian military not only isn't winning, but suffered a major defeat, and it can lose. In fact it can lose in a rather - in a much quicker fashion than I think they assume.
I understand that the Russians are being told that their country is in an actual emergency, and that they are required to make real sacrifices on its behalf. I think they would if they believed it was true. So that’s what I’m looking for when observing Russia: how much are people willing to suffer before they stop believing.
I leave you with this clip, where the newly mobilized men of a nuclear power and giant hydrocarbons exporter are being told that their state doesn’t have the resources to furnish them with basic medical equipment.
