The expression “deep state” is used more and more often in the political sphere today and is gradually passing from journalism to the generally accepted political language. It is a “fuzzy” expression, which everyone understands differently.
When and where this expression “deep state” was used for first time
This expression first appeared in Turkish politics in the 90s and described a very specific situation in Turkey. In Turkish, the “deep state” is “derin devlet”.
This is important, as all subsequent applications of this concept are connected in one way or another to the original concept of the type, which first appeared in Turkey.
In Turkey, starting with Kemal Ataturk, a completely clear political and ideological movement emerged – Kemalism.
Kemalism
At the heart of Kemalism is:
- the cult of Kemal Ataturk himself (literally “Father of the Turks”),
- strict secularism (refusal to give the religious factor not only a political, but also a social character),
- nationalism (including the emphasis on the sovereignty and unity of all citizens of multi-ethnic Turkey),
- modernism,
- Europeanism and
- progressivism.
Kemalism was in many ways a direct opposition to the worldview and culture that dominated the religious and traditional Ottoman Empire.
Since the very creation of Turkey, Kemalism has been and remains in many ways the dominant code of modern Turkish politics. Based on these ideas, the Turkish nation-state was founded on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire.
Political heirs
Kemalism openly prevailed during Kemal’s own reign. And then that baton passed to his political heirs.
- The ideology of Kemalism included European-style parliamentary democracy.
- At the same time, however, real power was concentrated in the hands of the country’s military leadership – primarily the National Security Council (NSC).
- After Ataturk’s death, it was the military elite who became the guardians of Kemalism’s ideological orthodoxy.
- In fact, Turkey’s National Security Agency was established in 1960 after a coup.
- Its role increased significantly after another coup in 1980.
Kemalism intertwined with military Freemasonry
It should be noted that many senior ranks of the Turkish military and intelligence services are members of Masonic lodges. Thus, Kemalism was closely intertwined with military Freemasonry.
Whenever the Turkish republic moved away from Kemalism, going either to the right or to the left, the Turkish military overturned the election results and began repression.
But it is worth paying attention to the fact that the term “derin devlet” appears in Turkey only in the 90s of the 20th century. It was at this time that a significant development of political Islam in Turkey began.
The arrival of Erdogan and the questioning
And here, for the first time in the history of Turkey, the confrontation between the ideology of the deep state and political democracy is felt. Moreover, the problem arose precisely when the Islamists of Necmettin Erdogan and his follower and successor Rejep Tayip Erdogan, in fact, moved towards an alternative political ideology that directly challenged Kemalism.
This was true for everything:
- Islam instead of secularism,
- contacts with the East more than with the West, Muslim solidarity instead of Turkish nationalism.
- Generally Salafism and Neo-Ottomanism instead of Kemalism.
- This also included anti-Masonic rhetoric.
- Instead of Masonic secret societies, the secular military elite relied on traditional Sufi orders and moderate Islamic network organizations such as Fethullah Gulen’s Nursism.
Above all “deep state”
Here the idea of the deep state (derin devlet) appeared as a descriptive image of the military-political Kemalist core of Turkey, which considered itself above political democracy and, by its own decision, annulled the results of the elections, arrested political and religious figures, i.e. placed above the legal procedures of European-style politics.
Electoral democracy only worked when it corresponded to the policy of the military Kemals. A party, as in the case of the Islamists, based on a completely different ideology more reminiscent of Ottomanism than Kemalism, even if it won the elections and headed the government, could be dissolved without any explanation.
Moreover, in such cases, the “suspension of democracy” had no strict constitutional basis – the unelected military were acting out of “revolutionary expediency” to save Kemalist Turkey.
Real war
Later, Erdogan started a real war with Turkey’s deep state, culminating in the Ergenekon affair, which began in 2007, when (under the flimsy pretext of preparing for a coup) almost the entire military leadership of Turkey was arrested.
However, Erdogan later fell out with his former associate Gulen, who was deeply embedded in Western intelligence services, and reinstated many members of the deep state, forging a pragmatic alliance with them – mostly on the common ground of Turkish nationalism .
The discussion of secularism was softened and postponed. Then – and especially after the failed attempt by the Gülenists to overthrow Erdogan in 2016 – Erdogan himself began to call himself a “green Kemalist”.
However, during the bitter confrontation with Erdogan, the positions of the deep state in Turkey were significantly weakened, and the ideology of Kemalism … became blurred (although it remained).
When does the Deep State make sense?
Some general conclusions can be drawn from this plot of the political history of modern Turkey. Thus, a Deep State can exist and make sense where:
- there is a democratic electoral system
- when above this system there is an unelected military-political power, welded by a very specific ideology (independent of the victory of one or the other party).
- there is a secret society (for example, Masonic type), which unites the military-political elite.
And the deep state becomes known when obvious contradictions begin between the formal norms of democracy and the power of this elite (otherwise the very existence of the deep state is not obvious).
Only possible in a liberal Democracy
A deep state is only possible in a liberal democracy. When dealing with overtly totalitarian political systems—as in the case of fascism or communism—there is no need for a deep state.
Here, a strictly ideological group is openly recognized as the supreme authority, placing itself above formal laws.
One-party rule underlines this model of governance – and no ideological or political opposition is expected.
And only in democratic societies, where supposedly there should not be a dominant ideology, the deep state appears as a phenomenon of “hidden totalitarianism”, not only does it not reject democracy and the multi-party system in general, but manages it, manipulates it with discretion.
Communists and fascists openly recognize the need for a dominant ideology, and this makes their political-ideological power direct and overt. Liberals deny ideology, but they have it.
The revelation
This means that they influence the political processes based on liberalism as a doctrine, but only implicitly.
Liberalism reveals its openly totalitarian and ideological character only when there is a contradiction between it and democratic political processes in society.
Liberalism and democracy are not the same thing, since democracy in some cases may not be liberal at all.
In Turkey, where it borrowed liberal democracy from the West and did not fit well with the political and social psychology of the society, the deep state was easily discovered and got its name.
In other democratic systems, the presence of this totalitarian-ideological power, illegal and formally “non-existent”, was felt later.