Missed opportunities

We are far today from the genuine hope that the launch of the Ergenekon investigation initially generated in 2007. As the inquiry into coup plots broadened and the list of defendants lengthened to include journalists and academics, more questions were raised about the fairness of the process.

Coup attempts were a reality in Turkey, and no one who has spent any length of time in this country would question the existence of rogue elements within the state who were allowed to take illegal actions and commit human rights violations with impunity, particularly in the 1990s in the Southeast.

But the various investigations launched in the past few years, including Sledgehammer, which ended last year with the sentencing of more than 300 military officers, have shown that sidelining the army and limiting the generals' role in politics, while an important step, is not sufficient in itself to open the way to a truly democratic order. In fact, it has become depressingly clear that as the threat of military intervention receded, the civilian government adopted many of the attributes it blamed the tutelage regime for, including its paranoid attitude, with only minor alterations.

Electoral victory does, of course, make a significant difference. The ruling Justice and Development Party's (AKP) legitimacy rests on the support granted by voters in three successive general elections. But its understanding of democracy, limited to the rule of the majority, and the long tradition in Turkey of taking revenge against one's opponents have combined to highlight the many shortcomings that Turkey still needs to address before it can enjoy a pluralist system that protects the individual rights of all and guarantees freedom of expression.

The rule of law -- law that cannot be stretched, twisted or used arbitrarily -- is the cornerstone of such a system. Some people would argue that when fighting opponents willing to step outside of what is legal, it is impossible to play fair. Yet, you cannot hope to establish a clean new system on shaky, murky foundations. Turkey's flawed judicial practices, which often involve lengthy pre-trial detention periods, punish defendants before their guilt has even been established.

In the case of Ergenekon, the investigation has also been too limited in scope, failing to look into some of the worst abuses committed by state elements, especially in the Southeast. This selective approach, concentrated on attempts to undermine and overthrow the ruling party in the past decade, has inevitably been interpreted as being motivated by political retaliation.

This is why these inquiries seem to be such missed opportunities. Turkey needs to confront past misdeeds committed in the name of an overbearing state, but it needs to do so more broadly. Attempts to impose an ideology and an ill-fitting single identity have caused, and continue to cause, unnecessary social divisions and personal suffering in a very diverse society. Over the decades, Armenians, leftists, Jews, Kurds and Islamists -- and this list is not exhaustive -- have all been considered internal enemies of the state at one point or another and have paid a high price as a result. The government's response to the Gezi protests suggests the trend is continuing.

Instead of recognizing that it is possible to build a system that works for all and embraces differences as richness, politicians continue to fuel divisions, encouraging people to wrap themselves in the mantle of their own victimhood while ignoring injustices committed against others. The influence of the army has decreased in Turkey, but the country's civilian rulers have yet to fully challenge its legacy. Too little progress has been achieved in the construction of a genuine democratic system. Reforms in the early years of the AKP opened a new window, but the process has suffered serious setbacks in the recent period.