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Article Citation - WoS: 38Citation - Scopus: 43An Unfinished Grassroots Populism: the Gezi Park Protests in Turkey and Their Aftermath(Routledge Journals, Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2015) Ozen, HayriyeFocusing on the Gezi protests, this study addresses two questions: How did a particular struggle against the demolition of a park spontaneously turn into nationwide mass protests? And why was this mobilisation unable to transform itself into a popular counter-hegemonic movement? Drawing on the Laclauian concept of populism, I demonstrate that Gezi mobilised various groups by turning into a symbol of the repressive responses of the hegemonic power to various social demands. This popular mobilisation could not go beyond a conjunctural experience due to its inability to unify heterogeneous protesters and to respond effectively to the counter-strategies of the hegemonic power.Article Citation - WoS: 11Citation - Scopus: 16Overcoming Environmental Challenges by Antagonizing Environmental Protesters: the Turkish Government Discourse Against Anti-Hydroelectric Power Plants Movements(Routledge Journals, Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2014) Ozen, HayriyeDue to the growing public importance of environmental concerns in the contemporary world, governments that prioritize economic interests over environmental concerns may try to counter environmental challenges not by openly declaring that they do not want to consider environmental demands, but by attempting to antagonize the protesters who voice such demands. This essay explores such a governmental response by analyzing the discourse articulated by the Turkish Government against movements that oppose the construction of hydroelectric power plants (HEPPs) on environmental grounds. In particular, the analysis focuses on how HEPPs, environmental claims and demands of movements, and environmental protesters are represented within the pro-HEPP discourse, and in what ways these representations appeal to popular perceptions. It is demonstrated that the discourse of the government attempts to counter the challenges of protesters by establishing an antagonist relation between the protesters and society by representing HEPPs as crucial for the economic development and, therefore, as compatible with the interests of society as a whole. Moreover, it also attempts to achieve this through portraying the protesters as criminals and terrorists who block the economic development of the country and pose significant threats to the commonwealth, not for legitimate environmental concerns but for some dubious motives and incentives. It is concluded that, with this approach, the government has managed to gain popular consent not only for the construction of HEPPs, but also for the repression of such movements.Article Citation - WoS: 6Citation - Scopus: 8What Comes After Repression? the Hegemonic Contestation in the Gold-Mining Field in Turkey(Pergamon-elsevier Science Ltd, 2018) Ozen, Hayriye; Ozen, SukruIt is widely known that many local environmental mobilizations against resource extraction projects of trans national capital have been repressed by the use of the state force in the late-industrializing world. What is less known is the aftermath of these repressions. Do they conceal all the traces of these mobilizations and lead to naturalization of the extractive operations of transnational capital at the local spaces? We address this question by examining two subsequent local environmental mobilizations in Turkey against gold-mining MNCs. Drawing on Laclauian insights on political struggles and hegemony, we first conceptualize repression of dissent not only as the repression of dissidents or protesters, but also that of protest discourse. Then, we argue that the forceful repression of the actors of those mobilizations succeeding to articulate an appealing protest discourse can make the hegemony and domination of transnational capital at the local level highly fragile, thus providing the conditions of possibility of subsequent similar mobilizations. The protest discourse constituted through such mobilizations may sediment despite the repression of protesters and become highly influential on the discursive trajectory of subsequent mobilizations. Yet, such an influence, as we also demonstrate in this study, may not only enable subsequent movements, but also limit their hegemonic capabilities.Article Citation - WoS: 14Citation - Scopus: 18Interactions in and Between Strategic Action Fields: a Comparative Analysis of Two Environmental Conflicts in Gold-Mining Fields in Turkey(Sage Publications inc, 2011) Ozen, Hayriye; Ozen, SukruThis study addresses how multinational corporations and protesters in an environmental struggle learn from the proximate struggles within the same field and how they structure the broader institutional field. Drawing on the literature integrating the social movement and new institutional theory, particularly the "strategic action fields" (SAFs) approach of Fligstein and McAdam, the authors comparatively study the interactions in and between two sequential environmental struggles in the field of gold mining in Turkey. The findings suggest that the interactive processes in an SAF and their consequences are largely built on the lessons drawn from both "successes" and "failures" in the proximate SAF that preceded it. Furthermore, those actors that act proactively are more likely to stabilize the SAF according to their interests. Finally, state interventions from the outside create temporary stability that involves the acquiescence of challengers, whereas the consent-seeking actions of incumbents are more likely to generate a permanent stability, stabilizing the broader field.Article Citation - WoS: 23Citation - Scopus: 22What Makes Locals Protesters? a Discursive Analysis of Two Cases in Gold-Mining Industry in Turkey(Pergamon-elsevier Science Ltd, 2017) Ozen, Hayriye; Ozen, SukruThis study addresses the question why a struggle emerges between local communities and mining MNCs. Many studies in the extant literature tend to explain the emergence of these struggles by relying on some "objective conditions" such as the characteristics of the industry, strategies of companies, features of community, and governmental policies. Drawing on Foucauldian and Laclauian insights, we argue that the analysis of such struggles should rather focus on meaning-making processes, through which each party to a struggle articulates surrounding conditions in particular ways, thereby giving shape to new meanings and identities. By comparatively examining Efemcukuru and copler goldmine cases from Turkey, in which a struggle emerges in the former but not in the latter in spite of similar conditions, we demonstrate that the emergence of struggles is mainly due to the construction of rival discourses that construct the issues of mining, environment, and development in highly different ways. We argue that already-prevalent conditions play a role in the emergence of struggles to the extent that they are employed, framed, and refrained in the rival anti-mining and pro-mining discourses. The argument goes further that the availability of anti-mining discourse when the local meaning systems are dislocated by the arrival of MNCs, as well as its popular appeal at the local level are critical in the emergence of local mobilizations against gold-mining. Finally, emphasis is put on the relational nature of struggle processes, where anti-mining and pro-mining discourses are mutually constituted and reconstituted through a constant reformulation of hegemonic strategies. (C) 2016 Elsevier Ltd. All rights reserved.Article Citation - WoS: 22Citation - Scopus: 27Located Locally, Disseminated Nationally: the Bergama Movement(Routledge Journals, Taylor & Francis Ltd, 2009) Ozen, HayriyeHow and with what consequences did the Bergama struggle evolve from a local environmental campaign against the operation of a goldmine to a broader political struggle that mobilised a set of heterogeneous social groups at the national level? The constituency of and support for the Bergama struggle increased as it provided a 'discursive space' for the articulation of a disparate set of particular social demands neither mediated nor fulfilled within the existing political system in Turkey. As the Bergama movement expanded through the articulation of a number of social demands for changes in the broader economic and political structures, several status quo forces became involved in the struggle against the movement and played a crucial role in the gradual demise of the movement.
