Shock and Awe

Istanbul is on the move; rather the attempt is to crash into the ‘first world’ or ‘global north’ subscribing to conventional definitions. The city and its population have been on the move since centuries, due to both internal and external stimuli. The violent birth of a republic as the empire took its last sigh probably has its bearing in contemporary times reflected in the centrality of ‘command and control’ structures. Istanbul migrated from being an empire to being a republic, and now, within a span of half a century, it wants to migrate into the ‘first world’, be part of the elite of the European Union. What has this movement, this migration meant for the people and for Istanbul itself? From being an important city in the beginning of the 20th century, it went off the world map for a few decades that resulted in a flight of population from the city. The emergence of Istanbul just a few decades later meant that it saw sweeping changes in fortunes and conflicting realities for populations that were not geared to absorb those changes. It didn’t even take a generation for these changes to take place and quotes like “this place is unrecognizable after every 2 years” embody the speed at which transformations are taking place.

This ‘violence of transformation’ is probably manifested in a ‘shock and awe’ treatment of the development process. The response to this shock is almost equally violent in nature and embodies all the elements of a lopsided vision of the city. The two decade old consciousness of being part of the ‘global north’ is probably envisioned as a mono-functional image of Manhattan or Hong Kong. Whether it is a response or an attempt to give direction to the inevitable is debatable, however, from the standpoint of the city, it is somewhere between the two as it has created a landscape of tension at various levels and strata, in social and physical realms. The crashing of two realities in the same space, whether contrasting or not, but definitely conflicting, has a tremendous bearing on the communities whose resilience is broken in front of draconian laws and organizations or in front of raw power of capital. A few pockets of resistance are withstanding enormous pressures, but without dwelling into a constructive rhetoric. Their response to the ‘shock and awe’ treatment is reactionary. The rhetoric against government’s strategic standpoint on land tenure (guided by real estate considerations) is again land tenure. It’s rebellious, leading to a Sulukule or Gulsuyu/ Gulensu. Developmental objectives of the society as a whole or in parts are ignored by both the sides.

The EU’s ‘acquis communautaire’ lists aspects such as fundamental rights, social security and women’s rights, which are highly questionable within the current state of development in Istanbul. Our experience in Istanbul demonstrated the lack of focus in such areas and overt focus on economy and associated imagery in cities such as Istanbul. Numerous questions arise from the past and current state of housing in the city, the state’s answer to housing and its implicit agenda of rationalizing use of space as per its ‘global’ vision. And more importantly, what should be people’s stand and rhetoric to such an agenda.