What message do the election results give to whom?

In the election process, which, being "early" as its name suggests, caught the parties unprepared, the parties nevertheless regrouped very quickly in a short time and, with great excitement, put on a high-tension election campaign performance. In fact, the best measure of the performance should be the turnout rate. Low turnout rates in elections in the world's most developed democracies are explained by the people's alienation from politics, their diminishing expectations of politics, and the weakening of their belief that they can change things through politics.

As people believe that the vote they cast, saying "it has always been like this and will go on like this anyway," will have no effect, they remain indifferent to the ballot boxes. It is not incomprehensible that this should be the case in some countries ruled by dictatorship. In Egypt, because everyone knows as well as their own name that the result coming out of the ballot box will change nothing anyway, turnout rates fell to as low as ten percent. At the end of the day, the officials made the necessary corrections (!), showing the turnout rate as if it were above 40 percent and ensuring that the leading candidate received 99 percent of the votes. Would you, if you were in such a position, want to take part in such an election and give the current dictator more legitimacy?

Leaving such countries aside, how are we to explain political alienation in developed countries? What kind of cynicism, or what kind of indifference, is the result of people's lack of interest in politics and the scarcity of political participation?

In Turkey, people believe they can change many things with their votes and run to the ballot boxes. If they have any dissatisfaction with those who govern, the ballot box offers the best opportunity to express it, and with votes many things really do change. So much so that even Erdoğan's winning indisputable victories alone against all his rivals in all elections for 16 years does not create despair for the opposition. In fact, it should not. After all, even if they have not managed to topple Erdoğan by election with the votes they cast and the political participation they display, each time they succeed in giving a very clear message and in influencing his politics with the message.

In the results of all the elections he has won so far, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan has cared, in addition to the votes given to him, even more than those, about the votes not given to him. That is why immediately after every election he has launched deep analyses of the votes not given to him, and has tried to adjust his politics by obtaining survey studies, in-depth observation, interviews and research reports on this. In fact, the most important factor that enabled him to win again the next time has been his side that listens to these messages.

Now, with the 24 June election results, an important message, in fact more detailed than it appears, has emerged. A message of the kind that every election result writes. Reading it carefully is the politician's most important responsibility. The message is not only for the AK Party, of course. It is a long text that addresses everyone who took part in the election. Some may not take the messages in this text upon themselves at all, of course. That is a matter of quality. But those who aspire to organic politics cannot ignore these messages.

First of all, assessments such as that this many of the AK Party's votes went to the MHP, that this many of the MHP's votes went to the İYİ Party, that this many votes came on loan from this party and that many from that party, need to be eliminated from the outset. When we evaluate the election processes all together, the clearest message that emerges is this: Votes are not a partridge in anyone's bag, nor in any party's. No party or person has title-deeded votes.

Voter behavior in Turkey has matured and individualized to the utmost. The rote 70 to 30 percent distribution of the classical right-conservative voter and left voter has no counterpart left anymore. The deep political-sociological dynamics and movements of recent years have produced an entirely new blend in vote distributions. Moreover, this blend has not settled either. There is a situation that requires everyone to prove themselves anew in every election.

Of course, the difference between the AK Party votes and the President's votes needs to be thought about at great length. The President's charisma is still the AK Party's greatest political and social capital. However, it is also very clear that the AK Party organizations are seriously failing in adding new organic added value on top of this capital. That those who have no contribution other than recklessly consuming and exploiting Erdoğan's existing charisma have become a factor pulling the AK Party considerably down was seen with this clarity most in this election.

Despite this, what perhaps prevented the AK Party from receiving fewer votes was that in the same election Erdoğan's Presidency was also being voted on. During the election process, apart from the rallies of the President and the prime minister, the AK Party organizations neither experienced an election excitement nor were able to make others feel it. In many places, an exhaustion beyond metal fatigue was noticeable. A very in-depth analysis of all of these needs to be made.

The AK Party organization should be the sturdiest vehicle that will get us to the 2023 and 2071 goals, but it is also very clear that a serious study must first be started on the carrying capacity and quality of this vehicle.

In the message we have, there is also important data on Kurdish voter behavior. Many comparisons are made taking 1 November or even 7 June as the base, but in my view 16 April constitutes a much more important base. On 7 June it had been the Kurdish votes that saved the referendum.

There has been a decline in the Kurdish votes' inclination toward the HDP compared to 1 November and 7 June, true, but on 16 April a greater inclination toward the AK Party (through the "yes" votes) had formed. What happened that this inclination turned back toward the HDP by 8-10 percent within a short period such as a year?

No one should think that the Kurdish votes are title-deeded to either the HDP or the AK Party. Since there is also no ground of terror pressure that could be invoked in this election, it must be accepted that Kurdish votes swing on an utterly rational and ideological pendulum. Of course, what falls to the AK Party is to thoroughly analyze what kind of loss, within a year, it has suffered in these votes swinging on the pendulum.

The text that the election results put forth can bear much more commentary, of course. That is all for now.