Are protests a right?

“I have a dream...”

Martin Luther King

Social movements are movements with political and economic content towards the system and the established order. Social movements arise when people do not have a chance to have their voices heard, or when they are deprived of making their wishes heard. For a movement to be qualified as a social movement; It should be based on solidarity, involve a conflict, and push the limits of the system it is in.

Since the beginning of the 21st century, authoritarian regimes in which rights and freedoms are restricted have increased even in Western European and North American countries where democracies have declined and are known as established liberal democracies. In fact, it literally started to spread like a contagious disease. Since the end of the Cold War, today's authoritarian regimes are characterized by the rule of civilians rather than military rule. But what a civil administration! It is an authoritarian rule in which one-man regimes emerge, in which rights and freedoms are limited and power change is prevented despite elections. Authoritarian regimes want to prevent mass uprisings to ensure the continuity of authority. To achieve this, they try to deter uprisings and rebellions by applying low-intensity pressure techniques. Simple and everyday conflicts and events are suppressed by the police or other private internal security units. However, when it comes to organized and violent demonstrations, the army is used or assistance from other authorities, as in Kazakhstan. In such situations, the will and power of the army to protect the regime is vital; otherwise authoritarian regimes become largely vulnerable. In the Middle East, since the end of the 1970s, for nearly 40 years, one-man regimes continued without facing the threat of a coup, suppressing the emerging opposition voices and protest demonstrations with the police force. Examples of this are King Hussein bin Talal (1952-1999) in Jordan, Hafez Assad (1971-2000) in Syria, Hosni Mubarak (1981-2011) in Egypt and Saddam Hussein (1979-2003) in Iraq.

We see that social movements have started to increase in number since the 1980s. Not only did their numbers increase, but with the developments in globalization and communication technology, there were also changes in the organizational forms of social movements, the subjects they dealt with, their aims and the profiles of the individuals participating in the movement. With the change in demands, individuals began to make more personal and daily life demands such as sexuality, women's abuse, student rights, and environmental protection. The increase in communication enables both individuals within the same country and individuals in different countries to organize around the same problem quickly and develop a common reaction without the need for a common place or a leader. As the new social movements seen in recent years, the media is also used very effectively in parallel with communication in the protests. Just as a social movement is organized and started over the internet, a social movement that has already been started reaches wider masses via the internet.

In terms of changing social movements, the protests most discussed by experts are the uprisings in the Middle East and Arab countries. Those who participated in the uprisings in the Middle East and Arab countries revolted against the established order in an angry, ambitious and great patience manner and with the cries of 'Get out Mubarak' and 'Get out Ben Ali'. While doing this, they tried to express their wishes with all kinds of means. Alain Badiou, author of The Rebirth of History, describes such revolts against the state as "historical uprisings". For example, he evaluates the uprisings in Tunisia and Egypt as "historical uprisings" in terms of the determination of the participants and the socio/political meaning of the metaphor they use. On the other hand, according to the author, even if crises occur in Western countries, which are content with their situation, revolts in Western countries are uncertain, because they have the confidence to overcome them. The uprising that may arise as a result of a crisis in Western countries with a high level of welfare is a direct uprising, that is, it has no historical background, it emerges with the crisis and ends in a short time. Badiou describes the historical upheavals in the Middle East and Arab countries and the direct uprisings in Western countries as follows: “Actually, everyone knows that, except for the "great wars", the destruction will not go on: a direct uprising lasts for a maximum of one to five days. The historical uprising, even if surrounded and battered by the police, takes weeks or months, where it concentrates, or in the large squares it customarily occupies a certain day of the week, as the crowd grows steadily.”

The common feature of the social movements experienced in the geography of the Middle East until today is the politics of the region. i, its economic and social structure and the existence of long-lasting authoritarian regimes. Factors such as the lack of a democratic structure, high economic inequality and difficult living conditions in the countries in the Middle East region have caused the social movements in that region to be more economically active. People have been fighting for better living conditions and income inequality for years. For example; The social movements known as “Bread Rebellion” that took place in Egypt in 1977, Tunisia and Morocco in 1984, Sudan in 1985, Algeria in 1988, Jordan and Lebanon in 1989, which are among the countries of the region. It was caused by the economic inequalities and poor living conditions in the Middle East geography.

The protest actions in this region continued in the 70s, 80s and 90s, affecting each other. In this sense, the "Green Movement" that started in Iran in 2009 and the "Arab Spring and Arab Revolts" in the Middle East had repercussions all over the world.

Green Movement: After the re-election of Iranian President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad in the 2009 elections, millions of people came together to organize demonstrations and protest the election results. The name of this social movement was “Green Movement” because the color green, which represents reformism and opposition, was used in the demonstrations. In this social movement consisting of young people, women, LGBT members who advocate different sexual orientations, groups marginalized by the regime, former revolutionaries, religious and ethnic minorities, democracy, human rights, freedom of thought, use of economic incomes for Iran and Iranians, improvement of policies towards the West, etc. protest demonstrations were held for the demands. However, the demands were not met in these protest movements and demonstrations were held again on February 14, 2011.

Arab Spring and Arab Revolts: It caused great repercussions in the world. On 17 December 2010, M. Bouazizi set himself on fire in the square after the counter of a young man, M. Bouazizi, who was selling fruit on the street in Tunisia, was seized by the use of violence by municipal officials. They are protest movements that emerged after this event and then spread to the entire Middle East. As we can understand from the events and the extent it has reached, the main reason is the reaction to the low living conditions imposed by the oppressive regimes. When the high level of unemployment, especially among young people, was added to the great injustice in income distribution in Tunisia, the protests that started on a small scale grew and got out of control. As a result of the protests, President Ben Ali had to flee to Saudi Arabia with his family. The demonstrations reached wider audiences through social media and spread throughout the Middle East. The use of social media, which is a common feature of new social movements, has had an impact on social movements in the Middle East as well as all over the world; Protests were also held in Algeria, Libya, Egypt, Yemen and Syria. Individuals organized by communicating through various social networks established on the internet, especially Facebook and Twitter, and organized demonstrations by coming together in a common place. For example, there were already reasons that paved the way for the emergence of the Arab Spring demonstrations in Egypt, and there were the Bread Riots that started in the mid-70s and continued until the early 2000s, various strikes and many protests against the administration. An activist was killed by police violence in the demonstrations that started in Egypt, and this situation was announced to large masses on the internet, groups were formed on Facebook and protests started in Tahrir Square on January 25, 2011. Hosni Mubarak, who had been in power for thirty years, resigned within 17 days as a result of the actions of the protesters, who gathered in Tahrir Square and numbered in the millions. Wael Ghonim, who represents the importance of the role of social media in social movements in Egypt, said, “This revolution started on the internet, it started on Facebook. If you want to liberate a society, just give them the internet”.

Today, however, authoritarian regimes prefer to keep the opposition voices under control with soft power strategies, rather than suppressing the institutions and culture of democratic life with traditional methods as a way of ensuring their continuity. While it is preferred to suppress civil society in traditional authoritarian regimes, the control of civil society in today's authoritarian regimes is provided by the so-called NGOs (GONGOs - NGOs established by the political power) created by the government. This new phenomenon, which we encounter in countries such as Russia, Belarus, Azerbaijan, China and Venezuela, is used by authoritarian governments for three main purposes. These are respectively; to control foreign funds entering the country, gain international legitimacy, and neutralize democratic opposition within the nation.

Authoritarian regimes, especially after the "color revolutions", started to highlight alternative social movements as well as violent repression as a way of combating social movements. These “so-called social movements”, organized in a planned way through a GOGO, take to the streets after every social opposition protesting the regime and hold rallies in support of the regime. It has been observed that the rising civil society mobilization in the Middle East countries since the 90s was expected to lead to a democratic regime transformation, but this did not happen, and at the same time, it was observed that the civil society mobilization increased the authoritarianism of the government. The reason for this is the so-called NGOs, namely GONGOs, established by the government. In some authoritarian regimes, the change of government occurred because the ruling elite lost their physical capacity and power. The reason for the Eastern European regime changes in the late 80s is that the increasing citizen activism caused a loss of self-confidence in the administrators and the social opposition weakened the power's "repression" capacity and forced them to make concessions. The change in government caused by the citizen activism of the 80s became a lesson to the new authoritarian leaders and the governments started to use civil society for themselves. Authoritarian governments in Arab countries have maintained their will and capacity to govern by using civil society in line with their own goals. According to studies, Russia criminalizes NGOs supported by foreign funds and supports NGOs that are apolitical or close to itself. Egypt keeps human rights associations under constant surveillance by the authorities by blocking freedom of movement, freezing their assets, and rhetoric about anti-terrorism. In Ethiopia, the government encourages NGOs to become service-oriented organizations by causing problems for rights-based organizations.

When we look at the world, the most recent political protests in authoritarian regimes; These are the protests in France in 2018, in Hong Kong in 2019-2020, in Belarus in 2020-2021, and finally in Kazakhstan, which started on January 2, 2022 and still continues.

French Yellow Vests protests: On 17 November 2018, more than 280 thousand people took to the streets in France to protest against the government. In the Yellow Vests movement, demonstrators from the government:

• Taking measures to support tradesmen;
• Pensions are not less than 1,200 Euros;
• Large corporations pay their taxes;
• Providing job opportunities for the unemployed;
• Lowering gas and electricity prices;
• Retirement age is 65 years;
• Entry of the referendum into the constitution;
• Amendment of some constitutional articles;
• Reducing house rents in city centers and
• They wanted international agreements to be put to the referendum as well. The protests of the Yellow Vests had results in a short time and Macron had to take a step back. Since even the proposal to postpone the oil tax hike planned in the protests for 6 months was met with opposition, this hike was completely cancelled.

2019-2020 Hong Kong protests: Protests in Hong Kong on June 9, 2019, protesting a bill that would facilitate the handover of individuals found to be operating against Beijing to the Chinese authorities. The protests that started against the bill turned into a growing reaction and a general demand for democracy, and the protests continued for months. Young professionals working in the service sectors such as communication, informatics and finance, also known as precariats, constituted the weight of the protests. Small protests that started in the streets of Hong Kong turned into large-scale protests targeting the Chinese and Hong Kong governments. Protesters Reddit and Wire They spread the protests using LIHKG, a forum and messaging app that could be described as an egram mix. Protesters in Hong Kong asked the government to end the protests;

• The repeal of the extradition law of criminals completely,
• Release of detained protesters,
• Not using the accusation of “riot” by the government,
• An independent investigation into police interventions.
• They demanded universal suffrage in Hong Kong Chief Executive elections. However, the Chinese government struggled with the protesters by waging a propaganda war both on the streets and on social media. China has tried to maintain internal security control with millions of cameras and facial recognition systems it has established for its own people, and has opened many accounts and counter-propaganda to control protests on social media. Hong Kong, on the other hand, had difficulty in controlling the leaderless protests organized through social media. The demonstrators are still voicing the demand for 'full democracy' before 2047, when the 'one state, two systems' agreement will expire.

2020-21 Belarusian protests: Political demonstrations against the Belarusian government and president Aleksandr Lukashenko. The protests took place before and during the 2020 Belarusian presidential election, in which Lukashenko completed his sixth term in office. In fact, similar protests took place in Belarus after the 2001, 2006 and 2010 presidential elections. However, Lukashenko ensured that the demonstrations came to an end after a certain period of time, with the intervention of the security forces each time. But the protests that started during the 2020 elections have been wider in all parts of the country and with the participation of people from all segments of society. On the eighth day of the protests, the "Liberty March" organized by the opposition was the largest march in Belarusian history with the participation of 200,000 people. The reason for the protests is the significant deterioration in the living conditions of the society due to the decrease in the economic resources of the state under the Lukashenko dictatorship, and the formation of deep anger and fear in the society for twenty-six years. The Belarusian protests are important in terms of showing that the people will no longer be afraid and intimidated by the one-man regime. However, Lukashenko clearly stated that there is no possibility of a transfer of duty or a renewal of elections, that this situation will lead to instability in the country, and he gave a message to the people by posing with Kalashnikov. First the EU and then the USA announced that they do not recognize the Lukashenko government. The Western world began to impose economic sanctions on the Lukashenko regime due to the pressure on the opposition in Belarus. Lukashenko, who only stands with the support of Russia, does not take a step back and tries to completely suppress the opposition in his country.

2022 Kazakhstan Protests: In Kazakhstan, which is generally known as an authoritarian state and a stable Central Asian country, the reason for the protest actions that started as of January 2 seems to be the increase in natural gas, but the main reason is the authoritarian government in the country and the poor socio-economic situation of the people. Nazarbayev, who has ruled the country with his family for 32 years since 1990, was the target of the protesters who shouted "Shal Ket (Old man out!"). As the protests grew, founding leader Nursultan Nazarbayev resigned from the Presidency in 2019. President of Kazakhstan, Cömert Tokayev, who Nursultan appointed as the head of the country in 2019, against the protests from the Collective Security Treaty Organization (CSTO), which was led by Russia and included five former Soviet countries (Kazakhstan, Armenia, Belarus, Kyrgyzstan, Tajikistan) to suppress the rebellion. asked for military support. Kate Mallinson, Central Asia Specialist of the London-based think tank Chatham House, stated the reasons for the protests in Kazakhstan, saying, "The protesters are in deep resentment and anger at the failure of the Kazakh government to modernize the country and implement reforms that will affect the lives of people at all levels." How and when the protests in Kazakhstan will end is unpredictable, it may take weeks or even months. The uprising and demands of the people may not result in a change in the political structure in the country. Because although Badiou describes the people in the uprisings in the Middle East region as determined, we see that not only in this region, but also in the west or east, all dictators are determined to continue their authoritarian regimes.

Our next article, where does the right to protest and march come from and what is “civil disobedience” seen as a touchstone function in modern democratic states of law?