For years, public discontent with Turkish President Recep Tayyip Erdogan has been clear, with many arguing he has dismantled human rights protections and democratic norms on a scale not seen before in his 22 years in power.
Take, for example, the statement made by German politician Gabi Zimmer in 2017, following the controversial Turkish referendum result. She said: “Erdogan has abused Turkish democracy by winning a majority of the electorate in a referendum to change the constitution for personal benefit. His strategy was to insult journalists, Kurds, the opposition, dissenters, and even EU countries and to declare them enemies. This made him look like a strong man and close ranks behind him.”
Then, in March 2025, the world watched as Istanbul’s mayor and opposition presidential hopeful Ekrem İmamoğlu was arrested on charges including corruption and alleged support for terrorism linked to the outlawed Kurdistan Workers' Party. His trial began this week, with Monday's hearing held inside Istanbul's Silivri Prison.
While the country continues to react to the arrest, another question is emerging: What if this unrest is not just political, but also the result of years of economic strain under Erdogan’s rule?
Determined to find answers, The New Arab spoke to Turkish citizens to understand how economic pressures are affecting their lives.
The final straw
In the heart of Istanbul, conversations with ordinary people revealed a common concern: the struggle to make ends meet. Some confided that, despite well-paying jobs, they could not afford to move out of their parents’ homes. Others described the ritual of double-checking meat prices before filling their carts and carefully budgeting every purchase.
This was in January, just months before protests erupted in March. While headlines and speculation focused on the political fallout, many believed the real ticking bomb was the economy.
Although most regimes can survive political transgressions, many of those The New Arab spoke to agreed they often stumble and fall under the weight of a snowballing economic crisis.
Damla, a 26-year-old lawyer based in Istanbul, says the numbers are not just statistics; they dictate the boundaries of daily life.
“A habitable studio apartment near my work or family costs nearly as much as my monthly salary,” she explains. “I earn more than twice the minimum wage, yet I still can’t afford to live on my own.”
Like many of her peers, Damla remains financially dependent on her family, despite working full time. A simple dinner out can cost around 700 TL per person, while a kilogramme of meat hovers near 1,000 TL.
“I often don’t make it to the end of the month without help,” she confesses.
The legal sector, she says, has not been spared the downturn. Law firms have shrunk, layoffs are widespread, and new job openings are rare.
“There’s this mindset now: ‘Be grateful you even have a job,’” she adds. “It’s used to justify stagnant or falling salaries, even as the workload increases.”
Housing has become another flashpoint. Damla still lives with relatives in a family-owned home, an arrangement she considers a form of protection.
“If I had to rent, I’d be in serious trouble,” she says.
As a lawyer, Damla has seen the legal gymnastics landlords now employ to work around government-imposed rent-increase caps: signing pre-agreed eviction notices, forcing tenants out early to re-rent at double the price.
She continues, “Most landlords prefer short-term rentals because each year rental prices nearly double, but under the law, they can only increase existing rents by around 50%. So, they evict tenants and rent to someone new at double the price. It’s led to many people losing their homes.”
When asked whether there is a way forward, Damla points to the protests that swept the country in March.
“That was the final straw. People are in the streets not just because of politics, but because they’re angry and exhausted,” she says.
“The economy, which had slowly been recovering over the past two years, collapsed back to its previous low in just three days. Whether we can recover again remains to be seen. But starting in June, even harder times are likely ahead.”
Cheap money, costly consequences
To better understand Turkey’s economic landscape, The New Arab spoke to Can Selçuki, who runs Research Istanbul and was previously an economist at the World Bank’s Ankara office.
Can, whose expertise spans private-sector development, innovation, and competition, traces today’s instability to a deeper structural fragility embedded in Turkey’s post-2001 growth story.
“In 2001, Turkey had a deep economic crisis,” he recalls. “It entered an IMF austerity programme that brought down inflation and gave independence to key regulatory bodies. The economy grew, yes! But the underlying driver was cheap foreign money and strong domestic demand, not deep reform.”
That fragile equilibrium began to unravel in 2018, as global financial conditions tightened and regional geopolitical tensions rose.
“Inflation was already rising, and then came the pandemic,” he shares. “By 2021, the government tried to shift to a new growth model by lowering interest rates, depreciating the lira, and reducing reliance on foreign bonds and imports. But they did it only through monetary policy. No structural reforms. That led to a surge in FX demand from regular people and made things worse.”
Since May 2023, Turkey has pursued a macroeconomic adjustment programme focused on taming inflation. But progress has been slow and costly.
“Programmes like these are supposed to be painful, yes, but also fast,” Can says. “This one isn’t. It relies only on monetary tools with no fiscal support. That’s why businesses and households are still suffering under high inflation and uncertainty.”
One of the core myths of the current strategy is that a weak lira will boost Turkey’s export competitiveness. Can is unequivocal: “Almost 70% of Turkish exports depend on imported intermediate goods. So, the lira’s depreciation only raises input costs. The short answer is no. Even the long answer is no.”
He highlights the textile sector as a case study, noting, “Firms are relocating to Egypt, where labour costs are nine to ten times lower. Turkey cannot compete globally on cheap inputs alone; it needs value-added production and innovation.”
Can continues by emphasising that current policies appear to prioritise suppressing domestic demand rather than fostering structural change.
“The minimum wage is now based on target inflation, not actual inflation,” he explains. “There’s no second adjustment during the year anymore. Credit and wages are being squeezed because the government believes inflation is solely a demand-side issue. Nobody’s talking about corporate profit margins or taxation.”
According to Can, years of hyperinflation have also distorted pricing behaviour across the private sector.
“That’s why it’s taking so long,” he notes. “There’s a gap between official forecasts and real expectations. The Central Bank expects 24% inflation in 2025. But markets think 30%, and households are bracing for 60%.”
In this environment, consumer behaviour has changed dramatically.
“Programmes like this work only when people believe in the target,” Can says. “But people don’t. They spend their wages fast, because if they don’t, their money loses value. This isn’t about saving; it’s about survival.”
Interestingly, the consequences extend far beyond the household.
“Official unemployment is at 8.5%, but the real number could be as high as 27–28%. Turkey’s youth NEET (Not in Education, Employment, or Training) rate is among the highest in the OECD, and young women are particularly vulnerable. This is wasted potential,” Can shares.
Meanwhile, foreign investment has largely dried up, as Can notes that “FDI peaked in the early 2000s, when Turkey was still seen as a credible EU candidate, but has been almost non-existent since.”
The real estate market is another pressure point.
“There was a cap on rent increases that was lifted last year. Now, landlords are making up for lost time. Rents are spiking, and the cost-of-living crisis is worsening,” Can says.
While inflation is likely to fall, Can warns about the price of that decline: “Inflation will go down, but at what cost? Businesses are shrinking. Unemployment is rising. People are getting poorer. And inequality is widening. If this continues, we’ll lose export capacity and become a poorer, more unequal country.”
But Can stresses that “it doesn’t have to be this way. Turkey needs fiscal reform, improved taxation, better allocation of public funds, and investment in agriculture and productivity. If there is political will, it can still be salvaged.”
Testing Erdoğan’s power
It's important to note that economic strain rarely stays limited to balance sheets. As the cost of living continues to rise and structural reforms stall, unrest has begun to spill into the streets.
Discontent over inflation and job insecurity is increasingly fusing with deeper frustrations about democratic backsliding, institutional decay, and a growing sense of exclusion from political decision-making.
To unpack how these overlapping crises feed into one another, The New Arab spoke to Henri Barkey, Cohen Professor of International Relations at Lehigh University and adjunct senior fellow for Middle East studies at the Council on Foreign Relations.
As Henri puts it, Erdoğan has overplayed his hand.
“Erdogan must have anticipated some reaction to İmamoğlu’s arrest,” he says, “but the scale of the backlash was far greater than anyone expected.”
He argues that Erdogan assumed he could control the fallout through increased repression.
“What happened in 2019 was very telling. Ekrem İmamoğlu defeated one of Erdogan’s closest allies, the former prime minister, by 80,000 votes. Erdoğan, who essentially controls everything, told the Supreme Electoral Council to find a pretext — irregularities, crimes, anything — to cancel the election. A new vote was held three months later. And you know what happened? İmamoğlu won again, this time by 800,000 votes. People reacted,” Henri says.
According to Henri, that should have been a warning. “It was a do-or-die moment for Erdogan. İmamoğlu is popular, charismatic, and has done a good job running Istanbul. The opinion polls showed strong potential for him. There was a primary scheduled for 23 March, where İmamoğlu was expected to win, so Erdogan wanted to avoid a scenario in which the opposition consolidated around an official candidate.”
Instead, the opposition outmanoeuvred him. “For once, they did something smart,” Henri explains. “The primaries were supposed to be limited to party members, but they opened it up. Anyone could vote. People stood in line for hours. Half a million turned out.”
Despite marginal economic improvements since Mehmet Şimşek was appointed minister of treasury and finance after Erdogan’s 2023 re-election, Henri believes the reforms have not gone far enough.
He shares, “Before 2023, Erdogan was pushing a theory that lowering interest rates would bring down inflation. After winning, he brought in Mehmet, a seasoned IMF and World Bank figure, to fix things. But the economy has not improved sufficiently.”
The underlying issue, Henri says, is not just economic mismanagement but also the spiralling of authoritarianism.
“Repression is increasing. People are being jailed for a tweet. They’re charged arbitrarily and kept in prison before even seeing a judge. Anybody can be a great president, but after 23 years in power, people want change. That’s normal.”
He also criticises Erdogan’s foreign policy as divisive and self-aggrandising. “In the early years, especially during his time as prime minister, he had real influence. He pushed back against the military’s dominance, opened up the system, and gained clout. But post 2007, he became increasingly authoritarian, and started believing himself to be omnipotent.”
Henri recounts Erdogan’s rocky relations with Arab nations. “He saw himself as the natural leader of the Muslim world. At first, people gave him the benefit of the doubt. But eventually, Arab leaders resented his claims. Relationships across the region deteriorated until he found himself isolated. Now he’s trying to repair things with the Gulf countries. He once said he would never shake Sisi’s hand; then he went to Egypt and did just that. He had to make concessions.”
Despite Mehmet’s appointment, investor confidence remains fragile. “The Turkish reserves were deeply negative before Mehmet took over. They improved, but the day İmamoğlu was arrested, for instance, Turkey spent $20 billion just to protect the lira, which still lost value.”
For Henri, the İmamoğlu arrest marks a dangerous threshold. “Going after İmamoğlu is a step too far. It scares people. It shows that political motives, not economic logic, are guiding decision-making. You can’t trust a government like that. One day you’re fine; the next, your assets are seized. Why would anyone risk investing in Turkey?”
He also points to international headwinds. “Trump is imposing huge tariffs. There’s talk of a global recession, some even say stagflation, and Turkey will be hit harder than most.”
Growing pressure
So, what happens next?
“Not tomorrow, but within a year or two. The economy will bring the system down. When the next election approaches, the Turkish president will probably claim health issues and avoid running. Or he will allow early elections, because under the constitution, he can only run again if his second term is cut short. It’s a legal blind spot he may try to exploit,” Henri says.
He adds: “The opposition wants early elections. Erdogan won’t let that happen under current conditions, but pressure is growing. The protests are better organised. People aren’t just marching; they’re boycotting pro-government companies. There’s momentum.”
Media blackouts are another sign of state nervousness. “If you read the Turkish press, you’d think nothing is happening. There’s complete silence.”
In Henri’s view, Mehmet’s failure to deliver real reform has crushed remaining optimism. “There was trust in Mehmet, but now people realise he can’t act without political will. And without that, there is no confidence left in the Turkish economy.”
Ultimately, each fall has its anatomy, and each political uprising has its specific inertia.
Chaima Gharsallaoui is a journalist and filmmaker from Paris
Follow her on Instagram: @chaimagharsallaoui