Meet the Journalist: Christopher de Bellaigue on the Failed Coup in Turkey

The thwarted Turkish coup of July 15, 2016, will have long-term repercussions. The man who was most threatened by the coup and gained most from its failure was Turkey's populist authoritarian: President Recep Tayyip Erdogan. The principle called into question by the military units who came out against him, in the course of the massive purge he launched in the coup's aftermath, was Turkish democracy. But Turkish democracy, or demokrasi as Christopher de Bellaigue calls it in his Guardian article to distinguish it from the textbook, minority-friendly democracy of the 'mature' polities of the west, is not unique to Turkey; in fact by looking at the Turkish model we can learn much about the political majoritarianism that may be becoming a consensus system in many parts of the world.