Mockery of Popular Vote
Will you be able to publish the results of a popular vote that elected a name, unknown to you until then on the front page of your news magazine? Will you be able to come out and confess your ignorance of public intellectuals in ascendance and prepare a dossier on the personality of those who garnered more votes than the usual suspects — both for your own information and for your readership?
These are the questions challenging the editorial staffs of US-based Foreign Policy and UK-based Prospect magazines, for Fethullah Gülen, a hitherto largely unknown — to them — Turkish intellectual who has been voted the world's top intellectual in their recent poll looking for the leading 100 living thinkers of the world.
Should the editors of both magazines be happy for the great number of voters who came forward, or should they be questioning the legitimacy of the votes given to Gülen. Apparently Foreign Policy chose the first option, and Prospect inclined towards the second, if we are to believe the Guardian piece that quoted Prospect complaining that Gülen's supporters had "made a mockery" of the poll.
It is revealing that Prospect editor David Goohart drew a parallel between Gülen's victory and the "conflict between the secular nationalist establishment and the reforming Islamic democrats of the [Justice and Development Party] AK Party" of Turkey. The poorly made analysis of that secular nationalist establishment in the run-up to the July 22 election victory of the AK Party was precisely the same: The public made a mockery of the polls! It will be unfortunate if Goohart finds himself an associate of these Turkish antidemocrats skeptical of the popular vote in a different but parallel context.
The editors were surprised at the support Gülen garnered. The surprise, I assume, is not a result of their lack of prior knowledge of Gülen and others. In the end, they were the ones who compiled the list of the 100 candidates. This surprise, I'm afraid to say, seems to be a result of their Eurocentric understanding of the world. "Somehow I can't imagine Prospect publishing a picture of Fethullah Gülen on its cover and anointing the liberal Muslim as the world's top public intellectual. I guess Prospect will have to revert to an off-line, more traditional way of validating their votes," wrote Andrew Keen [I assume this is the self-proclaimed "leading contemporary critic of the Internet" who writes occasional papers for the Independent also.] in the Independent's blog.
Oh, how familiar this all is!
Don't these words echo those of the elitist-secularist-nationalist men of the Turkish establishment claiming that "democracy is too luxurious for Turkey"?
Ah! A few words about the 500,000-some votes Gülen received.
For those who (will) claim the poll is hijacked: Gülen was able to gather more than 100,000 attendees at his conferences back in 1994. With all due respect to the academics on the list, which one would be able to gather 1,000 today? We were selecting public intellectuals, no?
For the editors of the two magazines: Please do not publish only the results; include also the geographical distribution of the votes each candidate received. You will see that Gülen's popularity is not limited to Turkey. After all, just a month ago his supporters gathered participants from 110 countries for a Turkish language olympics in Turkey. Ask your IT department if you think this is impossible. They will also tell you that they record the IP numbers of each computer casting a vote; hence no chance of hijacking exists.
For Gülen's supporters: Shame on you! Is that all you could do? This small number reveals your poor computer-friendliness and Internet media awareness whereas even Foreign Policy editors think of you as "typically educated, upwardly mobile Muslims." You know very well that you are responsible for others' favorable opinions of you.
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