A political game?: the dispute over the Canal Istanbul project

Abstract

This study aims to understand how ideologies become embedded in political projects through strategies of legitimation aimed at justifying specific ideas, beliefs, and emotions. By using the political negotiation between the Justice and Development Party (AKP) and the Republican People’s Party (CHP) concerning the Canal Istanbul Project as an illustrative example from Turkey to ‘ideology in action’, this article shows how various rhetorical combinations appeal to an analysis of ‘ideology at work’. Our analysis is based on 20 in-depth interviews with both opponents and supporters of the project, in addition to a comparison of two official websites providing scientific evidence from each party’s perspective. The results show that the two poles of the dispute aim to recruit more people as their political supporters by using their own scientific reports with claims that they are ‘objective’ and aspire for the benefit of Istanbul.