Iran, Turkey and the Kurds
Nihat Ali Özcan, PhD
14 June 2012
As has been foreseen, the attacks of the outlawed Kurdistan Workers’ Party (PKK) have begun to increase with the coming of summer. We are receiving a lot of conflict news, especially from the border with Iraq and towns.Nowadays, we are witnessing interesting developments in particular about the PKK and about the Kurdish problem in general. Despite all the difficulties, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan is continuing his rhetoric of “fighting against terrorists, negotiating with politicians.” In this regard, he is taking some steps, such as allowing Kurdish language teaching in schools. On the other side, Beşir Atalay, Turkey’s deputy prime minister, is drawing a much more promising picture. According to him, initiatives are being taken to “disarm the PKK” with the help of northern Iraqi
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The Tahrir Square looked much smaller this time
Güven Sak, PhD
12 June 2012
We all have learned the hard way that the number of Tahrir Square residents was quite small compared to Egypt's of 82 million. Last night I passed by Tahrir Square in Cairo, Egypt, the epicenter of the Revolution of January 25th that overthrew Hosni Mobarak. However, the Square that had looked gigantic on television and that had intoxicated me in 2011 looked very small this time. We all have learned the hard way that the number of people in Tahrir Square was quite small compared to Egypt's overall population of 82 million.
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How to define a more Southern G-20 agenda
Güven Sak, PhD
09 June 2012
The G-20’s focus on current events like the global economic crisis is understandable. That should not however, come at the expense of neglecting structural issues. Another G-20 Summit is approaching in mid-June this year in Los Cabos, Mexico. The G-20 is a forum in which the leaders of major economies essentially compare notes. It is composed of the 20 largest economies of the world, with the exception of Switzerland, the Netherlands and Spain (the last two are coming with the EU delegation anyways).
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Can Turkey fly via entrepreneurship?
Güven Sak, PhD
08 June 2012
Given that Turkey performs poorly on the human development index, there is still great progress to be made. The Union of Chambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey and the US Department of State have been carrying out a joint Global Entrepreneurship Program in Turkey. The objective of the Program is to familiarize Turkish entrepreneurs with their peers in the region as well as in America so they can learn from and imitate each other. We are discussing how the success attained in one part of the globe can be transferred to other regions. Last month, in the context of the Program a delegation of foreign investors visited Turkey. During the visit, a business plan competition was carried out with the participation of more than thirty entrepreneurs selected from among the best of the best proje
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An exploration into new monetary policy
Fatih Özatay, PhD
07 June 2012
The study stresses that the CBT does not have at its disposal appropriate tools to fulfill the objectives assumed in the late 2010 with the new monetary policy framework. How to design a monetary policy that focuses both on financial stability and price stability? Monetary economists and central bankers all around the world have been endeavoring to answer this question lately. The June issue of the journal İktisat İşletme ve Finans – Economics, Business and Finance covers studies that seek to answer this question. The studies covered in the journal assess the new monetary policy framework of the Central Bank of Turkey (CBT) with this perspective. On Tuesday, I talked about two out of five studies in the issue. Today I want to summarize the rest. Institutional arrangements I authored the
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Turkey’s stance on the civil war in Syria
Nihat Ali Özcan, PhD
07 June 2012
Day by day, the clashes in Syria have been spreading to a larger area and getting more and more frequent. The government is losing control in some places and the number of casualties is getting bigger. A civil war is on the threshold. We may get more tragic news in the days ahead if nothing miraculous happens. Worst of all is that millions of people are now living in fear that they will turn out to be refugees both inside and outside the country. The clashes in Syria are transforming from a counter insurgency to a civil war, while changing in character. In such a case, it won’t be surprising to see more bloody clashes, because as they have more civilian casualties, the hostility will be fed more and directed to ethnic and sectarian differences, which would make parties more merciless. As i
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A valuable discussion
Fatih Özatay, PhD
05 June 2012
Here is the main question: how can the CBT implement a monetary policy that targets price stability and financial stability at the same time. The June 2012 issue of the journal İktisat İşletme ve Finans (Economics, Business and Finance) has a theme that was frequently addressed and discussed at this column for the last two years. Here is the main question it asks: how can the CBT implement a monetary policy that targets to simultaneously attain price stability and financial stability. I would like to repeat why this critical question is raised: before the global financial crisis, many market economies had concentrated monetary policy efforts on price stability. It was thought that, price stability with a disciplined fiscal policy would automatically ensure financial stability. And a clim
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The ban on abortion increases crime rate
Güven Sak, PhD
05 June 2012
What came as a surprise was that the legalization of abortion in the US with the decision of the Supreme Court in 1973 played a considerable role in the drop in crime rates in the US during the 1990s.
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$25,000 GDP per capita in 2023: Are we dreaming?
04 June 2012
Turkey’s GDP per capita reached $10,000 in 2011, finally surpassing the five-digit threshold. The next goal is to reach $25,000 by 2023.[1] We have 11 years to go. Can we really make it? Please check the chart below to see where we are currently. The chart shows GDP per capita in countries with populations over 10 million (that is 84 countries[2]) for the last six decades. The data is difficult to examine, as there are 5160 different cells in the figure. Each row represents a country and each column represents a year. Yellow cells indicate that the GDP per capita of a country in the corresponding year was below $10,000. Red cells indicate a GDP per capita between $10,000 and $15,000, while green cells mark per capita income between $15,000 and $25,000. Countries in the pink are best positi
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Imports and GDP growth
Fatih Özatay, PhD
02 June 2012
There is strong evidence that the downturn has not stopped in the fourth quarter as argued by officials and that the slowdown has been continuing. On Thursday, foreign trade statistics for April were announced. I will evaluate import figures in reference to the estimates for 2012 growth. Pace of increase in total imports has been decreasing since September 2011. In the last three months, imports decreased year-on-year. There appears a similar trend in non-energy exports, as well. The only difference is that year-on-year drop in non-energy imports has been continuing for the last five months. Sub-components of imports depict a picture alike where the drop in April is stronger than that in previous months for all of the three sub-components of imports. In addition, it is seen that the annual
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