Public statement
The board of the Research Committee 21 of the International Sociological Association makes public its rejection of the recent political events in Turkey. While we reject the failed coup d’état of the night of July 15th, we express our serious concerns about several authoritarian measures established by the government over the past months and reinforced since the failed coup, especially the state of emergency, the large scale arrests of individuals with no connections with the coup and the possible suspension of human rights conventions. The restriction of civil rights, including the right to express divergent opinions, to organization, to mobility and to mobilization, as well as the arrests of press members, academics and members of civil society organizations must be denounced and rejected as a clear attack on the same democratic values violated by the failed events of July 15th. In this sense, our solidarity goes with this statement to the Turkish people and to its academic community, especially attacked in its autonomy, independence and even its basic civil rights.
Moreover, although the Turkish situation is the ground for our immediate concerns, we would like to state publicly our rejection to the recent wave of shrinkage of democratic spaces and of assaults on social, political and civil rights of citizens, minority groups, migrants and democratic institutions in several countries of the world. As an academic and professional association, we cannot remain silent about these developments. Tolerance, freedom of speech, disagreement, mobilization and academic freedom, as well as the respect to democratic rules and electoral results, are basic components for the construction of better, less unequal and more civic societies.
