The case has shown that from now on generals are not untouchable and it is no longer easy to engage in illegal activities, thanks to advanced technology and the ever-increasing success rate of the security forces. Yet some sections of society will still continue to attempt to derail the government through undemocratic means for at least another decade. For this reason, the government should take precautions as soon as possible.The oligarchy in the country is weakening fast, but this does not mean that it will disappear instantly or that its members will accept the rules of the democratic game. They show no signs of respecting society and its decisions. They still think that ignorant people have been cheated by dishonest politicians and that these people do not have the capability to understand the oligarchy's sophisticated stance. It is almost impossible to convince the oligarchy that we no longer live in the 1930s, that the society is well developed, sophisticated, pluralistic and in dynamic engagement with global actors. A possible but only natural outcome of this will be the oligarchy's continued attempt to resort to undemocratic means. Ergenekon gang members were caught easily, but one of the reasons for this was Ergenekon's hyper self-confidence. It was confident no one would dare chase it so it did not bother acting discreetly. No one was shocked to see these gang members arrested as these people were not playing their undemocratic games very secretly. I am sure that the oligarchy is now drawing its own conclusions and taking its lessons from the Ergenekon case. In the future they will be more careful and more intelligent.
Even though it is an extremely important case and it will set the stage from now on, we should not naively expect that the Ergenekon case will annihilate all undemocratic forces in the country once and for all. The indictment will be made public on Monday, but we can guess that it is unlikely it will touch the upper echelons of the undemocratic forces in the media, İstanbul businessmen and the military. The roots of these undemocratic forces should be reanalyzed and appropriate steps should be taken to weaken these undemocratic roots and sources.
Democratization of the legal system, a new civil constitution, radical and quick EU reforms, maximum transparency and accountability of all state institutions should be achieved as soon as possible. The government is giving the impression that instead of democratizing the institutions, it prefers to keep these institutions under its control to achieve its aims fast. But this is another undemocratic oligarchic mentality. The state should be as small as possible. Privatization should be completed as soon as possible. The system of government tenders, licensing and so on should be very transparent so that politicians cannot be blackmailed by businessmen and their associates.
A new political party system should be implemented to avoid the iron law of oligarchy. Party leaders should see that if their deputies are elected more democratically -- and thus become more accountable to the electorate rather than to the leader (see for instance the British system), undemocratic forces will find it impossible to interfere with politics. Party leaders, mainly Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, should make sacrifices on this issue if they are sincere in wanting democracy. Otherwise, even if the Constitutional Court does not shut down the party, people will -- in the medium term -- do so, as it is always the people who suffer the consequences of undemocratic processes in the country -- not the politicians, who come and go. We keep warning the oligarchy that the society is democratically more mature, agile, informed and so on and politicians should digest this reality as well. Neither the society nor the deputies will go astray, even if we have more democracy.
