"Strong, but Anxious State": The Fantasmatic Narratives on Ontological Insecurity and Anxiety in Turkey/"Guclu ama Kaygili Devlet": Turkiye'de Ontolojik Guvensizlik ve Kaygi Uzerine Fantasmal Anlatilar.

• Author: Adisonmez, Umut Can

Introduction

The hegemonic discourse on the problem of state survival in Turkey has been unfolding over a long period. Since the foundation of the country, the hegemonic discourse has shown both continuity and an ongoing process of change. However, what has become more prominent in the discourse is the idea that Turkey is surrounded by internal and external enemies who are ready to destroy it. This idea is known as Sevresphobia. Although the Treaty of Sevres, stipulating a territorial division of Turkey in the aftermath of the First World War, never materialized, Sevresphobia, the fear of the ever-present possibility of a Sevres-like partition of the country by great powers, still informs the socio-political space in Turkey. For example, 78 percent of those polled in a recent survey (1) agreed with the following statement: "just like they did in the past to the Ottoman Empire, the European countries want to dissolve and disintegrate Turkey now." This result indicates that the hegemonic discourse has become the surface of inscription from which a vast majority of Turkish subjects make sense of the ontological security of the state and society.

The hegemonic discourse on the problem of state survival is a key element of politics in Turkey. It has been successful in two ways. Firstly, it determines the present ways of understanding, defining and articulating the ontological security of the state. By doing so, it makes alternative articulations on ontological security unthinkable. Secondly, it exercises a grip on subjects by channeling their sense of ontological security. In this way, it serves as an organizing principle for socio-political relations and provides identification opportunities through which subjects make sense of themselves and the world around them. Recently, Turkish society has experienced unprecedented political instability caused by a series of political events, the July 15 coup attempt in 2016 being the most destructive. In their attempt to govern the coup and the ensuing crisis, the political elites foregrounded the hegemonic discourse on the problem of state survival. In this context, the discourse on ontological insecurity and anxiety become prominent again. Against this background, the central focus of this article is to reflect upon and problematize the hegemonic discourse on the problem of state survival.

We begin with the problematization by highlighting the seemingly paradoxical nature of the contemporary political discourse on the problem of state survival. The ways in which this paradox emerges is closely linked to a combination of two ideas: the New and Old Turkey. In this newly emerging political discourse, the New Turkey is presented as a strong and powerful state determining its own destiny while the Old Turkey is portrayed as a politically and economically unstable and insecure state. However, while the political elites employ a discourse that signifies New Turkey as a strong/powerful state, they also foreground society-wide anxieties - e.g., Sevresphobia. This is the point where the paradox of the hegemonic discourse reveals itself. While the discourse on a strong/powerful state signifies a state of ontological security, the discourse on Sevresphobia underlines an ongoing state of ontological insecurity. In this sense, the political elites foreground the very forms of insecurities and anxieties which, normally, a strong state would not experience. Hence, the political discourse includes seemingly contradictory narratives, coexisting in paradoxical tension. This raises the following questions. Why do political elites articulate the New Turkey as an increasingly powerful state, but at the same time foreground ontological insecurities of the state in their political discourse? Why would a state with the second-largest army in North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) after the United States (US) be constantly preoccupied with the problem of state survival?

We argue that understanding the paradoxical character of this hegemonic discourse requires an engagement with fantasmatic narratives. Fantasmatic narratives (2) are typically structured around ideals (e.g., being a powerful state) and obstacles (e.g., Sevresphobia). The realization of the ideals is often made conditional on the circumvention of an implied obstacle (or obstacles). Structured in this way, fantasmatic narratives play vital roles in maintaining hegemonic discourse and governing collective anxiety.

Firstly, fantasmatic narratives provide anxious subjects with clear-cut and comforting answers to their ontological insecurities. In this way, they simplify the socio-political space and make anxiety tolerable. Secondly, fantasmatic narratives are the affective force behind hegemonic discourses. The capacity of a hegemonic discourse to stand as an object of identification largely depends on its fantasmatic narratives and the subject's affective investment in this narrative. Fantasmatic narratives mobilize a subject's identification and create the political subject. Finally, political elites often mobilize fantasmatic narratives to govern the traumatic events and ensuing crisis before they can become the sources of a political struggle. When put into practice, fantasmatic narratives leave little space for alternative articulations. This keeps the political dimension of the security policies at bay, limits political contestation, and establishes a legitimate background for the politics of emergency/exception and fear.

The article is structured as follows. First, it lays out the main elements/arguments of the On-tological Security Theory and Post-foundational Theory of Discourse and articulates an analytical framework for the analysis of political discourse on ontological security. This section underlines the affective/political character of discourse on the problem of state survival and discusses the role of fantasmatic narratives and different forms of agencies in the constitution and re-constitution of the ontological security regimes. The second section contextualizes the political discourse on the problem of state survival by broadly laying out the main characteristics of this discourse in early and contemporary Turkey. Expanding on these sections, the following sections analyze the contemporary political discourse on ontological security and fantasmatic narratives on the problem of state survival in Turkey. This section focuses on the formation of the ontological security discourse by the ruling Justice and Development Party (JDP) and empirically focuses on the political discourse of Recep Tayyip Erdogan - the leader ofJDP and Turkey's current president.

Anxiety, Radical Contingency and Fantasmatic Narratives

OST evolves around two concepts: ontological security and existential anxiety. While ontological security is the need of the subject to exist in a stable way and feel oneself as whole (3), ontological insecurity is the condition under which the subject feels a "deep, incapacitating state of not knowing how to get by in the world." (4) For Mitzen, subjects satisfy their need to feel ontologically secure by articulating unique and consistent autobiographical narratives (5) and self-identities. (6) In this way, they aim to govern their ontological insecurity and existential anxiety. For Giddens, articulating a self-identity and formulating a set of behavioral routines (7) is an attempt to alleviate the driving impact of existential questions. (8) Herein, the keyword is "attempt". This is because, as Mitzen argues, "the need to experience oneself as a whole person in time can never be fully satisfied". (9) This quest always remains a failed attempt, and thereby a source of anxiety.

Recently, the OST scholarship has further built upon the distinction between fear and anxiety as a governing practice of security. (10) This literature argues that "anxiety -as a sensation, an emotion, and a thought- prevails through all stages of being and must therefore be central for any political analysis". (11) While fear is about visible and known threat/risk, in times of anxiety, the object of threat/risk is not visible, known, or identifiable. (12) Anxiety additionally differs from fear in terms of its orientation in time and space. While anxiety is a future-oriented and long-acting response to an unknown threat, fear is a present-oriented and short-lived response to a clearly identifiable and tangible threat. (13)

The concept of anxiety is vital to account for ontological security as an ongoing process. For Giddens, behind the taken-for-granted aspects of everyday practices and discourse, there is a hidden chaos that has the potential to destroy the sense of the very reality of things. (14) In other words, anxiety lies underneath our everyday life and cannot be eliminated. It makes it difficult to maintain a stable way of being, thus triggering ontological insecurity. As Browning argues, anxiety "stalks us constantly, threatening to overpower us and leave us floundering in despair and helplessness if we fail to keep it at bay." (15) Considering this, Kinnvall suggests a movement from ontological security as security of being (a possession) towards a conception of ontological security as a constant security-seeking process. (16) This suggestion represents a shift of focus from "being ontologically secure" to "become ontologically secure." (17) While "having ontological security is a precondition for action", "seeking ontological security is driving choices and behavior". (18)

In Post-foundational Discourse Theory, the search for an ontological ground and meaningful existence can only be done in and through discourse. (19) Discourse is the only possible origin of meaningful understanding of the self and the world. In this conception, objects' social meaningful-ness (signified) can only originate from their articulation in a discourse - a particular arrangement of meaning conveying entities (signifiers). (20) For PTD...