Turkey is experiencing the crisis of labor seen in all the parts of the world. Job insecurity, health and safety problems at workplaces, de-unionization, unemployment, sub-contracting, and the degeneration of class identity and solidarity that develop with precarious employment, comprise the most important labor issues in Turkey, as in large parts of the world. This study investigates the unique political, cultural, and economic factors within Turkey that affect global labor issues; analyses the shape and size of the crisis of labor in Turkey; and discusses actual and urgent problems such as the status of sub-contracting workers. The study aims to explore the roles of all social, cultural, economic, and political dynamics in the crisis of labor in Turkey.

The crisis of labor includes many social, political, and economic aspects. The rise of neoliberalism has caused significant problems related to labor: for example, legislative enforcements upon labor rights and working conditions, the decentralization of labor processes, obstacles to unionization, precarious employment, declines in labor wages, and significant rises in levels of unemployment. In particular, neoliberal legislative enforcements have created procedural problems for the social security of workers and their right to unionization. 

The Soma mining accident (2014) was a major shock to the Turkish public and attracted significant attention and criticism around labor issues. The first dimension of public criticism was related to workplace safety. The Soma mine case, where 301 workers were killed, revealed significant concerns about worker safety and regulation by the relevant governmental authorities. A second point of public focus was the use of sub-contracting workers. During the 1990s, sub-contracting workers in Turkey had been used in limited cases; however, more recently, the number of sub-contracting workers has increased dramatically. Low wages, temporary contracts, and the bypassing of legal limitations to unionization have caused this major growth in sub-contracting. Even though soon after the Soma mining accident, the Turkish government promised to eliminate the use of sub-contracted labor, sub-contracting workers still comprise an important segment of labor in Turkey. While the government has made some reforms to the status of sub-contracting workers by creating a new categorization, this will not improve the conditions of sub-contracting workers. Instead, it will allow these problems to be reproduced in different ways.  

In recent decades, it has been argued that the working-class influence on politics has weakened. Left parties (socialist, social democrat or labor parties) began to lose their electoral power; furthermore, in order to recover this loss, left parties have attempted to sway various social groups beyond the working class. In Turkey, the relationship between the working class and left political parties is more problematic than elsewhere. Political parties who identify itself as ‘left’ gain their electoral support mostly from the middle and upper classes. This leads to problems of political representation and attachment of the working class in the political sphere and difficulties around addressing labor issues. 

One of the important causes for the split between the working class and left political parties is ideological. Marxist movements in Turkey have weak social and cultural connections to the Turkish working class. A major difference between the two groups is religion. In Turkey, workers and lower classes in general tend to have strong religious convictions. However, Marxists in Turkey have for decades repeated the maxim that “religion is the opium of masses” and have never been sympathetic toward religious people. As a result, workers’ levels of religious commitments remain relatively high. This ideological problem has been transferred to left politics and has transformed into a kind of Islamophobia in recent Turkish political history.

Another important dimension of the crises of labor in Turkey is the subordinated state of labor in cultural life. The cultural hegemony in Turkey is dominated by the Westernized upper classes who have not allowed the working class a role in literary, artistic or media production. Furthermore, academics, newspaper columns, and TV debates all give very insufficient attention to labor issues. This lack of media attention is responsible for the public’s lack of awareness of labor issues. The Soma incident was thus a turning point in public awareness.

The primary reason why labor issues have minimal public and political influence may be the weakness of unions and processes of unionization. Not only have unionization rates experienced regular declines, but the importance of the unions for unionized workers has also decreased. Both the de-unionization policies brought through neoliberal influence and failures to manage active and influential social movements have led to the current weakness of labor unions.

As summarized above, with reference to multiple social, political, and economic factors, this work explores the many different dimensions of labor issues in Turkey.