In a move well-timed with Turkey’s recent election – and upcoming presidential runoff – BBC Two has released a two-part documentary on the man at the centre of it, Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Using archive footage and a veritable “who’s who” of the British foreign press, the episodes show how Erdoğan’s understanding of religion’s power in Turkey and knowledge of populist poetry helped take him from the son of a ship captain to Mayor of Istanbul, prime minister and eventually president. It’s an informative, if not always engaging, watch, keen on highlighting how past moments in Erdoğan’s life could have been clues to his eventual turn towards dictatorship.
Photograph Ozan Kose/AFP via Getty Images
