Dr. Ülker Sözen

Biography

Ülker Sözen received her PhD degree in Sociology in 2017 from Mimar Sinan Fine ArtsUniversity in Turkey. She was a postdoctoral fellow from 2019 to 2022 in the InternationalResearch Group on Authoritarianism and Counter-Strategies (IRGAC), wherein she conductedresearch on civil society activism and authoritarianism in Turkey. She is currently a postdoctoralresearcher in the DFG funded research project “Piety and Secularity Contested: Family andYouth Politics in post-Kemalist 'New Turkey'” at the Institute of Religious Studies at LeipzigUniversity, studying expressions of religiosity, love, and romance by the youth on social media.She will start as a postdoctoral researcher in the Gerda Henkel awarded project in June 2024.

Project Description

Counter-authoritarian politics in digital platforms in Turkey

This project will investigate how progressive discourses and counter-authoritarian politicsare produced in the Turkish digital landscape against the backdrop of political polarization,authoritarian pressures, and online policing.Furthermore, structural complications ofplatforms that feed echo chambers, fragmentation, and non-democratic forms ofcommunication will be considered. The study will concentrate on the circulation of discourses and exchangescentered on prominent sites of contestation and activism in contemporary Turkey, including but not limited to feminist and labour politics, and social movements.

In addition to addressing the complexities and complications of online activism, thisstudy will delve into the new configurations and possibilities of democratic imagination andcollective action that digital platforms may enable. To examine the microprocesses of political communicationand mobilization, theproject will expand on the concepts of network subjectivity, affective labor,and digital political labour. Besides, it will consider the broader political economy ofauthoritarian neoliberalism in Turkey and the negotiations between state elites and platformcompanies with the purposes of increasing the political control over platforms and securingmarket interests. In this research, multiple methods will be deployed including digitalethnography, in-depth interviews with digital content producers/ activists, and policy analysis.

Publications

Sözen, Ü. (2025). Young Muslims in the Malady of Love: Preaching and Digital Intimate Publics on Turkish Social Media. Turkish Studies, 1–28. https://doi.org/10.1080/14683849.2025.2483767
Sözen, Ü. (2025). Emotional Landscape of Activism in Turkey: Hope and Emotional Sustainability Under Authoritarianism. In Paul Kubicek (ed.), Paths of De-Democratization in Turkey (Culture, Society, and Political Economy in Turkey series), New York: Peter Lang, pp. 107-129.
Sözen, Ü. (2024). Despair and the Question of Emotional Sustainability under Authoritarianism: Insights from Turkey. IRGAC website: https://irgac.org/articles/despair-and-the-question-of-emotional-sustainability-under-authoritarianism-insights-from-turkey/
Sözen, Ü. (2023). State and Society in Turkey after the Earthquakes: Initial Reflections. IRGAC website: https://irgac.org/articles/state-and-society-in-turkey-after-the-earthquakes-initial-reflections/
Sözen, Ü. (2022). Production of activism under authoritarianism: Insights from the rights- based civil society in Turkey. In IRGAC (eds.), Global Authoritarianism. Perspectives and Contestations from the South. Transcript Verlag, 255-271.
Sözen, Ü. (2022). Civil society under siege in Turkey: authoritarianism, polarisation and counterstrategies. Humanitarian Alternatives, 20, 74-83.
Sözen, Ü. (2022). Authoritarianism and counter-strategies in the classroom. The pedagogy of collective learning across geographies. In Dossier: IRGAC Lecture Series (ed. Ülker Sözen). IRGAC website. https://api.irgac.org/uploads/IRGAC_DOSSIER_6613c76f23.pdf
Sözen, Ü. (2021). How to achieve transnational solidarity in the age of neoliberal authoritarianism and border securitization? IRGAC website. https://www.irgac.org/2021/1053/