Talk:Turkey

The article is too long

It's currently 13,585 words or 87kb. Will aim for under 9k words per Wikipedia:Article_size and Wikipedia:Peer_review/Turkey/archive3. That means multiple sections will need to be trimmed. Although some areas need expansion. For example, coverage of earthquakes, faultlines etc are ridiculously short. Bogazicili (talk) 20:06, 7 March 2024 (UTC)

Trimming is certainly a good thing, but you should ensure first that the child articles are in an appropriate shape. E.g., Turkey#Republic_of_Turkey is much better writen than History_of_Turkey#Republic_of_Turkey; the latter trails off into a mere timeline (but then child-child article History of the Republic of Turkey is looks better). This is relevant because History of Turkey in its entirety is the child article of Turkey#History. So anyonw jumping straight from the section Turkey#History to History of Turkey will have – as of now – a worse reading experience at the bottom of the latter than at the bottom of the Turkey#History. I only mention this because I have seen cases trimming of main articles without brushing up the child articles. I think @CMD can be of much help in the challenge of how to create best structure and best content in article hierarchies. –Austronesier (talk) 09:26, 9 March 2024 (UTC)

Too long? What do you mean by too long? Pages about countries of the world usually tend to be written very long to detail lots of information about the country. Loc863 (talk) 14:52, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

• Trimmed lengthy part about branches of government. This is already in Government of Turkey. Bogazicili (talk) 19:36, 21 April 2024 (UTC)

  After 13.5k, the article is finally 11,518 words. Bogazicili (talk) 22:23, 31 May 2024 (UTC)

The article is still 11,402 words. I'll rewrite and shorten the Foreign relations section, which is one of the longest sections now. Other parts of the article will be trimmed too, although I might add a few things as well. I don't think the article can get below 9k words, but below 10k will be my goal. Bogazicili (talk) 18:35, 22 September 2024 (UTC) Bump Bogazicili (talk) 12:50, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

If you want an easy word removal, remove the Science and technology subsection. It's a level 4 section in Economy of Turkey, totally out of relative proportion here. CMD (talk) 13:01, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

I'm still going over the article. There are lots of places to remove and trim before Science and technology subsection. Some parts still have very poor sourcing.

For example, one paragraph in climate is redundant. LGBTQ rights needs to be trimmed and merged into Human rights section.

The child articles are also very low quality. So we can't asses DUE with respect to other Wikipedia sources.

I have been sidetracked with other Wiki articles

By the way, we are at 10,746 words now. Much better compared to 13,585 words Bogazicili (talk) 13:20, 12 November 2024 (UTC)

10,641 words at the moment. There are lots of places to tighten and get below 10k. I'll be doing that over the next several weeks. Also note that there's an actually an article: Science and technology in Turkey.

I won't be aiming for under 9k though. I think under 10k is ok, even for Featured Articles. Bogazicili (talk) 19:13, 20 November 2024 (UTC) Bump Bogazicili (talk) 20:42, 11 January 2025 (UTC)

Where's the Emblem of Turkey?! 202.138.239.24 (talk) 07:57, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

This has been discussed many times. Phil Bridger (talk) 09:02, 29 April 2025 (UTC)

Informational point on naming

It's probably worth noting that while major news sources such as AP, BBC, CNN, etc. are all still using "Turkey" there has been a significant shift in travel guides:

• Rough Guides Türkiye
• Lonely Planet Türkiye
• Insight Guides Türkiye
• Türkiye Travel Guide - independently published by George M. Ripp

This is significantly different from the classic case of Germany - all these brands are using "Germany" not Deutschland. I presume this is because the campaign of the Turkish government to ask people to use Türkiye is starting to succeed. I don't think the Germans are campaigning for people to use Deutschland.

To note: I don't think this shift justifies a name change here, but it probably does signify a trend that will likely take hold in the long run. Jimbo Wales (talk) 09:34, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

At least two are inconsistent: Lonely Planet Türkiye on the book, Lonely Planet Turkiye on its web site; Rough Guide Türkiye on the book, Rough Guide Turkey on its web site. (Nice plug for Amazon.) Bazza 7 (talk) 12:30, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Primary topic: The country or the bird?

The primary topic for "Turkey" in American English is a bird. Why not have "Turkey (bird)" be the main article and rename this one to Turkey (country)? ~2026-40999-08 (talk) 19:11, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Does it help answer your question if I point out that this is worldwide English Wikipedia, not American English Wikipedia? Largoplazo (talk) 19:38, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

The article is written in American English, and Wikipedia is an American website ~2026-40999-08 (talk) 20:13, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Nevertheless, this isn't a US-centric website. Largoplazo (talk) 20:28, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Nevertheless, the article should at least try to not create confusion for the country with the largest English-speaking population. I feel like a reasonable course of action could be having this be the default redirect for "Turkey", with the article itself being titled "Turkey (country) ~2026-40999-08 (talk) 20:50, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Your argument notwithstanding, Wikipedia simply isn't a nationalistic organization that gives special favor to the American point of view. As for confusion, right at the top of the article a reader sees This article is about the country. For the bird, see Turkey (bird). No confusion. Largoplazo (talk) 22:48, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Why was this closed? — Preceding unsigned comment added by ~2026-40999-08 (talk) 21:19, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

 Not done: to request a page move, follow the instructions at Wikipedia:Requested moves. Tbhotch^™ (CC BY-SA 4.0) 22:28, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Because the consensus is explained in the FAQ. –LaundryPizza03 (dc̄) 23:02, 23 July 2026 (UTC)

Topic primacy isn't clear, see https://books.google.com/ngrams/graph?content=turkey+food%2C+turkey+country&year_start=1800&year_end=2022&corpus=en&smoothing=3 Why not label to be equal to both topics?

I've unboxed this because it didn't seem to be working anyway, and because this thread hadn't anywhere near reached the length and the level of unproductiveness that normally justify boxing.

My final response to the requester: It was fine for you to test the waters in an ordinary thread but, as Tbhotch said, if you still believe the page should be moved, and since, as you can see, it's going to be a controversial request, you should follow the procedures at WP:Requested moves to make a formal request, as nothing further can be achieved by continuing in this thread. Before doing that, however, consider that, as indicated by LaundryPizza03, this discussion has been held before and the way the articles are named now is the outcome. That doesn't mean the question can't be raised anew, but, in deciding whether it's worth your time, you ought to take into account what's been said previously and how the current state of affairs was reached. Largoplazo (talk) 11:20, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

• Pageviews Turkey got an average of 11,766 page views per day in the last year. Turkey (bird) got 1,221 per day. Even if we make an assumption that everyone viewing the bird article came here first, that still leaves this article's views at more than eight times that of the bird, so it is clearly the primary topic. This is probably a good illustration of the fact that whilst the USA is the largest English-speaking country in the world, that does not necessarily map to readers of the English Wikipedia. Black Kite (talk) 11:26, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

• there's also the issue of why people look at Wikipedia articles. Presumably a great deal of it is to find out about things they don't already know. And given the relative complexity of the two, I'd have to suggest that the country is going to attract more readers for that purpose than the bird. There's really only so much you can usefully say about a large domesticated avian, bred as food. A large country, with a long and complex history, and with extensive archaeological artefacts dating back to the Neolithic, is inherently going to have more written about it, about many, many topics. Hence the difference in readership between the two. AndyTheGrump (talk) 12:57, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

• I think we were being trolled here. It seems implausible that anybody could genuinely think that a nation of 86 million people was not the primary topic for its own name. The frivolous argument was advanced crassly and I did wonder whether the American exceptionalism used in place of any actual argument was intended to wind people up. This is the English language Wikipedia not the American English Wikipedia and all English variants need to coexist within it, which they do surprisingly well except when somebody tries to make trouble. Alternatively, I wondered whether this was a way to sneak a rename to "Türkiye" in through the back door. When the TA switched to using another TA I pretty much lost all patience with them and warned them for sockpuppetry.

Obviously, I'm not going to roll this up again. If people think that this has exposed anything worth discussing then go ahead. That can happen even when a thread starts off on an invalid basis. Please, just don't waste too much of your time on an OP who probably wasn't serious in the first place. --DanielRigal (talk) 13:19, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

WP:AGF Largoplazo (talk) 23:22, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Note: Thread renamed from '"Turkey" is a bird' to 'Primary topic: The country or the bird?' to be less inflammatory and to reflect the actual discussion. --DanielRigal (talk) 13:24, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Yeah, OP here, you got me. I think in general Wikipedia isn't reactive enough, (ironic, given that wiki means fast), such as not renaming this article Turkiye as per the country's wishes or not having "Gulf of America" in the header for the Gulf of Mexico. I didn't genuinely believe any of the arguments that I previously offered, if you couldn't tell. ~2026-41183-74 (talk) 15:09, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

The reason it's still called the Gulf of Mexico is because almost no one calls it the "Gulf of America" except Trump, people/groups who support Trump, and US federal executive agencies (because they have to). In fact, the ratio of "Gulf of Mexico" to "Gulf of America" is increasing over time.

As an aside, Google Maps handles the dispute the same way as the Sea of Japan/East Sea naming dispute: it displays "Gulf of Mexico" to users in Mexico, "Gulf of America" to users in the US, and "Gulf of Mexico (Gulf of America)" everywhere else. We obviously can't do that. SuperPianoMan9167 (talk) 22:58, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Of course I'm not suggesting that wikipedia should be different in different regions, I just think that a different name being used by the federal government constitutes something worth mentioning in the header, especially as the controversy is ongoing.

I realize that this conversation should probably be held on that article ~2026-41254-10 (talk) 23:28, 24 July 2026 (UTC)

Turkey should be changed to Turkiye, the official name is Turkiye.

Turkey should be changed to Turkiye, the official name is Turkiye. Eqnn (talk) 05:42, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

No. See Talk:Turkey/FAQ. Wikipedia doesn't go by the official name, it goes by what a country is generally, actually called in English for details. Largoplazo (talk) 11:12, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

I don’t think Wikipedia policy is to intentionally disrespect entire nations of people ~2026-50360-84 (talk) 23:10, 17 September 2026 (UTC)

Turkiye redirects here. Anybody looking for the article using that name will be sent here. There is no risk of anybody not finding what they are looking for. --DanielRigal (talk) 11:48, 28 July 2026 (UTC)

Similar to the Gulf of Mexico and the Gulf of America situation, with it being Turkey and Türkiye. Loc863 (talk) 14:47, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

The official name in English isn't Turkiye. The official name in English is Türkiye, which is very odd and problematic because there is no letter ü in any English alphabet. Why did the government of Türkiye insists on including a non-English letter in its official English-language name is odd, and frankly, a bit arrogant. Peter-T (talk) 05:44, 21 August 2026 (UTC)

-I think it's a problem of incompatibility with English Phonetics.

We can all Hear, Listen and appreciate the Turkish pronunciation of "Türkiye".

To pronounce those sounds in English, you will have to write something like:
Toorkee'eh
Toorkee'uh

Or something similar..
And that's the root of the problem!

The Turk Country, wants the international written form to be: Türkiye

But if you pronounce that in English it will sound like: Tiurkay-i (with Latin/Spanish sounds)
Right?

-So it's a bit of a silly discussion, and a bit of a Tantrum in itself.

English language Cannot make you pronounce "Türkiye" in the Turk way,
unless you write something like "Toorkee'eh"

So you cannot have it both ways!

You can force the usage of the written form, Türkiye,
but that form does not work Phonetically in their preferred way, in the English language!

If you want the English form to sound like the official "Türkiye", you need to write Toorkee'eh.

-Turks will not like that,
because it doesn't coincide with the new official written form.

English will Not like that,
because you're not going to go and tell them what to do with their language..
or that their phonetics are wrong and need to be changed lol

Right?
Am I making sense?

-And the same applies for every single language!
If you pronounce "Türkiye" in Castellano/Spanish, you get: Tur - ki - YE.

Whereas the official Turk pronunciation is more like: Tur - kie

Spaniards will pronounce the YE as a separate sound, and we will give you KI and YE.

This does not conform with the Turk pronunciation,
but is a direct result of pronouncing the official "Türkiye" written form in Spanish..

Right?

-So you cannot pretend to change the Phonetics of every single language where "Türkiye" does not Sound the same exact official Turk way.. right?

And you cannot pretend to have every single language change their historic Written form, just because;
specially if that is detrimental to the Phonetics...

The more we make any language Phonetic be more like the official "Türkiye",
the less correct will the written form be.

And viceversa,
we can force the official written form "Türkiye",
but that will probably result in a dissimilar and wrong Phonetic sound.. not the official Turk way. Quintessence7 (talk) 07:45, 11 September 2026 (UTC)

The amount of images

Is insane because at Human rights sections, there is a huge gap. Why do we have so much pics? For example relevance of Nuri Bilge Ceylan (left), Beren Saat (middle), and Türkan Şoray (right)? Why are they even here? UEFA Euro 2016 pic shouldn't be either for example. It was one of the worst campaigns. As if they won something. Turkish coffee irrelevant, too much building pics. 2 airplane pics, why not one? Why demonstration pics? I would also cut one of those maps, maybe Seljuks leave the Beylik period, since they're the same era. Beshogur (talk) 16:21, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

@Beshogur: I agree. Feel free to be WP:BOLD and follow MOS:IMAGERELEVANCE. Bazza 7 (talk) 20:55, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Also undue weight. We have a photo of Haghia Sophia. Selimiye Mosque, Sultan Ahmed Mosque, we can leave one? Also don't see why Mor Hananyo Monastery is placed, as if the population is divided 50/50. I have nothing against this place, but as a Turkish person, I heard it today for the first time. Bit generous for a Christian population of 1%? Beshogur (talk) 21:54, 3 August 2026 (UTC)

Let us add "under authoritarian gouvernement" in the information box

🤔 ~2026-47863-75 (talk) 09:28, 2 September 2026 (UTC)

You'll need to show that it's routinely described that way in current reliable sources. Also, take a look at the previous discussion of this from a year ago. Largoplazo (talk) 12:14, 2 September 2026 (UTC)

Foundation for Defense of Democracies https://www.fdd.org/analysis/2026/06/03/turkeys-democracy-is-dying-as-erdogan-dismantles-opposition/

Carnegie Endowment for International Peace https://carnegieendowment.org/events/2026/06/turkiyes-democratic-breakdown

Stanford University centers and institutes#Freeman Spogli Institute for International Studies https://fsi.stanford.edu/news/resisting-authoritarianism-turkey-local-level

Jacobin (magazine) https://jacobin.com/2026/01/turkey-brazil-lawfare-authoritarianism-imamoglu

And a scholarly source:

https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/european-political-science/article/abs/political-science-in-the-age-of-populism-perspectives-from-turkey/37EFE8CC302CE65C16FCFDDC8BBE4829 Chidgk1 (talk) 14:54, 2 September 2026 (UTC)

If I search sources that mention that the sky is blue, I will find sources mentioning that the sky is blue. Largoplazo specifically asked for sources that routinely describe it as such, not for sources mentioning it. Furthermore, the use of "under authoritarian [governement]" is merely an editorialization added by people under the excuse that it is found in these articles: Russia, Egypt, Kazakhstan, Bahrain, Mozambique, and Ethiopia. Several more countries are under authoritarian governments and/or are becoming authoritarian states. The parameter |government_type= was created for types of government, not to label how western societies assume a country is currently behaving. Tbhotch^™ (CC BY-SA 4.0) 19:19, 2 September 2026 (UTC)

@Tbhotch "Western society" doesn't need to assume how the Turkish government is behaving - foreign journalists and academics are generally allowed here in Turkey and can see and report much more freely than in, for example, China.

Based on their surnames Duygu Ersoy and Jülide Karakoç are probably Turkish origin (whether they consider themselves part of a "western society" I don't know). If you are asking for Turkish sources obviously they are harder to find as quite a lot of media here is financed directly or indirectly by the government but there is for example:

https://www.evrensel.net/yazi/99348/turkiye-avrupa-ve-otoriter-rejimlerin-normallesmesi

https://dergipark.org.tr/tr/pub/usdad/article/1772551

https://medyascope.tv/2026/09/02/gannusi-ornegi-ya-islamcilar-demokrat-sekulerler-otoriter-olursa/ Chidgk1 (talk) 17:09, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

Still it's not a form of government. Turkish presidential system is already supposed to be authoritarian with all the power. Beshogur (talk) 18:26, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

Information that can be added to Politics in Turkey. Infoboxes are intended to be for quick facts, not a place to add all the possible descriptions of the article's subject, as people tend to do with infoboxes everywhere (this is not just an issue seen in countries, see Wikipedia:Contentious topics/Infoboxes). How is it helpful to tell people: "This country is a republic/monarchy/communist state under an authoritarian regime"? It is not helpful, and it is given undue weight to an aspect that is modern and can be corrected in the future, but since it was added to Russia at some point, then now people want the label to appear to every country described or perceived as authoritarian, even when the tendency is a recent case, like the never-ending requests at the United States.

Recalling what I said above, there are only six articles using "under an authoritarian government", plus the even more editorialized "under an authoritharian dictatorship" for the following nine countries: Republic of the Congo, Togo, Burundi, Cameroon, Belarus, Tajikistan, Nicaragua, Rwanda, and Venezuela. Authoritarianism#Current list of countries lists several countries that are not in the lists above, and this map also shows that the list falls short on the actual number of authoritarian states.

Several countries listed at Authoritarianism#Current list of countries have threads on their talk pages discussing either, or why the article is labeled as an authoritharian/dictatorship (example: Talk:Russia#Dictatorship in infobox? in May 2026) or why the article is not labeled as an authoritharian/dictatorship (example: Talk:China/Archive 22#mentioning in the info box that china is authoritarian in May 2026). Also for communist states, like Talk:Cuba or Talk:North Korea, it is common to read people questioning why they use "communist state" instead of dictatorship.

So in my view, this label of "under an authoritarian regime" is just a modern label that people want to add under a biased idea that countries must be labeled in infoboxes by Wikipedia as such simply because some sources describe nations as such and "other articles" have the label. Instead, such information must be explained at the respective politics sections/articles of the authoritarian states without giving undue weight to it. Tbhotch^™ (CC BY-SA 4.0) 19:14, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

Turkiye has not fair but still has free elections. You can't compare Turkiye to these dictatorships. There is zero proof that Erdogan is elected by rigged election. His party is not even the majority in the parliament, and he lost the last local elections. As I told, the presidential system gives him these powers. He isn't doing anything outside his de jure roles. Beshogur (talk) 19:20, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

Tell me you didn't read what I wrote without telling me you didn't read what I wrote. Tbhotch^™ (CC BY-SA 4.0) 19:32, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

This is a perfect example of why the label should be removed. Now not only Wikipedia was labeling Equatorial Guinea as a "Unitary presidential republic under a hereditary dictatorship", now Wikipedia is labeling the country as a "Unitary one-party presidential republic under an totalitarian hereditary dictatorship". Maybe the real discussion should be at Template talk:Infobox country or WT:Countries banning such biased language exclusively used by editors to criticize governments. Tbhotch^™ (CC BY-SA 4.0) 20:05, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

why do u have a problem with objective facts? Nk was also correctly described in the info box as being under a totalitarian hereditary dictatorship untill the commie scum white washed it ~2026-47968-39 (talk) 09:18, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Both kazakhstan, uzbekistan and turkey are literal one party dictatorships with sham elections. Most opposition leaders are jailed, kurds, secular turks, kemalists: it doesnt matter. ~2026-47968-39 (talk) 19:47, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

Erdogan's party is minority in the parliament, and 2 years ago he lost the local elections. Beshogur (talk) 11:03, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

Turkey is a presidential republic the parliament role is reduced. Shadow4dark (talk) 19:34, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

His coalition needs 360 for a referendum and 400 to ratify a constitutional amendment. Beshogur (talk) 22:08, 4 September 2026 (UTC)

kazakhstan is a literal one party dictatorship since its independence, ruled by literal dictators (like turkey currently) 💀💀💀💀 + there was a LONG discussion back in 2024 on whether to include "authoritarian" in the kazakhstan info box and most participants agreed on it citing numerous respected and objective sources:) ~2026-47968-39 (talk) 19:43, 3 September 2026 (UTC)

• Well, we have to consider that this is a regime that had the front-runner for the next elections arrested, seized his companies and sanctioned media companies that didn't follow the government line on reporting it. Yet the word "İmamoğlu" does not appear in this article once (indeed, it is in a single sentence in the lead of Recep Tayyip Erdoğan and then never mentioned again). In this article the "human rights" and "media" paragraphs contain a very few sentences that are damning of Turkey's records but again, are not expanded on at all. That seems to be like an article (or indeed a couple of articles) that are seriously unbalanced. Black Kite (talk) 11:20, 4 September 2026 (UTC)