New Book Exposes Erdoğan’s “Civil Death Project” Targeting the Hizmet Movement

Date posted: December 28, 2025

A major new contribution to the human rights literature on contemporary Türkiye has been released with the publication of Erdoğan’s Civil Death PROJECT – Persecution of the Hizmet Movement in Türkiye, authored by civil rights scholar Prof. James C. Harrington and international human rights attorney Coşkun Yorulmaz. Published by Blue Dome Press and distributed globally by Simon & Schuster, the book provides a rigorously documented account of the political, legal, and sociological mechanisms that have enabled one of the most sustained and far-reaching campaigns of state repression in modern Turkish history. It is now available for order through Amazon and Simon & Schuster’s distribution channels, with early copies already reaching warehouses in the United States.

In contrast to descriptive chronologies that catalog events in isolation, Harrington and Yorulmaz offer an analytically structured, evidence-based investigation into what they term President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan’s “civil death project.” This project, they argue, constitutes a systematic attempt to stigmatize, neutralize, and ultimately eradicate the Hizmet Movement as a social actor through a combination of state-orchestrated hate speech, criminalization without evidence, and the erosion of procedural and substantive legal safeguards. Drawing on public records, legal filings, international human rights judgments, government statements, and media documentation, the authors situate this repression within the broader frameworks of international criminal law and the global scholarship on authoritarianism, collective punishment, and political persecution.

One of the book’s central findings concerns the continuity and intensification of coercive measures long after the formal termination of Türkiye’s state of emergency in 2018. Statistical data cited in the book reveal that 1,877 individuals were detained or arrested for alleged Hizmet affiliation in just the first five months of 2024. During his first year in office as Interior Minister (June 2023–May 2024), Ali Yerlikaya publicly celebrated the detention or arrest of 9,251 individuals, averaging 771 per month. These figures underscore the authors’ argument that emergency governance has persisted in practice despite its nominal dissolution.

Equally alarming is the documented expansion of repression to include children and adolescents. In May 2024, 38 schoolchildren, including 14 under the age of 15, were detained en masse. A subsequent police operation resulted in the detention of 544 individuals, many of whom were mothers and daughters accused merely of providing informal educational assistance to the children of imprisoned Hizmet members. Harrington and Yorulmaz emphasize that none of these cases involve acts of violence or threats to public order; they reflect, instead, the criminalization of peaceful association and support networks, in direct violation of Türkiye’s obligations under international conventions.

The book also addresses the intensification of official hate speech at the highest levels of state authority. Even after Fethullah Gülen’s death in late October 2024, Erdoğan continued to employ dehumanizing rhetoric, describing Gülen’s passing as “a dishonorable death” and characterizing him as “a demon in human form.” Such language, the authors contend, is not merely rhetorical excess but constitutes state-directed incitement and signals intent relevant to the assessment of crimes against humanity. This analysis aligns with contemporary scholarship on authoritarian discursive strategies and their role in enabling structural violence.

In its concluding chapters, the book turns to a normative legal analysis, asking whether Türkiye’s actions against the Hizmet Movement meet thresholds for international criminal responsibility. Harrington and Yorulmaz examine Türkiye’s binding commitments under the European Convention on Human Rights, the International Covenant on Civil and Political Rights, the Convention Against Torture, and the evolving jurisprudence on enforced disappearances, arbitrary detention, and discriminatory persecution. Their conclusion is unequivocal: the evidence warrants serious consideration by international judicial and quasi-judicial institutions, and Erdoğan’s administration may be implicated in conduct that meets established definitions of crimes against humanity.

The authors ultimately argue that accountability is unlikely to emerge from domestic institutions, which they describe as structurally incapacitated by executive dominance. As such, they call for a coordinated response from the international community, asserting that “the political slaughter continues, and only collective action from democratic governments and multilateral institutions can halt this trajectory.” The book thus functions not only as a historical record and legal analysis but also as an urgent appeal to global actors responsible for the protection of fundamental rights.

Erdoğan’s Civil Death PROJECT is available for purchase and pre-order at the following links: