Anchoring Patriarchy Online: Crisis of Social Reproduction, Religious Populism, and Digital Authoritarianism in Turkey

The crisis of social reproduction (CSR) is a central component of the global polycrisis of our era, reflected in the rise of anti-gender discourses, sexism, and hypermasculinity that characterize many authoritarian regimes and movements. The CSR in today’s Turkey is manifold. At the political level, the Justice and Development Party (AKP) advances pronatalist and familialist policies consistent with its religious conservatism and authoritarian governance strategy. These policies aim to harness demographic power and maintain social control while reinforcing the party’s neopatrimonial rule through patriarchal authority within the family, which extends into public life. Correspondingly, suppressing gender equality struggles concretizes as a central agenda item of the AKP regime, which is fought through familial state policies, punitive measures, and moral panic campaigns against LGBTQ individuals and feminism. At the societal level, the CSR manifests as conflicts and tensions stemming from the destabilization of patriarchy and traditional gender roles under the dual pressures of neoliberal globalization and the growing gender equality struggles. This upheaval generates social and subjective tensions around sexuality, romance, and marriage, which have become focal points for religiously influenced preaching and self-help discourses in Turkey. Notably, these discourses increasingly leverage digital media to broaden their reach and influence. Through hypermasculinist discourses and the deployment of popular psychology terminologies such as masculine and feminine energies and the anchoring of romantic relationships, these ideological discourses promote idealized gender roles and reassert patriarchal norms. These discursive strategies are closely linked to the circulation and internalization of authoritarian perspectives on selfhood and the world, a connection that remains largely underexplored. Against this backdrop, this paper will investigate the relationship between authoritarianism and the CSR in contemporary Turkey, focusing on two interrelated areas: state control and manipulation over digital communication and the proliferation of digital preaching and religiously influenced self-help content online. State control in this context includes banning content and restricting access to specific websites and social media platforms under the pretext of protecting children, youth, and the family. It also involves supporting select digital creators who produce content aligned with the AKP’s conservative social vision, often incorporating religious themes. In addition to analyzing the state’s digital media strategies to suppress gender dissidence and promote patriarchal familialism, this paper will examine the content created by popular digital preachers and self-help influencers who address issues of sexuality, gender roles, romance, and marriage. Audience responses and interactions within these digital spaces are also explored to shed light on how patriarchal familialism and authoritarian gender ideologies are constructed, disseminated, and contested in Turkey’s digital sphere. Through this analysis, the paper aims to provide a nuanced understanding of the interplay between digital communication, state control, and the political and subjective implications of the CSR in contemporary Turkey.