Allies in Decline: Two Reports for Türkiye and the US

Two new reports tell a similar story about democratic decline inside “the Western alliance”. One tracks the steep fall of academic freedom in the United States. The other shows Turkey sinking to the bottom of the World Press Freedom Index. Together, they suggest that NATO’s “allies” are increasingly aligned militarily, but drifting away from any shared commitment to open knowledge and critical debate.

In the US, the Classroom Becomes a Front Line

The latest update of the Academic Freedom Index shows the United States as a “fast and steep” case of deterioration in university autonomy over roughly the past decade. A country that long sold itself as the global benchmark for liberal higher education is now grouped with states where political intervention into campuses is routine, not exceptional.^[1]

The decline accelerates after 2020 and deepens under the second Trump administration, as governors and legislators move aggressively into university governance. Entire fields—from gender studies to parts of the humanities—are targeted as ideologically suspect. Laws and policies framed in terms of “parents’ rights,” “anti‑woke” agendas, or fights against “indoctrination” end up shrinking what can be taught and who can be hired.^[1]

The irony is that this is happening in a system that still formally protects free speech. Academic freedom erodes not only through outright bans, but through stacked boards, budget threats, and politicised appointments. The legal shell of autonomy survives, while the real power to set academic agendas quietly shifts to partisan actors.

In Turkey, Journalism Is Criminalised Routine

If the US data is shocking because of the speed of decline, Turkey’s press freedom story is shocking because of how low the country has already fallen. The latest World Press Freedom Index places Turkey in the 160s out of 180 countries, firmly in the “very serious” risk category. Local coverage, such as Diken’s headline on the ranking, reads less like news and more like confirmation of what journalists already live every day.^[2][3]

The mechanisms are by now familiar. Prosecutors lean on elastic offences—“spreading disinformation,” “insulting the president,” “denigrating state institutions”—to investigate and jail reporters. Courts order the blocking of news sites and social media posts. Regulatory bodies punish critical outlets while rewarding loyalist media owners with licences and public advertising.^[2]

Since the 2016 coup attempt, emergency decrees, mass trials, and the transfer of media assets into government‑friendly hands have turned much of the mainstream press into an extension of political power. Independent journalism survives largely in small digital outlets and on social platforms, constantly under legal and economic pressure.^[2]

Different Paths, Shared Outcome

It would be easy to treat these as two unrelated crises: Turkey as the “problem child” of NATO, the US as the well‑meaning but temporarily confused hegemon. The reports tell a less comforting story.

In Turkey, the newsroom is the primary target; in the US, the university campus. In Ankara, repression is often spectacular—raids, arrests, televised trials. In US state capitals, it is more bureaucratic—legislation, funding cuts, silent reshaping of boards. But the outcome converges: institutions that produce and circulate critical knowledge are brought under tighter political control.

This convergence has implications for the idea of “the West” itself. NATO still functions as a military alliance. Joint exercises continue, bases remain, arms deals are signed. Yet the normative claim that this alliance represents a community of liberal democracies defending open societies is harder and harder to sustain when one ally jails journalists and another systematically undermines academic autonomy.

Disinformation Thrives in These Gaps

For researchers of disinformation and digital politics, the link is direct. When academic freedom contracts, whole areas of research—on inequality, race, gender, technology, climate—become harder to pursue. When press freedom collapses, investigations into corruption, abuse, and policy failure disappear from the public record. In both cases, conspiracy narratives and propaganda find more room to circulate, facing fewer institutional checks.

In Turkey, people often turn to social media, small websites, and citizen journalism projects to get information that never appears on television. In the US, students and precarious scholars increasingly rely on newsletters, podcasts, or TikTok to say what they cannot easily say in highly politicised campus environments. These alternative spaces are vital—but also fragile, easily targeted by harassment, platform moderation, and state regulation.^[2]

Global indices become part of this information struggle. Governments dismiss rankings on academic or press freedom as biased and “foreign” when they are negative, even as they celebrate favourable scores on investment or competitiveness. The measurement of freedom itself is turned into a political battlefield.

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1. https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/13642987.2021.2010047
2. https://www.eua.eu/publications/positions/academic-freedom-under-pressure-in-turkey-eua-statement-of-solidarity-with-universities-and-scholars.html
3. https://www.brookings.edu/articles/turkey-managing-an-unfriendly-ally/