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In a quiet but historic turn, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party announced its official dissolution during its 12th Congress in May 2025. After more than four decades of armed conflict with the Turkish state, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party has committed to peaceful political engagement. For a group long viewed as Turkey’s most persistent internal security threat, this move is as surprising as it is consequential.
The transition from using violence to using legal and political avenues to address the Kurdish question in Turkey is a welcome development. A peaceful resolution rooted in democratic processes is both overdue and essential. However, the method by which this transition is unfolding raises deep concerns: It is an opaque, top-down process conducted by elites in secret — without public dialogue or parliamentary debate. The Turkish and Kurdish publics remain largely in the dark. Without transparency, public inclusion, and institutional accountability, this moment of peace risks replicating the failures of the past and prompting a return to violence.
Aging Out of War: The Transformation of a Militant Group and Erdoğan’s Calculus
To understand this transformation, it is useful to revisit the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s foundational role. In the 1980s and 1990s — following decades of brutal state repression that denied the existence of the Kurdish people, language, and culture — the insurgency launched by the Kurdistan Workers’ Party transformed the Kurdish issue from a largely suppressed and peripheral cause into a central national and international political issue. Earlier civil and political efforts by Kurdish leftist groups, diaspora organizations, and figures like İsmail Beşikçi had worked to preserve and assert the Kurdish identity under harsh conditions. However, none of these movements had succeeded in mobilizing a large-scale struggle that could forge a united front across different Kurdish communities, force the Kurdish question onto Turkey’s political agenda, and draw sustained international attention.
For many Kurds in Turkey and Syria, the very concept of a “Kurdish question” was born out of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s political and military struggle. Without it, Kurdish demands for recognition may have remained buried. This is not an endorsement of the group’s tactics or use of violence. Rather, it is a recognition of the militant group’s historical impact in forcing the Kurdish issue into Turkey’s public debate. The conflict has cost over 40,000 lives since the 1980s, and both the United States and the European Union have designated the group as a terrorist organization.
Today, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s leadership is aging. At 77 years old, Abdullah Öcalan remains the symbolic and intellectual head of the group, despite being imprisoned since 1999. His call to dissolve the organization and pursue democratic means reflects more than a strategic calculation — it embodies a personal transformation. Recent research shows that the age of rebel leaders significantly shapes the outcomes of civil wars: Elderly leaders are statistically far more likely to pursue negotiated settlements than younger ones. Öcalan’s shift exemplifies this pattern: an aging revolutionary seeking legacy over victory.
Once a Marxist firebrand advocating an independent Kurdistan, Öcalan now promotes “democratic confederalism,” a decentralized, rights-based system grounded in nonviolence. This pivot reflects both the psychological effects of long-term isolation and a transition into a later stage of life focused on legacy-building. The same logic applies to other top leaders, like Murat Karayılan and Cemil Bayık, who have led the organization in Öcalan’s absence. These are aging leaders who increasingly prioritize legacy over victory as they approach the end of their lives.
On the Turkish side, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan — now in his early 70s — may also be contemplating his historical legacy. Early in his tenure, Erdoğan spearheaded modest reforms and pro-Kurdish openings. But his later years have been defined by democratic backsliding and economic turmoil. Turkey has not transitioned into a consolidated democracy under his leadership. Instead, it has become more authoritarian. Istanbul Mayor Ekrem İmamoğlu, a key opposition figure, faces politically motivated corruption charges, while prominent Kurdish leader Selahattin Demirtaş has been in jail since 2016 on terrorism accusations. Since 2018, Freedom House has classified Turkey as “not free,” a status it has maintained to this day.
The convergence of two aging figures — one imprisoned, the other embattled — creates a rare alignment. Like Yasser Arafat and Yitzhak Rabin in the 1990s, both Öcalan and Erdoğan may now be acting under the shadow of their own mortality. Arafat, once the militant face of Palestinian nationalism, and Rabin, a former Israeli general, defied political norms to pursue peace. Their decisions were shaped as much by legacy as by strategy. Turkey’s case echoes this dynamic. Although the peace agreement between Arafat and Rabin had substantial international involvement — including U.S.-brokered negotiations and Israel’s recognition of the Palestine Liberation Organization as the legitimate representative of the Palestinian people — the Kurdish-Turkish case is unfolding without any visible legal or institutional involvement inside Turkey or internationally.
On the part of the Turkish state and electorate, there is little indication of a willingness to acknowledge or address the Kurdish question. The government has portrayed Öcalan’s call and the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s disarmament as the end of a security threat, framing it solely as a victory over terrorism. For example, Erdoğan described the rebel group’s decision to lay down arms as a major step toward a “terrorism-free” Turkey without mentioning any reciprocal political or cultural rights for Kurds. In the 2023 presidential election, several opposition parties formed an alliance to defeat Erdoğan but excluded the pro-Kurdish party — signaling that, for some major opposition groups, opposing Kurdish recognition remains more important than democratic reform. More broadly, neither the ruling party nor the opposition appears prepared to engage with the Kurdish question. Instead, both seem content to merely end the armed struggle without addressing its underlying causes.
Broader regional shifts have also influenced the Kurdistan Workers’ Party’s calculus. While Iran has occasionally tolerated or even tactically used the group against Turkey, it has also repressed its own Kurdish population; attacked the group’s Iranian offshoot, the Kurdistan Free Life Party, often in Iraqi territory; and supported the Assad regime against Kurdish forces in Syria. With the collapse of Assad’s territorial control and recent U.S. and Israeli strikes on Iran’s regional allies, including Hamas and Hizballah, Tehran’s broader influence in the region appears to be under pressure. In this shifting environment marked by growing international hostility toward armed non-state actors, the group’s disbandment appears both ideological and pragmatic. Continued insurgency is increasingly untenable.
Historically, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party has focused primarily on Turkey and Syria. Its Iranian offshoot, the Kurdistan Free Life Party, was established in 2004 and engaged in armed clashes with Iranian forces, particularly in its early years. Since the outbreak of the Syrian civil war in 2011, the Kurdistan Workers’ Party has increasingly concentrated on Syria, while its Iranian branch has shifted toward civil and political activities. The Kurdistan Workers Party’s decision to end its armed struggle could bolster Kurdish forces in Syria as they pursue political solutions in both Syria and Turkey while maintaining their alliance with the United States.
Although a formal political relationship between Turkey and Kurdish forces in Syria may seem wildly implausible, such a development is not inconceivable in the long run. Prior to 2008, Turkey strongly resisted recognizing the Kurdistan Regional Government in Iraq, yet over time, it developed extensive political and economic ties with the Kurdish autonomous government. A similar shift could occur with Syrian Kurdish forces, depending on their evolving relationships with both the United States and the Syrian state. In the long term, Turkey’s foreign policy may adapt to the emergence of a Kurdish regional authority in Syria.
Toward Peace Without the People? Risks and the Future of Kurdish Politics
Despite its magnitude, the peace process remains exclusionary. No legislative debate has taken place; no civil society consultations have occurred; no third-party mediators or international organizations, such as the United Nations, are involved; and there is no clarity regarding what political, cultural, or linguistic rights, if any, the Kurdish people will gain in return for the dissolution of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party. The last major attempt at a peace process (from 2013 to 2015) failed in part for similar reasons. As Burak Bilgehan Özpek explains, the process was largely informal and opaque, having been conducted through back channels without parliamentary approval, legal guarantees, or public oversight. This lack of transparency made it fragile and vulnerable to political shifts, external shocks, and nationalist backlash — factors that ultimately led to its collapse.
This raises serious concerns. While aging leaders may initiate peace, lasting and sustainable peace demands legitimacy. Without grassroots involvement, transparency, and institutional safeguards, the process risks being perceived as hollow or imposed.
Generational change within Kurdish society adds another layer of complexity. Young Kurds in Turkey are far less inclined toward guerrilla warfare. They are running for office, forming non-governmental organizations, and leading digital campaigns. For them, armed resistance belongs to a past era. The group’s aging leadership recognizes this shift. Yet rather than cultivating younger leadership, they appear to be trying to rewrite their legacy. If the root causes of Kurdish grievances remain unaddressed, new forms of resistance — perhaps nonviolent but equally disruptive — may emerge.
The prospect of factions opposed to ending the armed struggle splitting from the Kurdistan Workers’ Party is unlikely (at least in the short term), as the organization is highly centralized and lacks internal freedom. As a result, there is little opportunity for dissidents to mobilize and launch a new armed group in the near future. As research on post-conflict societies shows, successful demobilization demands more than disarmament or economic assistance: Ex-combatants must feel safe, socially recognized, and politically included. Without transparent and formal reintegration frameworks that restore both status and security, there remains a risk that mid-level commanders and political elites could remobilize these networks for future violence.
The Silence of Guns But Not Grievances
The dissolution of the Kurdistan Workers’ Party marks a historic inflection point shaped by aging leaders, shifting geopolitics, and a generational pivot away from militancy. Yet, negotiations are being conducted behind closed doors. For any peace process to succeed and endure, it must go beyond a private understanding between elite figures. If the deal remains opaque, excludes civil society, and fails to offer meaningful political or cultural concessions, it risks alienating not only the Kurdish public but also the militant group’s remaining armed cadres.
Without broader public engagement and institutional clarity, the risk of fragmentation — or even a return to armed resistance — remains very real. Lasting peace requires inclusive and transparent mechanisms that make peace politically sustainable.
Policymakers should move beyond closed-door negotiations to establish a formal legal framework for Kurdish cultural and political rights. They should initiate parliamentary debate, invite independent observers or mediators to foster accountability, and ensure meaningful Kurdish participation through civil society organizations and elected representatives. In addition, there ought to be clear and credible mechanisms to support the reintegration of ex-combatants into civilian life through education, employment, and rehabilitation programs. International third-party actors, particularly the European Union and the United Nations, should take part in the process to promote transparency and hold both sides accountable. These steps are essential to both strengthen the credibility of the peace process and prevent it from collapsing into renewed conflict. Only such measures can transform a fragile ceasefire into legitimate, lasting peace.
Ahmed Hamza is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of North Texas focusing on ethnic and party politics.
Afolabi Toye is a Ph.D. candidate at the University of North Texas focusing on civil war and African politics.
Image: Levi Clancy via Wikimedia Commons
