This is true, but I think it's significant that Erdogan has been promising (along with many other things) economic growth in a fairly traditional sense. His voter base is largely rural and traditional, but to my knowledge he's been offering continued economic growth with rural areas seeing more benefit and less disruption, and has failed to deliver. Even if GDP is a bad thing to optimize, it's significant any time leadership fails on its own metrics.
More broadly, I think lots of nations today could maintain healthy economies with flat or shrinking national GDP, but those are countries which have little reason to expect 'natural' GDP increase without a growth ideology. Most obviously, post-industrial nations which can't rely on growing populations or rapid labor productivity boosts from urbanization and infrastructure investment: Sweden or the UK could plausibly operate at near-constant GDP, and Japan could even grow per capita GDP while shrinking national GDP. More subtly, nations which actively avoid pursuing the common arc of demographic transition, urbanization, and industrialization: Mongolia or Bhutan might try to take an entirely different path. And crucially, any of these nations would need to plan for the outcome: if Sweden 0% GDP growth without intending to, it would point to serious economic problems.
Given all of that, Turkey seems like a singularly bad candidate for falling total GDP. The population is still growing at 1.5% and labor productivity at 2%-3%, while experiencing urbanization and major infrastructure expansion. Crudely put, 1.015*1.025 ought to net Turkey 4% GDP growth without considering anything any other factors at all, so a substantial decline points to something going badly wrong.
More broadly, I think lots of nations today could maintain healthy economies with flat or shrinking national GDP, but those are countries which have little reason to expect 'natural' GDP increase without a growth ideology. Most obviously, post-industrial nations which can't rely on growing populations or rapid labor productivity boosts from urbanization and infrastructure investment: Sweden or the UK could plausibly operate at near-constant GDP, and Japan could even grow per capita GDP while shrinking national GDP. More subtly, nations which actively avoid pursuing the common arc of demographic transition, urbanization, and industrialization: Mongolia or Bhutan might try to take an entirely different path. And crucially, any of these nations would need to plan for the outcome: if Sweden 0% GDP growth without intending to, it would point to serious economic problems.
Given all of that, Turkey seems like a singularly bad candidate for falling total GDP. The population is still growing at 1.5% and labor productivity at 2%-3%, while experiencing urbanization and major infrastructure expansion. Crudely put, 1.015*1.025 ought to net Turkey 4% GDP growth without considering anything any other factors at all, so a substantial decline points to something going badly wrong.