Dr. Erik den Hartigh's Blogposts

Lost In the Turkish Fog
 
Like almost everything else in this fascinating country, the local fog seems to be a uniquely Turkish phenomenon.
 
How do I know this? Well, I drove my car to work the other day in pretty dense fog. I turned on the back fog lights. To be on the safe side, I also turned on the head fog lights. I noticed that almost none of my fellow drivers did the same.
 
Being an academic, I made a small survey on how they used their fog lights. My sample is not perfect, because while doing research I also had to watch the road and perform a few life saving maneuvers.
 
I noticed the following: about 20% of drivers did not switch on any lights at all. As I said, Turkish fog seems to be different. In the no-lights case, the fog is clearly inside the heads of the drivers. About 10% of people drove with their indicators on. Here the fog is inside the car, preventing them to see the fog light switch. Another 10% drove with their high beam lights on. Now, as anyone with a driving license should know, these are not effective in dense fog, because the small water particles in the air reflect the light, so that it blinds the driver. But, as I said, Turkish fog seems different, less reflective, if anything. About 60% of people only used their normal, low beam lights. Never mind that they are hardly visible in fog. Did I mention that Turkish fog seems to be different?
 
When I first came here, I asked my Turkish friends why people here drive the way they do. A favorite answer - usually given by the higher educated ones - was the low general education level. Others told me it has to do with kısmet: when it's your time, you pass on, if not, you don't. Any safety precaution is superfluous. I have found both explanations to be flawed.
 
About education level and fog lights: we can assume drivers of expensive cars to be on average higher educated than drivers of, say, a Tofaş. Yet, I saw as many Mercedes’s without fog lights as I saw Tofaş’s. My sympathy here is with the Tofaş driver, as he can at least credibly claim that his fog lights are broken. Then there are many cars with some university stickers on the back, and yet without lights or fog lights. Assuming that such stickers are not some kind of strange fashion among unskilled laborers, it seems that education does not really matter.
 
What about kısmet then? This is more difficult to assess from the outside, but let's just assume that people with “god protects you” type of statement on their car are more susceptible to this kind of thinking than people with the famous “father of the Turks” signature on the back screen. Alas, between them, I did not see any systematic difference in fog light policy.
 
So, it's clearly not about education and clearly not about kısmet. My only explanation is that Turkish fog is just different, unique and probably less opaque than normal fog. I’d be happy to stand corrected.

For your comments and ideas, please contact Dr. Erik den Hartigh at erik.denhartigh@ozyegin.edu.tr.

Dr. den Hartigh's research interests are in corporate strategy, innovation, and business networks. Since 1998 he has been a part time consultant at TVA Developments, a small think tank assisting pivotal companies and government institutions with complex strategic issues. Dr. den Hartigh teaches courses on general management, corporate strategy, technology and strategy, project management, and innovation systems.