Paper short abstract:

I investigate the moral economy of speculation at times of crisis to understand the uncertainty of ongoing economic fluctuations and hyperinflation, political instability which creates a climate of polarization, not only in the political and cultural spheres but also in terms of consumption patterns

Paper long abstract:

This paper investigates the moral economy of speculation at times of crisis in the Turkish Context. My research context is driven by the contingency of crises and uncertainty in Turkey, such as the ongoing economic fluctuations and hyperinflation or political instability which creates a climate of polarization, not only in the political and cultural spheres but also in terms of consumption patterns. In this context, the national fiat currency has lost its credibility, and people are preoccupied with anticipating and coping with economic uncertainties. The theoretical framework of this paper is centered on understanding the moral economy of speculation and money in times of crisis. I identify three fundamental components of this moral economy: a collective understanding of legalized gambling, wealth, money, and luck; the establishment of normative practices within the legalized gambling sector; and the social mechanisms that contribute to the classification and stratification of society, particularly with regard to class, gender, and moral perspectives on gambling delineate an examination of the moral economy of speculation in Turkey. work on moral economy and everyday ethics provides valuable insights into the intersection of economic practices, crisis, and moral frameworks. A moral economy framework focuses on how ‘everyday ethics’ (Webb Keane 2019) intersects with the speculative economic decisions that people engage with. I argue that this allows us to pay special attention to the hierarchies between different forms of speculative activities to examine how the deployment of certain moral boundaries represents class, gender, cultural, religious, and financial disparities.