BIography

Prof. Fahrettin Altun was appointed by President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan as the Presidency's Head of Communications on July 25, 2018.

Engaged in researches in the fields of political communication, media and communication sociology, political sociology and cultural studies, Fahrettin Altun was born in 1976 in Stuttgart, Germany.

Graduated from Istanbul University Department of Sociology in 1998, Altun received his Master's Degree at Mimar Sinan University Department of Sociology and his PhD at Istanbul University in 2006 with his thesis entitled "Comparative Analysis of McLuhan and Baudrillard's Media Philosophies".

Altun attended the Department of Political Sciences of the University of Utah as a visiting researcher between 2002 and 2003. He was among the founding academic committee members of Istanbul Şehir University and acted as the founding coordinator of the College of Communications. He also acted as the Head of the Department of Communication at Istanbul Şehir University between 2008 and 2014. He then worked as a faculty member at the Department of Sociology of Istanbul Medeniyet University between 2015 and 2017.

Prof. Fahrettin Altun served as the General Coordinator of SETA Istanbul (Foundation for Political, Economic and Social Research) and Deputy General Coordinator of SETA between 2014 and 2018. In the meantime, he was also the Dean of the School of Communication at Ibn Haldun University.

Aside from his academic posts, he served as the chief editor of the monthly magazine "Kriter" and as a commentator on the television programs "Enine Boyuna" on TRT 1 and "Dışa Bakış" on TRT News. In addition to television programs, he wrote columns on Sabah and Daily Sabah newspapers. Fahrettin Altun, who previously prepared and presented the program "Ayrıntı", which was broadcast on TRT 2 and TRT News, worked as an editor for Yöneliş and Küre publishing houses, editorial director in Anlayış magazine and a columnist in Akşam newspaper.

In addition, Prof. Fahrettin Altun has authored five books in Turkish and one book in English. His books in Turkish are "Modernleşme Kuramı" and 3 others published by SETA publications, namely "The Triumph of Turkish Democracy: The July 15 Coup Attempt and Its Aftermath" and "Press Freedom in Turkey: Myths and Truths". He also contributed to the book "15 Temmuz'da Medya" as one of the authors. His most recent work "Türkiye as a Stabilizing Power in an Age of Turmoil” has been published in English by Academica Press Washington-London and discusses Türkiye’s stabilizing power and role as a playmaker in the international system.

He is married and has four children, and he has a good command of German and English.