Recep Tayyip Erdoğan (pronounced ) (b. February 26, 1954 in Istanbul, Turkey) is a Turkish politician, a former mayor of Istanbul and the Prime Minister of the Republic of Turkey since 14 March 2003. He is also the chairman of the Justice and Development Party (Turkish: Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi - "AK Parti"), which holds a majority of the seats in the Turkish Parliament.

Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was born, and mostly grew up, in the Kasımpaşa district of Istanbul, a less than affluent neighborhood, famous for its macho honor code. Kasımpaşa men are known to be quick to anger, painfully proud and blunt in word, and he has always been proud of being one.

Erdoğan spent his early childhood in Rize where his father was a member of the Turkish Coast Guard. The family returned to Istanbul when Erdoğan was 13 years old. As a teenager, he sold lemonade and sesame buns on the streets of Istanbul's rougher districts to earn extra money. After graduating from a religious high school (İmam Hatip school) he studied management at Marmara University's Faculty of Economics and Administrative Sciences. In his youth, Erdoğan played semi-professional football in a local club. The stadium of the local football club of the district he grew up in, Kasımpaşa S.K., a team which played in the Turkish Süper Lig before being relegated in June 2008, is named after him.