Government and Politics in Turkey

The politics of Turkey takes place within a framework of a parliamentary representative democratic republic, in which the Prime Minister of Turkey is the head of government, and of a pluriform multi-party system. Executive power is exercised by the government. Legislative power is vested in both the government and the Grand National Assembly of Turkey. The Judiciary is independent of the executive and the legislature.

The function of Head of State is performed by the President of the Republic (Cumhurbaşkanı). A president is elected every seven years by the Grand National Assembly but is not required to be a member of parliament. The current President Ahmet Necdet Sezer was elected on May 16, 2000. Executive power rests in the Prime Minister (Başbakan) and the Council of Ministers (Bakanlar Kurulu) who make up the government. Neither the Prime Minister nor the Ministers have to be members of Parliament; though in most cases they are (one notable exception was Kemal Derviş, who was the Minister of Finance following the financial crisis of 2001; he is currently the head of the UN Development Fund).

The Prime Minister is elected by parliament through a vote of confidence in his government, and he is generally the head of the party that has won the elections. The current Prime Minister is Recep Tayyip Erdoğan, whose Islamic conservative AKP won an absolute majority of parliamentary seats in the 2002 general elections. The President of the parliament is Bülent Arınç, also from the same party. Legislative power is invested in the 550-seat Grand National Assembly of Turkey (Türkiye Büyük Millet Meclisi) that represents the Turkish Nation. Its members are elected for a five year term by mitigated proportional representation with a national election threshold of 10%. There are 85 electoral districts that represent the 81 administrative provinces of Turkey (Istanbul is divided into three electoral districts whereas Ankara and Izmir are divided into two each because of their large populations). To avoid a hung parliament and its excessive political fragmentation, only parties that win at least 10% of the national vote in a national parliamentary election gain the right to parliamentary representation. Independent candidates may run, and to be elected, they must only win 10% of the vote in the district they are running from. Political parties deemed anti-secular or separatist by the Constitutional Court can have their public financing and activities suspended or its existence banned altogether. Turkey has a multi-party system, with several well-established parties, ranging from the far-left to the far-right.

The Armed forces have traditionally been a politically powerful institution, considered as the guardians of Atatürk's Republic. The protection of the Turkish Constitution and the unity of the country is by law given to the Turkish Armed Forces that therefore plays a formal political role via the National Security Council in the same functional way that exists also in other western democracies, as the guardian of the secular, unitary nature of the republic and reforms of Atatürk in the Turkish example. They have staged three coups between 1960 and 1980, whilst also influencing the removal of the Islam-oriented government of Necmettin Erbakan in 1997. Through the National Security Council (Milli Guvenlik Kurulu), the army contributes to recommendations for defense policy against any threat to the country, including those relating to any ethnic or religious separatism. In recent years, reforms have seen an increased civilian presence on the National Security Council and efforts to defunct military's constitutional responsibilities under the program of compliance with the EU demands. Despite its perceived alleged influence in civilian affairs, the military owns strong unequivocal support from the nation, and is considered to be Turkey's most trusted institution.