CIVIL MILTARY RELATIONS IN TURKEY: MOTIVES BEHIND THE SHIFT OF POWER FROM MILITARY TO CIVILIANS AFTER THE INTERVENTIONS

• Main Author: Uygun, Mustafa S.
• Other Authors: Looney, Robert E.
• Published: Monterey, California. Naval Postgraduate School 2013
• Online Access: http://hdl.handle.net/10945/32913

Turkish Military, the most trusted institution in the country for decades, has been a symbol of modernization and secularism in the country since the independence of the Republic in 1923. Especially with the introduction of the multi-party system after the Second World War, Turkish Militarys role became conspicuous by military interventions. Turkey witnessed 1960, 1971, 1980, 1997, and 2007 military interventions each in a different character. However, instead of grasping the civilian authority for decades, Turkish military elite tried to stay behind the curtains and passed on the governance to the civilians. Turkey was under direct control of the military only through 196062 and 198083. Especially in the last decade, the change in civil-military relations, aroused a scholarly debate over the role of the military in civilian authority. This thesis examines the military interventions in order to define the attitudes of the military elite, by focusing on the reasons of the fast shift of power from military to civilians. This thesis argues that the delegation of power from military to civilians is mainly due to the harsh isolation of officer corps from politics, democratic incentives in terms of modernization, and economic and institutional developments.