:The Politics of Turkish Democracy: İsmet İnönü and the Formation of the Multi‐Party System, 1938–1950.(SUNY Series in the Social and Economic History of the Middle East.)

Abstract

John M. VanderLippe's study is as timely as it is contributory to scholarly research on the vital period of Turkey's history and politics that it covers. The formation of multiparty systems has been nearly absent from among majoritarian Muslim countries in the post-World War II era. The author demonstrates that Turkey's multiparty system had its origins in the confluence of global, geopolitical, and regional developments that influenced its domestic politics. Turkey had established a staunch authoritarian system under the rule of Mustafa Kemal Atatürk (1923–1938). When Atatürk, known as the Eternal Leader, died in 1938, he was replaced by his former foreign minister and long-time associate, İsmet İnönü, who, by adopting the title National Leader, indicated that he would and wanted to continue the Eternal Leader's authoritarian one-party (Republican Peoples' Party, or RPP) system. İnönü's accession to power coincided with the outbreak of World War II. Turkey's prior experiences with European countries, resulting in the dismantling of the Ottoman Empire and the bitter struggle of Turkish nationalists to establish a republic in 1923, impelled İnönü to pursue a policy of neutrality, which he thought required the continuance of one-party rule. Post-World War II developments compelled İnönü to change his policies, if not his mind. For one thing, Turkey became a member of the United Nations, aligned with the United States, and was a recipient of Truman Doctrine aid. VanderLippe shows the close relationship between Turkey's domestic and foreign policies when he points out that on the same day (July 12, 1947) that Turkey and the United States signed a treaty of assistance, İnönü also made a statement, known as the July 12th Declaration, in which he promised continued support for the multiparty experiment (p. 150). It was important, for the principal leaders of the Demokrat Partisi (DP), the main challenger to the RPP, that Turkey's public-sector economy be reduced in favor of an enlarged private sector. By 1950, their argument resonated with a large portion of Turkey's public who also wanted more freedom of expression, religious freedom, less taxes, more schools, better roads, and electricity. This combination of interests brought the DP to power in 1950.