Changing the Turkish Constitution: An Institutionalist and Collective Action Perspective

Yıl 2021, Cilt: 30 Sayı: 2, 193 - 205, 30.10.2021

Alim Yılmaz Hayrettin Özler Didem Geylani

https://doi.org/10.26650/siyasal.2021.30.984112

Öz

Understanding change and/or resistance to change is critical in studying institutions. We argue in this paper that the supply of expressible alternatives to the status quo, as well as the provision of incentives for political parties and other socio-political formations to participate in collective action for institutional change, are essential. These can be described as “ideational monopoly” of specific actors or “supreme legitimacy” of established institutions, but the latter can be described as “institutional handicaps” in a problematic way. According to a survey of the literature, institutional transformation follows a largely isomorphic pattern for the most part. In Turkey, it is undeniable that the European Union associated Turkish objectives have been the primary engine of institutional transformation in the country for a long time. Some historical turning moments in Europe-Turkey ties, as well as the associated actions of governments and public opinion towards the Turkish constitution, imply that there is almost a visible correlation between constitutional change and EU-Turkey relations, at least in the short term. As a result of this affinity, we have argued in favor of isomorphic approach as the most successful means of bringing about structural change.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Turkish Constitution, EU, Institutionalism, Collective Action, Isomorphic strategies

Türkiye Anayasasını Değiştirmek: Kurumsalcı ve Kolektif Eylem Perspektifi

Öz

Kurumları incelerken değişimi ve/veya değişime karşı direnci anlamak çok önemlidir. Bu çalışmada, statükoya yönelik ifade edilebilir alternatiflerin sağlanmasının yanı sıra, siyasi partilerin ve diğer sosyo-politik oluşumların kurumsal değişim için, ortak eylemde bulunmalarının elzem olduğu savunulmuştur. Bunlar, belirli aktörlerin “düşünsel tekeli” veya yerleşik kurumların “yüksek meşruiyeti” olarak tanımlanabilir, ancak ikincisi sorunlu bir şekilde “kurumsal engeller” olarak anlaşılmaktadır. Literatürde, kurumsal dönüşüm büyük ölçüde eşbiçimli model olarak sunulmaktadır. Türkiye’de Avrupa Birliği vizyonunun uzun süredir kurumsal dönüşümün ana dinamiği olduğu yadsınamaz. Avrupa-Türkiye ilişkilerindeki tarihsel dönüm noktaları, hükümetlerin ve kamuoyunun Türk anayasasına yönelik değişim talepleri ile AB-Türkiye ilişkileri arasında görünür bir ilişki olduğu aşikardır. Bu yakınlığın bir sonucu olarak, yapısal değişimi sağlamanın en başarılı yolu olarak izomorfik yaklaşımın etkili olduğu iddia edilmektedir.

Anahtar Kelimeler

Türk Anayasası, AB, Kurumsalcılık, Kolektif Eylem, İzomorfik Stratejiler

Kaynakça

• References Bennan, G. & Buchanan, J. M. (1985). The reason of rules: constitutional political economy. (The collected works of James M. Buchanan; v. 10). Cambridge, New York: Cambridge University Press.
• Berger, P. L. & Thomas Luckman, T. (1967). The Social construction of reality. New York: Doubleday.
• Buchanan, J. M. (2004). The Status of the status quo, Constitutional Political Economy, 15, 133–144.
• Cebeci, M. (2016). De-Europeanisation or counter-conduct? Turkey’s democratisation and the EU. South European Society and Politics, 21(1), 119-132.
• Cohen, M. D., March, J. G. &. Olsen J. P. (1972). A garbage can model of organizational choice. Administrative Science Quarterly, 17, 1-25. Çağlar, D. (2007). Human rights conditionality in the relations of the EU and Turkey: a framework for analysis, International Strategic Research Organization, a Research Paper.
• Dimaggio, P J. D. & W. Powell, W. (1983). The iron cage revisited: institutional isomorphism and collective rationality in organizational fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147-160.
• Drewry, G. D. (1996). Political institutions: legal perspectives. In R.E.Goodin & H.D. Klingemann, In A New Handbook of Political Science (pp.191-204). New York: Oxford University Press.
• Esen B & Gümüşçü Ş. (2017). A small yes for presidentialism: the Turkish constitutional referendum of April 2017. South European Society and Politics, 22(3), 303-326.
• Festinger, L. (1957). The theory of cognitive dissonance. Stanford, CA: Stanford University Press.
• Fischer, H M. & Pollock, T. G.(2004). Effects of social capital and power on surviving transformational change: the case of initial public offerings. Academy of Management Journal, 47(4), 403–481.
• Gambetta, D. (1993). The Sicilian mafia: the business of private protection. Cambridge, MA: Harvard Univ. Pres.
• Hannan, Mi T. & Freeman, J. (1984). Structural inertia and organizational change. American Sociological Review, 49(2), 149-164.
• Henisz, W J. & Zelner, B. A. (2005). Resistance to multilateral influence on reform: the political backlash against private infrastructure investments. World Bank Policy Research Working Paper 3690, September.
• Hirschman, A. O. (1991). The rhetoric of reaction. Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press.
• Horton, S. (2006). The public service ethos in the British civil service: an historical institutional analysis. Public Policy and Administration, 21(1), 32–48.
• Huber, G P. & Glick, W. H. (1993). Organizational change and redesign, Oxford: Oxford University Press.
• Inglehart, R. & Baker, W.E. (2000). Modernization, cultural change and the persistence of traditional values. American Sociological Review, 65 (February), 19-51.
• Julde, D. (2003). Legislative institutionalisation: A bent analytical arrow?. Government and Opposition, 38(3), 497-516.
• Kalaycıoğlu, E. (2012). Kulturkampf in Turkey: the constitutional referendum of 12 September 2010. South European Society and Politics, 17(1), 1–22.
• Klein, P A. & Miller, E. S. (1996). concepts of value, and democracy in institutional economics. Journal of Economic Issues, 30(1), 267-277.
• Krasner, S. (1984). Approaches to the state: alternative conceptions of historical dynamics. Comparative Politics, 16, 223–246.
• Lıeberman, R. C. (202). Ideas, institutions, and political order: explaining political change. The American Political Science Review, 96(4), 697-712.
• Mahoney, J. (2000). Path dependency in historical sociology. Theory and Society, 29, 507-48.
• March, J. G. & Olsen. J. P. (1989). Rediscovering institutions: the organizational basis of politics. New York: Free Press.
• North, D. C. (1990). Institutions, institutional change and economic performance. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• North, D. C. (2005). Understanding the process of economic change. Princeton, N.J: Princeton University Press.
• Olson, M. (1982). The rise and decline of nations. New Haven and London: Yale University Press.
• Özipek, B. B. (2012). Constitution-making in Turkey after the 2011 elections, Turkish Studies, 13(2), 153-167.
• Peters, G. (1999). Institutional theory in political science: the new institutionalism. London, New York: Continuum.
• Philip M. A. (2013). Cooperative transnationalism in contemporary europe: europeanization and political opportunities for lgbt mobilization in the European Union. European Political Science Review, 5, 279–310.
• Pierson, P. (2000). Increasing returns, path dependence, and the study of politics. American Political Science Review, 94(2), 251-67.
• Rodes, R.A.W. (1995). The institutionalist approach, In D. Marsh & G. Stoker (Eds.), Theory and methods in political science (42-57). London: Macmillan Press.
• Rothsteın, B. (1996). Political institutions: An overview. In R. E. Goodin& H.D. Klingemann (Eds.), A New handbook of political science (133-165), Oxford University Press.
• Rowan, B. (1982). Organizational structure and the institutional environment: the case of public schools. Administrative Science Quarterly, 27: 259-279.
• Sancar, M & Eylem Ü. (2007). Yargıda algı ve zihniyet kalıpları. İstanbul: TESEV (Turkish Economic and Social Studies Foundation). Stinchcombe, A. L. (1995). On the virtues of the old institutionalism. Annual Review of Sociology, 23: 1-18. Suchman, M.C. (1995). Managing legitimacy: strategic and institutional approaches. Academy of Management Review, 20(3), 571-610.
• Thelen, K. (2003). How institutions evolve: insight from comparative historical analysis, in J. Mahoney and D. Rueschemeyer, Comparative historical analysis in the social sciences, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Tool, M R. (1996). A Neo-institutional Theory of Social Change in Veblen's The Theory of the Leisure Class. Presented at Meetings of the European Association for Evolutionary Political Economy. Krakow, Poland, October 1995, and at meetings of the International Thorstein Veblen Association at Carleton College in Northfield MN, May 1.
• Weir, M. (1995). Ideas and the politics of bounded innovation, in S. Steinmo, K.Thelen & Longstreth, F. (Eds), Structuring Politics: Historical Institutionalism in Comparative Analysis, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press.
• Williamson, O. (1975). Markets and hierarchies. New York: Free Press and London: Collier Macmillan.
• Zeynep Y. (2017). Oppositional usages of Europeanization in Turkish constitution-making: discussions on religious freedom. Turkish Studies, 18(4), 644-664.
• Zucker, L. G. (1977). The Role of institutionalization in cultural persistence. American Sociological Review, 42, 726-743.