Parlamenter Sistemlerde Politik Devresel Dalgalanmalar: Teori ve Türkiye İçin Bir Uygulama

This paper empirically investigates the political business cycle hypothesis for Turkey, taking into account the potential two-way interaction that originates from the control (with certain limitations) by the government over election timing. Using the single equation and simultaneous equation estimation procedures with the inflation rate being the political variable, two hypotheses about the incumbent government in a parliamentary system were tested. First hypothesis called as “manipulative cabinet” hypothesis states that, once the election is scheduled, the government manipulates the economy through its monetary and fiscal policies such that business cycle peaks (or troughs) synchronize with the timing of election. Second, and more important for the parliamentary systems, is the “political surfing” hypothesis that considers the possibility of dissolving the legislature by the government.Political surfing hypothesis states that the government waits for the right moment (characterized by high growth and/or low unemployment) to call an election. We found no evidence for the hypotheses in the 1986-1997 period. This result is surprising having regard to the observations and needs to be interpreted in the light of the specific features of the Turkish economy.