Türkiye’de Çoğulcu Demokrasi Söyleminin Oluşumu: Demokrat Parti’nin İncelenmesi, 1946-1960

Bu çalışma Türk siyasi hayatında çoğunlukçu demokrasi anlayışının oluşumuna odaklanmakta ve 1950 yılında seçimle iktidara gelen ilk muhalefet partisi olan Demokrat Parti’nin (DP) çoğunlukçu bir demokrasi söylemi olduğunu savunmaktadır. Bu doğrultuda Guillermo O’Donnell’ın “delegatif demokrasi” kavramından yola çıkılarak ve DP’nin çoğunlukçu bir demokrasi söylemi benimsemesinin altındaki nedenler tartışılarak, DP liderlerinin meclis konuşmaları temel kaynak olarak kullanılmış ve DP’nin demokrasi söylemi partinin demokrasi anlayışı, millet ve vatandaş tanımı, seçimler, siyasi kontrol ve hesap verilebilirlik, siyasal ve sosyal muhalefet gibi temel sosyopolitik meselelere olan yaklaşımı bağlanımda incelenmiştir. Araştırma, DP’nin muhalefette bulunduğu ilk günlerden iktidarda kaldığı on yıl boyunca delegatif demokrasinin tüm özelliklerini barındırdığını ortaya koymaktadır. DP Türk ulusunu monolitik bir toplum olarak görmüş ve her türlü sosyal, ekonomik veya ideolojik farklılıkları reddetmiştir. Parti kendisini ulusal bir hareket olarak tanıtmış, seçimleri vatandaşların siyasi karar vericilerle ilgili tutumlarını ifade edebilecekleri yegâne araç olarak konumlandırmış, kendisini milli irade ile özdeşleştirmiş ve oldukça bireysel bir liderlik yapısı sergilemiştir.

Formation of a Majoritarian Democracy Discourse in Turkey: An Examination of the Democrat Party, 1946-1960

This study focuses on the formation of a majoritarian democracy understandingin Turkish politics and argues that the Democrat Party (DP), which is the firstopposition party to rise to power with the 1950 elections, had a majoritarianapproach to democracy. Borrowing Guillermo O’Donnell’s “delegativedemocracy” concept and discussing the main causes of the adoption of amajoritarian democracy discourse by the DP, the parliamentary speeches of theDP’s leaders are used as the basic source and the democracy discourse of theDP is analyzed in areas related to the party’s approach to key sociopoliticalissues, including the democracy understanding of the party, definition of nationand citizen, elections, political control and accountability, and the political andsocial opposition. The research revealed that from its early opposition days to the last day of its ten years of power, the DP showed all the typicalcharacteristics of a delegative democracy. It considered the Turkish nation as amonolithic society and rejected any kind of social, economic or ideologicalfragments within the nation, introduced itself as a national movement, sawelections as the only tool for the citizens to express their satisfaction ordissatisfaction towards the political decision-makers, identified itself with thenational will and showcased a highly individual leadership.

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Archival Sources
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