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ABSTRACTState, Civil Society and Political Participation in TurkeyStudents of Turkish politics, such as Özbudun, Göle, Toprak and others argued, on the basis of aggregate data and using historical analysis, that two phenomena have been responsible for the relative lack of scope and magnitude of political participation in Turkey. They are the vehemence of a strong, capricious state, and a shallow and frail civil society. The argument has been that under the awe of a strong and capricious state, Turkish citizens have been forced to political docility, and kept a low profile in politics. However, both the national and international press and the media kept reporting the notoriety of various acts of protest from rallies, demonstrations, boycotts to even assassinations taking place in the country. It seems as if either the frailty of civil society have recently been fostering protest potential in Turkey, or the country has recently been experiencing an increasing robustness and vigor of civil society, which in turn is providing for increased political participation in the country. In this paper, I will use the individual level data of a national survey conducted in March ? April 2006 to measure the strength of civil society, on the one hand, and the relationship between civil society and political participation on the other. In this paper a causal model that explicates the relations between such characteristics of civil society as associability, interpersonal trust, social tolerance, political efficacy, and political participation is being developed and tested. The findings of the paper are compared with earlier findings in Turkey and with earlier findings in consolidated democracies where similar studies of civil society and political participation are examined. Hence, the paper will be able to provide insight into the changes that are taking place in the Turkish political system and most specifically in Turkish democracy. The comparative findings of the paper will also point to the role that civil society plays in determining political participation in a newly industrializing and democratizing polity as Turkey. ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper focuses on regime oscillation between authoritarianism and democracy. I argue that, both Turkey and Argentina during the post-WWII era constitute cases of regime oscillation, however, they have divergent patterns of oscillation. In Turkey, be ..PAT.-Unpublished Manuscript [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the critical problems that face new democracies is that of credible commitment: how could citizens and the losers of elections trust that the winners will honor the constitution and will not abolish political and civil rights once they gain control of state resources? The problem is even more pronounced if one or more of the groups competing for power present ideological platforms with ambiguous commitments to continued democracy. This is the common cooperation problem?there is no external enforcement mechanism and securing political power (particularly in a majoritarian system) essentially means gaining monopoly over the use of force. What is more, players in a young democracy lack the experience of repeated interactions and the advantage of established reputations. Although Turkey?as a not yet perfectly consolidated democracy?is often criticized for its history of military interventions, the military establishment has in fact been that enforcement mechanism and has kept civil administrations within the boundaries of the constitution. This has been traditionally interpreted as the failure of the Turkish democracy, given that military officers are not elected, and hence are not accountable to the people. Yet, the very independence of institutions responsible for ensuring that elected officials remain within constitutional boundaries?high courts?is one of the conditions commonly used to judge the democratic nature of polities. Furthermore, respectable polls in Turkey continue to show the military as the most respected state institution; all interventions had popular mandates and the military was quick to relinquish power as soon as they accomplished what they claimed to be their goal.In addition to presenting a formal model of the military?s role in the Turkish political system, this paper will demonstrate empirically that tense relations between the military and civil governments in Turkey correlate well with periods of intense public upheaval against the governments. The environments surrounding the military?s ?soft coup? against an Islamic party in 1997 and the lack of such an intervention against that party?s successor?the current administration of the Justice and Development Party (AKP)?in 2002 and later will provide additional support for this argument. I will be using machine-coded event data (using KEDS/TABARI) that span the period between 1995 and now. ..PAT.-Conference Proceeding [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article examines the motivations of the European Union (EU) foreign assistance and whether the foreign aid decisions reflect its commitment in promoting democracy and human rights in Turkey. The nature of such decisions, including the union's assessment of its relation with Turkey and the political system of the latter, is explored. It presents an overview of literature on conditional foreign aid scholarship, as well as the human rights and democracy in Turkey.