If a student of civil-military relations in Turkey were to write a paper on the evolution of the civil-military relations before the military coup attempt on July 15, 2016, s/he would have questioned, “What happened to the military in Turkish politics?” The conclusion drawn from this paper would probably be that the military was pushed out of politics through many structural changes undertaken by the AK Party government and a judgment made within the public sphere that the military should not play a prominent political role in society. A final finding could be that the contributions of the EU had played an external role in consolidating Turkish civil-military relations in favor of civilian supremacy.

Regardless of how the central question is stated and what the answers are, civil-military relations in Turkey and the place of the military in the socio-political domains throughout the history of modern Turkey have been a controversial subject. Since the foundation of the Turkish Republic, the country has experienced four military coups. While the Turkish Armed Forces (TAF) were able to perform a full-scale overthrow of the civilian governments and took over temporary rule during the 1960 and 1980 coup, it relied on more indirect means to bring about the forced resignation and replacement of the governments during the 1971 and 1997 coups. Due to the success of these four coups, it is not a surprise that Turkish politics has historically been dominated by the preferences of the military, and thus the nature of civil-military relations has been problematic in terms of improving democratic civilian supremacy over the military.

As a result of the ideological conflict between the military and AK Party, which has grown since the party rose to power in 2002, as well as a series of significant events since the beginning of the Ergenekon and Balyoz trials in 2008, there has been a substantial shift in the balance of civil-military relations in Turkey. Nevertheless, the question of how this rapid transformation of Turkish civil-military relations was achieved needs to be analyzed by looking at the external and internal dynamics of the AK Party era.

The AK Party government has made significant structural and political transformations in terms of civil-military relations and the military’s institutional and socio-political role, which have decreased the involvement of the military in politics since 2007. However, civil-military relations had not yet been fully civilianized before the July 15 military coup attempt. Following the suppression of the July 15 coup attempt, the unfinished democratization project of civil-military relations entered a new phase.

The June 24 presidential elections and the establishment of the new government model brought radical changes in civil-military relations as well. Initially, President Erdogan appointed his Chief of General Staff Gen. Hulisi Akar as Minister of National Defense. Following that, by presidential decree, the Chief of General Staff was positioned to operate under the Ministry of National Defense. Thirdly, by decree, the structure of the Supreme Military Council was re-designed in terms of the president’s autonomy over the final decision to determine promotions and assignments of colonels and generals and the number of ministers who can participate in Council meetings. Now, the decision regarding the promotion of the colonels and generals will be determined according to the absolute majority within the structure of the Supreme Military Council. The number of ministers who attend the Council meeting has also increased. The Vice-President and Ministry of Economy will be part of the Council meetings. But the question of whether Turkey reached a balance in civil-military relation remains due to the exceptional nature of civil-military relations in the country.

Ankara’s Four-Dimensional Strategy to Reconstruct Civil-Military Relations

To, ultimately, end the civil-military imbalance in post-July 15 Turkish politics, Ankara has attempted to restructure its entire state apparatus, in which security agents including the TAF will be positioned at the center. At the same time, the government has been trying to develop a comprehensive and long-term strategy for the newly emerging threats stemming from the regional insecurities in the Middle East. After the July 15 military coup attempt, the new period has entailed three crucial phases: lustration (de-Gulenization of the state) period, rehabilitation, democratic reconstruction of civil-military relations and modernization of the Turkish military. Ankara followed four-dimensional strategies in the post-July 15 coup attempt:

• Civilianization dimension is focused on democratic consolidation of the civil-military relations and requires that the TAF undergoes a full-fledged civilian control.
• Control-balance dimension sought to create a balance between the security forces in order to prevent a monopoly by the Chief of General Staff’s over the decision-making process within the army; and aimed to separate the security forces (Gendarmerie and Coast Guard Corps) from the chain of command to the Chief of General Staff to obtain a counter-balance.
• Ideological dimension sought to build ideational diversity within the officer core, but within the limits of their loyalty to the Constitution.
• Strategic dimension sought to redefine the national, regional, and international strategic mission of the TAF.

It is now that President Erdogan accomplished his first task by cleaning almost all the members of FETO within the TAF and other critical security institutions. The perception of TAF among the Turkish people has gained a very positive stance due to the increasing role of TAF in providing internal and regional security against threats emanating from the PKK and other terrorist organizations. TAF is more active militarily in Syria and Iraq to prevent terrorist activities against Turkey.

The second part of the post-July 15 civil-military relations is redesigned by civilian supremacy. But it does not necessarily mean that Turkey solved all its problems regarding civil-military relations. Under the presidency of Erdogan, the Ministry of National Defense will probably play a vital role in shaping Turkey’s military strategy and normalizing civil-military relations. The National Defense Ministry was in full control of the Chief of General Staff and responsible for daily military activities of TAF due to the exceptional status of Turkish military above its politics. Currently, the new minister has an important influence over the military institutions, and he has been closely working with the civilian authority in the post-July 15 Turkish atmosphere. Especially, TAF played an essential role in terms of recalibrating Turkey’s political strategy in Syria and Iraq and Turkey began to recalibrate its overall influence over the Syrian crisis.

President Erdogan’s central plan in the mid-term is to transform the Turkish military in accordance to the new regional and global geopolitical realities. TAF also wants to consolidate its adaptation capacity in order make the Turkish military more effective, deterrent, and professional. Therefore, the new minister Gen. Akar is seen as the most acceptable figure for TAF to make this transformation possible. However, since each of the aforementioned processes will take a long time to accomplish, there is a need for a comprehensive strategic roadmap for Turkey’s civil-military relations and for the strategic transformation of the military in order to increase the credibility of the TAF and minimize the security risks for Turkey in national, regional, and international security environments.

Despite the fact that it has been put on the back burner after the failure of the Arab Spring, the debate on alternative models of political order within the Islamic world still keeps its vivacity. These models are usually tended to be categorized with reference to their legitimacy base. And it constitutes the crux of political struggles within the Islamic world.

While the Iranian model is based on Shiite sectarianism, the Saudi model offers Sunni sectarianism or Wahhabism as its legitimacy base. Similarly, the Egyptian model wields secular Arab nationalism as its legitimacy base whereas the Turkish model rests on Islamic civilization.

These varieties of legitimacy base embody divergent political realities with national, regional and international dimensions. Iran, for instance, assumes a political community of the Shiites within its national boundaries, while it strives to structure its region on the basis of polarization between the Shiites and the rest and an international order which is grounded on the antagonism between the Islamic world led by the Shiites and the imperial West.

The Saudi case, on the other hand, embraces a political community of the Sunnis within its national borders whereas it seeks a regional order shaped around the polarity of the Sunnis and the Shiites or traditional monarchical forces and the reformists and an international order that underlines the hegemony of the West.

The Egyptian model puts forwards a political community of secular-nationalism within its national sphere especially after the coup in July 2013. This is accompanied by a regional order that rests on the polarity of traditional authoritarian political forces and their democratic enemies. Like the Saudis, this leads Egypt to team up with Israel and the Emirates and gives an unconditional backing to Western hegemony in international politics.

The Turkish model, offered by the Justice and Development Party (AK Party) after 2002, presents a political community of Muslims and non-Muslim peoples in a post-nation-state framework, which is in a way reminiscent of the Ottoman “millet” system. This post-nationalist politics, therefore, puts an enormous pressure on both the Turkish nation-state and the Westphalian order in the Middle East and challenges sectarian frameworks as well. This reformist ethos also echoes on the international level by suggesting an idea of a equal and multi-civilizational world order.

Indeed, the Turkish model trumps the other models not only with its inclusiveness but also its conformity with democratic politics. Despite their vast ideological differences and a high degree of animosity towards each other, the other models share a common ground in their denial of democratic politics. These authoritarian models equate or rather reduce politics to the state and the state is identified with a particular group or political force: The Mullahs in Iran, the royal family in Saudi Arabia and the military in Egypt. Hence, there does not exist an independent sphere of politics where the plurality of political groups and societal forces encounter each other.

The Turkish model posits a democratic option. Turkey’s transition from authoritarianism to democracy has taken place in three steps. First of all, in 1950 with the introduction of multi-party politics, the state lost its monopoly over politics. Politics finally gained its independence to an extent. Power began to be shared by the bureaucrats and the representatives of the people, that is the politicians.

The second step in democratization was the enlargement of the sphere of politics at the expense of state bureaucracy. The AK Party’s first period of rule, encompassing the years from 2002 to 2010, testified the roll back of the bureaucratic tutelage after the EU reforms and constitutional referendums of 2007 and 2010. After all, the relative share of politics in power has increased dramatically.

The third step in democratization involves constructing a new institutional framework that puts the nation’s will at the center of politics and guarantees the supremacy of politics over other sectors or power centers. Turkey’s gradual switch to a presidential system started with the 2007 referendum, reached a level of maturity with the election of Erdogan to the presidential post in 2014, became the institutional structure of the country on the paper after the April 16 referendum (2017), and is now waiting to be the institutional framework in practice after the June 24 elections. The June 24 elections, therefore, is important with regards to the fact that it will complete this final round of democratization in Turkey.

Having a legitimate, open and official opposition in a country is a vital indicator of democracy. In terms of concentration of power, every country has a government; the oppositions also exist in a similar fashion. Yet, in antidemocratic countries, the oppositions are obstructed and declared illegitimate through various methods. For this reason, it’s not the presence of a government that distinguishes democracy from other regimes; in fact, it’s the existence of an open and legitimate opposition that validates democracy.

In this respect, we might assert that oppositions as well as the government should have certain features in a democracy. The opposition’s duty is to keep the government in check within democratic boundaries and give the public the hope that a solution exists for each problem. This is where the government and opposition should stand. Having an open and legitimate opposition allows democracy, which is perceived as relatively unstable when compared to antidemocratic methods in the short-term, to be more stable than its alternatives on the long run.

CHP: more than an opposition

For a long time, the Republican People’s Party (CHP) has been carrying the mantle of the main opposition. Administrators of the party don’t seem troubled by this because securing more or less the same percentage of votes in every election allows the party to acquire a number of seats in the parliament and ensures them a presence in politics without too much effort. It seems that the CHP has grown accustomed to this mode of existence and doesn’t want to be disturbed. Or, maybe the party does want to break away from being the main opposition party but possibly is unable to break the cycle it created.

However the party congress held recently didn’t provide any hope for the possibility of breaking this vicious cycle. It’s the same old story for CHP and this saddens me greatly, as I believe that it is one of the most important political parties of Turkey and could contribute immensely to our democracy and our country.

What issues plague the CHP? I believe their issues could be discussed under two categories: procedures and principles.

CHP and procedures

Democracy is usually defined over the essence; however, these definitions are inadequate most of the time. They are even misleading sometimes. Exaggerated emphasis on the essence and every movements’ attempts to identify with democracy prevent democracy from consolidating. In order to annul this handicap, we should understand that democracy is about both procedures and principles; as it has always been the case in Turkey, we shouldn’t disregard and neglect the rules pertaining to procedure.

CHP’s democratic records are full of procedural failures. The party has pursued policies and acted in a way that cast justifiable suspicion upon its allegiance to democracy’s procedural rules in the last ten years.

Historically the CHP always sided with the junta after every coup in Turkey. The party either supported coups openly or was pleased by their realization implicitly. CHP finally distanced itself from coups during late Bülent Ecevit’s chairmanship. Unfortunately, his efforts couldn’t change the encoded values of the party; moreover, during the February 28 coup, Ecevit himself relinquished his anti-coup stance, rendering all of his efforts vain.

The CHP mentality always perceives coup d’états as a tool against democratic politics in its own favor. In recent years, the party has expanded the spectrum. CHP didn’t openly side with democracy in the fight between the legitimate government and the Gulenist criminal cult (FETO) that has been going on since February 7, 2012. It supported the Gezi Park violent protests, which was the rejection of democracy’s procedural rules by its own voter base, and incited the public. Moreover, CHP Chair Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu didn’t oppose the December 17/25 juristic coup and the party utilized the illegitimate tools FETO acquired through illegal means to attempt to depose the government.

Kılıçdaroğlu played the illegal and fabricated tapes in the Parliament. Even the July 15 coup wasn’t enough to sober up the CHP. With a late and hesitant statement, Kılıçdaroğlu expressed his opposition to the coup. A short while after, he renounced his stance. He put aside the actual coup, illogically distorted the term and called it a “civilian coup”; furthermore, he accused the government of perpetrating the coup and continues to advocate this claim, no matter how baseless it is. For this reason, CHP has to sincerely reaffirm its allegiance to democratic procedures and rules pertaining to it, showing the public that they are trustworthy.

CHP and principles

Indeed, CHP is a political party; however, this doesn’t ensure being democratic. Communists and fascists also had political parties. Therefore, the main issue is whether CHP is democratic or not.

We can’t answer this question just by looking at CHP’s party congresses, the number of candidates for chairmanship or whether certain administrators are elected by delegates. In this respect, there is a mass confusion in Turkey. Intra-party democracy and democracy as a regime are associated and usually confused with each other. Democratic-ness is determined by inter-party competition rather than intra-party. Meanwhile, a political party’s actual discourses and actions are more indicative of its democratic-ness instead of its party manifesto.

CHP usually acts like it single-handedly owns democracy, but its mentality and ideology is plagued with a myriad of issues. Firstly, the party sympathizes with putschists. This is a matter of principle as well as procedure. It could be claimed that there are certain individuals or cliques within CHP that tend to advocate for illegitimate methods of acquiring power, such as coups or violent rebellions, because the public seem to have condemned the party to a permanent impotency. This has to be acknowledged. However, there is more.

CHP’s ideology is not compatible with democracy. Let’s put the discussions about whether Kemalism is contradictory to democracy aside; the classical Kemalist understanding which dominates CHP doesn’t allow any space for principles, rules and procedures of democracy. In this respect, Kemalism is enthusiastic about creating the “ideal” individual and society through the power of the state; furthermore, it wouldn’t shy away from pruning the ethnic, religious and even the cultural majority. This actually summarizes CHP’s political history. Despite the need for an overhaul, CHP does nothing in this regard. The most CHP does is to pretend it interprets Kemalism in a way that is compatible with democracy through masterful rhetoric. Yet, it’s a challenge to persuade the public to believe this.

CHP is an ideological hodgepodge. The party’s antidemocratic mentality is also nourished by their understanding of social democracy. CHP believes social democracy is only about state intervention to economy; more importantly to the society itself. This is one of the reasons why Turkish social democrats are more antidemocratic than Turkish conservatives or even nationalists. If we leave extreme leftist parties and Peoples’ Democratic Party (HDP) aside, CHP has the most radical vision of a society among the three parties that have seats in the Parliament.

CHP definitely needs to shift its ideology, and thus mentality, towards democratization. Maybe expecting this to be an intra-party process is in vain and unjust. Unfortunately, such effort doesn’t exist in social democratic and Kemalist circles. Indeed, it’s becoming worse. Stuck between hatred toward Erdogan and a lack of new ideas, CHP is having a hard time putting distance between itself and violent methods. I’m not talking about the limited violence that was encountered during the Gezi Park violent protests; I’m referring to the violence employed by terrorist organizations. CHP is unable to distance itself from both PKK’s and DHKP-C’s violence. It’s unable to react in the same way as it reacted to Daesh. This situation renders CHP untrustable and dangerous in the eyes of the public.

Will CHP be able to break the vicious cycle, contribute to democracy, find solutions to problems and inspire hope in the public? I truly hope so, but it’s a tough challenge for the CHP.