The 1945-1960 Multi-Party Period and Counter-Revolutionism

[NOTE] This essay was written in sixth form for a nationwide competition. I have preserved the text as it was, and have not fixed improper and inconsistent citation practices. The content is also poorly organised, so I have added some headings. Any opinion or framing does not reflect my current attitudes.

Introduction

Speaking in the Turkish Grand National Assembly on the 18th of January 2023, President Recep Tayyip Erdoğan of the incumbent Justice and Development Party announced that the first round of elections would commence on the 14th of May. In his speech, he reminds the present MPs of the 1950 election held on the same date, and that ‘Our people, 73 years later on that same day, are going to say ‘enough!’’¹. In recent years, many actions have been taken by the Justice and Development Party to mythicise the personalities of the Democratic Party government (1950-1960) who were overthrown during the 1960 coup d’etat. The principal personality admired by Erdoğan and his support base is that of Adnan Menderes, 9th Prime Minister of the Republic of Turkey and leader of the Democratic Party. Menderes has achieved a status of martyrdom among those ideologically conservative due to his execution following the Yassıada trials set up by the military. The online newspaper of the state-owned broadcaster TRT describes the 3 ministers executed as a result of the Yassıada trials as ‘democracy’s first martyrs’² and in 2013 the island where the trials and subsequent executions occurred, Yassıada, was renamed to the Island of Democracy and Freedoms (Demokrasi ve Özgürlükler Adası)³. While it is true that the Democratic Party was beneficial for a while in the advancement of democratic freedoms within the Republic of Turkey, the years that it took power in government became increasingly authoritarian and aimed to curb democracy at every turn. It is not surprising that President Erdoğan, who is arguably an ideological successor to Adnan Menderes, would place so much emphasis on his character and politics, especially after the coup attempt in 2016 which saw his democratically elected government challenged as well. However, the amplified legacy of Menderes and his Democratic Party serves another purpose which presents a dichotomy between the grass-roots, democratically elected conservative, yet populist governments of Turkey and an entrenched secular, progressive elite. The latter clique has consistently been represented by the Republican People’s Party (Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi) which in 2023 composed the bulk of the opposition bloc against Erdoğan, and 70 years earlier against the Democratic Party.⁴