Only one thorny problem remains to be resolved before the new regime put into office by the military will be consolidated:
the question of the president of the republic, who has to take over from the putchists' leader, General Kenan Evren. The final transition from the military dictatorship will be made at the time of the presidential elections proposed for 1989.
FUAT ORÇUN
ORE THAN seven years after the coup d'état, the military's political operation has largely succeeded. The mass movement and the social opposition has been beaten.
Revolutionary groups, left trade unions, professional associations and democratic organizations have been dismantled. They have been stripped of all legal political rights by a whole series of restrictions, written into the lawbook as well as the constitution.
The masses have been dispossessed of any means of extra-parliamentary pressure.
All political activity has been forced into the sole framework of the bourgeois parliament. Stability has probably been assured thanks to strong and lasting governments of the "centre-right". Depoliticization in society continues and deepens. In terms of the process of "normalization", all the bourgeois parties have integrated themselves into an authoritarian and strong-arm parliamentary system.
It has, therefore, been a smooth transition, without marked schisms between the army and the political parties, with neither an explosion of the social opposition nor major contradictions inside the regime that carried it out. Compared to what has happened in a number of so-called third world countries, the Turkish bourgeoisie has been able to obtain the stability it wanted at little
10
• cost.
The social opposition has proved ex-
International Viewpoint • January 25, 1988 weak, and the left is having an identity crisis — now its goal is purely and simply to survive. It is the first time since the 1950s that the Turkish bourgeoisie has had such a long period of calm in which to realize its plans. It is clear that such a prolonged period of bourgeois order and stability is going to leave profound marks and bring considerable changes in all the structures of Turkish society.
### Referendum boosts political activity
Premier Turgut Özal's decision to hold a referendum on the question of the ban on political activity by pre-coup bourgeois politicians boosted political activity. Özal and his government spent their time during this campaign blackening the record of the "ex-leaders", drawing heavily on the arguments used by the military to justify their coup d'état. Sulyeman Demirel, the rival to the right of Özal, defended himself in recalling the "merits" of his government, which was overturned by the military.
As for the social democrats, they were unable to profit from the referendum by raising the legitimacy of the whole system established by the military, or by highlighting consistent demands for general democratic freedoms. For the Social Democratic People's Party (SHP) led by Erdal Inönü, the referendum was purely a transitory step very high number of "no" votes included -outside of the voters supporting Özal -those of a large fringe of the social-democratic electorate. Many supporters of the SHP voted against the lifting of sanctions against their previous leader Bulent Ecevit, who was accused of "dividing the left". Splitting from his old collaborators, Ecevit formed a rival formation, the Party of the Democratic Left (DSP), and led a campaign against the SHP. Looking at the vote, it should also be added that many electors did not understand the stakes in-
Özal calls legislative elections one year early
Even before the announcement of the voting results Özal announced his decision to hold early legislative elections. This decision — at a time when Özal and his Motherland Party (ANAP) held a comfortable majority in parliament, and in the absence of any serious opposition either inside or, more importantly, outside parliament - can be explained by two factors:
• First, they wanted to take the opposition by surprise, and to force the opposition parties into an electoral contest before they had time to reorganize with the politicians who had just been "amnestied".
• Secondly, they wanted to respond to the need to for a "reorganization" of the economy with new austerity measures that would have been unpopular before an electoral test.
Indeed, 1988 is going to be a very difficult year from the point of view of repaying the external debt. To satisfy the demands of international financial institutions in order to obtain new credit, and this on the eve of an election, would have been suicidal for a parliamentarist party. Moreover, immediately following the elections the government announced new price rises of up to 40% on nearly all consumer products, 1. See "Reconciliation between the generals and the politicians", JV 124, July 13, 1987, for a full account of the political developments leading up to the referendum and the banning of the pre-coup bourgeois politi cians. This article also looked at the different political parties and predicted the possibility of early elections and a right-wing victory. So as not to be repetitive, the article above is restricted to analyzing post-election results and probable developments.
£00013009 while the official price index spoke of a 40% inflation rate (50% in reality). In bringing forward the elections by a year, Ozal also brought in a new electora. law giving unheard-of advantages to the party winning the elections. To the existing 10% barrier (minimum votes to get MPs elected), the new law added a higher regional one and gave an additional MP to the winning party in each constituency. In spite of some timid threats of a "boycott" by Demirel and Ecevit's parties, the elections took place according to Özal's wishes. The main opposition party, Inönü's SHP, was lined up with the governmental argument on the one hand so that it would not create a crisis threatening the parliamentary game, and on the other to eliminate its rival, Ecevit, who had little hope of getting to the 10%
So it is no surprise that the ANAP won the elections with 36.3% of the vote, in spite of a loss of 9% since 1983. With a third of the votes, Ozal swiped two-thirds of parliamentary seats thanks to his electoral law. (In the 1977 elections, Demirel only had 189 MPs out of 450 with the same percentage of votes, while Özal got 292 MPs!)
The SHP kept its 99 MPs with 24,9% of votes, and Demirel has been able to return to parliament with 59 MPs for his Party of the Just Road (DYP), who got 19.5%. No other parties were able to pass the 10% barrier. Ecevit, although he won his constituency, was thus excluded. His party, the DSP, only having won 8.5%. Erbakan's Islamic Party and Colonel Türkes' fascist party, the MCP, were also kept out of parliament with 7.1% and 2.9% of the vote respectively. All the results taken together pleased both the Turkish bourgeoisie and international centres, including Moscow.
The election campaign was lifeless enough. No party fundamentally challenged the general's system and the legitimacy of the coup d'état. No party was able to present a global alternative to the government's policies. Neither the opposition
083005 nor the electors really believed that they could change the ruling power.
The SHP certainly took up some democratic slogans, but in a very cautious and timid way, and without going beyond the framework fixed by the military's constitution. The party was resigned in advance to a meek oppositional role. Its competitor, Ecevit's DSP, led a campaign in conflict with most of the left. First of all, Ecevit claimed that he wanted to create a "real social-democratic party" of the base against the "intellectual elite". But he began by harnessing the most reactionary MPs in the general's parliament and centering his campaign against the SHP, which, according to him, was an obstacle to the socialdemocrats taking power. In order to do this he didn't hesitate to flirt with the ruling ANAP. Resting completely on the personal charisma of Ecevit, the DSP nevertheless won 8.5% of the poll, more than the polls had predicted. But outside parliament the future of this party remains questionable. This fratricidal battle in the centre-left pushed floating voters to the right.
Islamic Party a force to be reckoned with
Demirel's party won a section of the disgruntled voters, mainly in rural areas. It could be said that 19.5% was a satisfactory score for the DYP, who had been caught unprepared by the early election. It was the first time in the history of the country that a right-wing party was in the running to take over from a government of the right. The conjuncture was not favorable for Demirel, who had only just come out of political banishment. His goal was to make a sufficiently significant return that would allow him to hold on until the next elections, and he got what he wanted.
The 7.1% won by the Islamic Party means that it is a force to be reckoned with. The Islamic current has been able to stabi-
TURKEY lize and get through the period of the military dictatorship without suffering losses. Indeed, the Islamics won 8% of the vote in the 1977 elections. In the recent elections, a section of its electorate preferred to register a useful vote for the ANAP, which has a large Islamic current. The 10% barrier also worked in fa vour of the Islamic Party, as did the fact that it has greater organic links with the voters and has a strong extra-parliamentary tradition.
Fascist vote is still a threat
The Islamic Party, moreover, won nearly 15% of the vote in Kurdistan, where they clearly act as a brake on the national struggle of the Kurdish people
Even if the Islamics could not play the role of spoilsport as did its minor partner in the coalition governments, they still have a certain influence thanks to the positions they have acquired in society. In percentage terms the fascists of the MÇP lost half of their voters compared to 1977. The moderate wing of this current is in the ANAP now. Internal divisions inside the fascist party, the losses they have suffered since the coup and general depoliticization explain their relative decline. That said, it still got the same percentage of votes as in 1973 when it first began to advance. In addition, in absolute figures, the MCP has doubled its electorate since 1973, and still remains a serious threat to workers. Their vote of 2.9% could be a jumping off point for the fascist current in a future mass radicalization. The fascists are particularly strong in hot spots like central Anatolie and the borders of Kurdistan, there are ethnic-religious clashes.
These elections have confirmed a constant trend in Turkey: that two-thirds of the electorate vote for the right. Social democracy has lost the influence it had in 1973, and is far from reaching the historic heights of 41% — its result in 1977. Its present division cannot let it hope for a turnabout in the short term, despite support from part of the socialist left. Even a large section of the working class electorate in the urban conurbations preferred to vote for the ANAP.
Lacking a credible alternative, the ruling ANAP's demagogy paid off. Its promises of "jumping a century ahead", economic expansion and deluxe consumerism were preferred by the voters. Lastly, the efforts made by the military in terms of "ideological construction" have made their impact felt: order and stability has come out of the ballot boxes.
The process of recomposition and reorganization in the socialist left is only just starting. The elections have therefore been an important test for judging the capacity of the left to elaborate a national political line.
At the time of the referendum, most
Marxist journals called for a campaign in :11 favour of a "yes" vote. They estimated that
January 25, 1988 • International Viewpoint
TURKEY the referendum was an occasion - although limited and insufficient - to oppose the restrictions imposed by the military. Against this, five currents from various origins, but dominated by revolutionary socialists, joined together around a common platform and published a joint declaration to denounce the electoral farce.
Four of these journals called for an abstention or no-vote, the fifth for a "yes"
At the elections, these groups, who had decided in their platform to prioritize the question of working-class independence against the bourgeois parties, presented jointly some independent working class and socialist candidates. Remembering the extremely sectarian traditions of the Turkleft, the very fact of such a united initia-
The content of the joint platform was from political restrictions on the unions to the national question and the oppression of women. The manifesto, entitled "Long live "subversive propaganda". The socialist candidates received thousands of votes in Istanbul. The joint platform of these five currents could be a modest, but nonetheless important, lever for ongoing united action. It could also play a positive role in the process of recomposition of the socialist left.
Against this, nearly all the currents who called for a "yes" vote in the referendum gave total support to the SHP, "in the name of the struggle for democracy"
On the eve of the elections, the Turkish Communist Party and the Turkish Workers' Party (TIP) announced their fusion in exile, and the general secretaries of the new United Turkish Communist Party (TBKP) also announced their decision to return from exile so as to legally form their party in Turkey. This showy return, accompanied by some European Communist MPs and journalists, was a fiasco, and the two CP leaders were arrested immediately they stepped from the plane. At the time of the fusion, the CP spectacularly abandoned its previous line and programme. From one day to the next, the ultra pro-Soviet CP decided to drop the "dictatorship of the prole12 should get out of NATO, make some pasi- tariat", withdraw its demand that Turkey International Viewpoint • January 25, 1988 humous gestures towards Eurocommunism
Another grouping that has evolved and radically changed its programmatic identity is the traditional Maoist current in what was the Turkish Workers" and Peasants' Party
(TIKP). Having followed through the logic of their third worldist and Soviet socialimperialist lines, the party's cadres ended up supporting formulations of the type "Strong state/national state". Today, after some unsuccessful attempts to form a legal, mass socialist party regrouping left currents, the leaders of this party have drastically trimmed down their radical talk. The orientation of founding a legal party has as its goal the creation of a socialist party with a national character, which would be the
ÖZAL: SELF-CRiTiCiSM left wing of parliamentary democracy.
The revolutionary groups like Dev-Yol (Revolutionary Road), Kurtulus (Liberation), Halkin Kurtulusu (Liberation of the People) and so on by and large collapsed after the coup d'état. Today, the groups that claim the revolutionary heritage appear to want to turn towards a larger and more unitary recomposition. But we are still a long way from constructing a revolutionary pole with any credibility.
Political and trade-union freedoms
Özal is in power for another five years. It is clear that he is going to follow the same austerity policies, and that we cannot expect any let-up on the socio-economic front. On the other hand, the years to come may hold some unexpected surprises in store from the "progressive-conservative' overnment (as Ozal himself calls it) in the area of juridical restructuring. For example, without openly abolishing the death penalty, ANAP hopes to put forward a law that will transform all death sentences that have not been ratified by parliament within the six months following condemnation into life imprisonment.
Thus, without fundamentally changing the repressive laws, a solution could be found for pending executions, which have now become politically unacceptable.
All this has to be seen in the light of Turkey's request to join the European Community. If the Turkish bourgeoisie wants to integrate itself into the EC it must, at least formally, adapt its legislation to European
"norms". So it is not excluded that Ozal's government will proceed with some juridical modifications in the sense of a kind of
"liberalization", but at the same time without changing the authoritarian and repressive nature of existing laws. The stumbling block in all this is the question of political and trade-union The government has to find a formunist" and "separe judged dangerous, while maintaining the legal existence of some "moderate" organizations. Moreover, General Evren himself has declared that it will be possi ble in the future to tatorship of the proletariat and that does not "receive orders from outside"
A socialist party that was happy just to without having any chance of passing the 10% barrier would be very useful for giving the regime a liberal and democratic facade.
Within the general stabilization of society, some breaches have opened nonetheless. After the shock of the first years of repression under the military dictatorship, students and workers with a strong tradition of struggle have begun to discuss with each other. In the universities, students have succeeded in forcing the government to retreat on its project for a law that seeks to standardize student societies. In spite of very tough conditions and police repression, this victory — even if modest — was the first in
With new trade-union laws on the right to strike, everybody drew the conclusion that because of the number and scope of restrictions it would be impossible to strike in the future. In addition, the government skilfully pushed this idea in order to discourage possible strikers. Despite this, some highly combative strikes have been led in the telecommunications, metallurgy, leather and
service sectors.
The number of strike hours was higher in 1987 than 1979, before the coup! These strikes have also mobilized big solidarity campaigns. But the workers lack a combative union federation, like the DISK in the past. This puts on the workers' movement agenda the question of reorganizing a strong, independent trade-union federation. Wide discussions are under way on different solutions: whether to continue to lead a struggle inside Türk-Is, or to orient rather toward a new restructuring via the indepen-
Kurdish national question now discussed openly
Another paradoxical development has been around the Kurdish national question This question, yesterday still a taboo subject, is today openly discussed, even in the big bourgeois press, and has the support of a much larger fringe of public opinion than previously. Of course, only the socialist journals speak in veiled terms of the right to Kurdish self-determination. But the fact that, even in bourgeois newspapers, the questions of human rights are stressed (for example, the right to speak their own language) is a very remarkable step forward in Turkey. It was not so long ago that even to admit to being Kurdish or that Kurds existed was a crime in Turkey. (Under the dictatorship, an ex-minister was thrown in prison for having dared to mention the word Kurdish.)
In its recent election campaign the SHP demanded the right of Kurds to speak Kurdish. Demirel has recognized that Kurds are citizens like any other. The ruling ANAP party included and got elected on its slate an ex-social democratic MP, a
Kurd, who is renowned for his "separatist" views and who was imprisoned by the dictatorship. The SHP also had a Kurdish ex-MP elected, who had also been imprisoned for "separatism".
Even the most chauvinist representatives of the bourgeois press have recognized that the Kurdish question cannot be solved by military means. And even the Chief of Staff has said that the Kurdish question is in the same category as that of Ireland, the
Basque country or Corsica, and that Turks must learn to live with it.
All this was happening at a time when the guerrilla struggle in Kurdistan was at its height. The Kurdish Workers' Party (PKK)
launched the guerrilla actions in August,
1984; a struggle has already resulted in a total of 1.000 deaths. In fact, before the coup, the PKK was only one of a number of
Kurdish organizations and was far from being hegemonic. Today, it is the only one in the field.
The PKK has profited skilfully from the conjuncture and the empty border created by the Iran-Iraq war. Based sometimes in
Irag and at others in Syria, it began by launching small expeditions — or rather suicide commandos — into the "Turkish part" of Kurdistan. Today, these actions have been stepped up and they have a certain implantation in Turkey.
That said, the methods of the PKK (an ultra-sectarian organization) are very controversial. It does not hesitate to resort to violence and even assassination against rival Turkish and Kurdish organizations. The same methods are used to sort out conflicts and internal differences inside the PKK
Such a bloody settling of scores has happened even among exiled members or those who have emigrated to Europe.
Furthermore, under the pretext that in wars women and children also die, the
PKK has not hesitated to organize and call for entire villages hostile to them to be massacred, killing defenceless children in
Another new factor in Turkey is the emergence of an autonomous women's movement, which did not exist before
1980. Appearing first at the level of feminist publications, this movement began to build and act most notably around a campaign and demonstration against marital violence and rape.
Campaign for liberation of political prisoners
A very large democratic campaign for the liberation of political prisoners is also under way. Limited primarily to detainees' families, this movement succeeded in collecting 130,000 signatures for a petition demanding a general amnesty at the time of founding a Human Rights League.
None of these struggles have yet found a clear political focus, but they are portents for future dynamics. The socialist movement must therefore organize in order to integrate these new dynamics and propose a socialist alternative where all parts of the social opposition can meet and find a place.
A real will to organize in a different way exists in the revolutionary socialist milieu. But in spite of their relative strength before the coup, revolutionaries' impact is today limited to the readers of various Marxist journals. Restructurthe revolutionary ing socialist movement is indispensable. This movement has been going for
20 years in Turkey, through two coups and a pre-revolutionary situation. Nearly all the socialist currents in the world have a group exviews their pressing there. Today, new discussion on socialist de-
TURKEY mocracy, internationalism, feminism, the independent mass organizations and so on are on the agenda.
A period of relative calm can perhaps be used for serious preparation before a new rise in struggles. Revolutionary movement must start afresh
The social opposition in Turkey is certainly still very weak, through important experiences, starting from zero, during the past 20 years: in the trade-unions; in the localities; of thousands of militants hardened by stretches in prison, who have seen many thousands of their comrades fall and who have continued the struggle in spite of terror and repression.
All these lessons and this experience must now be remodelled.
Of course, not only are we not on the eve of the revolution, but even partial victories will be very difficult to win. However, a healthy restructuring would allow the Turkish revolutionary movement to start afresh from a much more solid base than before. * 2. DISK: a trade-union federation that was banned by the junta, at the time with 300,000 members. Smaller but further left than Turk-Is, and including all the left and far-left currents.
TÜRK-IS: the first trade-union federation to exist in Turkey, created with the help of US unions. With 1 million supporters, mainly in the public sector, today it is the only authorized federation. Its general secretary was social security minister during the military govemment established by the 1980 coup d'état.
In some sectors, such as auto, leather (tanning), banking and so on some independent unions exist, which members of DISK joined after it was banned, and which have become very strong. One example is the metallurgy union (including auto), which today has around 60,000 members.
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January 25, 1988 • International Viewpoint