The excessive strengthening of the executive in parliamentary systems: The case of the head of state in Turkish constitutions

One of the great engines of state- and nation-building in Turkey has been the reference to the sovereignty of the people as a republic, in contrast to the disintegrating absolutist monarchy of the Ottoman Empire. Moreover, the first two non-ottoman constitutions (1921-1924 and 1924-1960) granted the executive branch as a whole, and especially the president, a highly limited scope of powers, and the legislature a predominant role. In practice, however, there was a clear discrepancy. Depending on the phase, either the president (1923-1950) or the prime minister (1950-1960) assumed the dominant role, rather than the legislature. With the first intervention by the military in politics in 1960, the constitution was amended to further strengthen the legislature and render the executive almost powerless vis-à-vis newly created veto players (e.g. second chamber, Constitutional Court). In the 1982 constitution, the executive was strengthened formally for the first time in the Turkish Republic, but with a strong president as institutional counterweight to the prime minister. In contrast to typical parliamentary systems, this arrangement of extensive presidential powers was susceptible to intra-executive conflict between the heads of state and government. Moreover, with the emergence of a multi-party system in the 1990s, multi-party government coalitions became necessary, and the office of the presidency grew even further in political significance. However, it was not until the controversial constitutional amendments of 2017 that a radical break with constitutional tradition transpired, with the legislature extensively degraded vis-à-vis the now popularly-elected head of government. However, the form of government remains a parliamentary system, even though much of political-science literature refers to the system as presidential. This paper takes a diachronic approach to examine the position of the head of state in Turkey in the constitution and in governmental practice over time. For one, this allows for identifying significant continuities and discontinuities spanning a total of four different constitutions. For another, the analysis reveals how the extensive constitutional amendments in 2018 do not introduce a presidential system, as widely purported, but rather usher in the transformation of a flawed democracy into a semi-competitive autocracy with a strengthened unified executive in a parliamentary system. In the wider context of democratic backsliding, the changing Turkish republic may illustrate how a parliamentary system can be just as, if not more easily combined with a strong or autocratic head of government than a presidential system. The current Turkish constitution renders the presidency quite powerful, allowing the president to take over important legislative functions: for instance, the president can rule by decree and pass a budget against the will of parliament. In theory, the fusion of powers leads to the possibility of aggrandizing executive power, dominating the judicial nomination process, and changing the rules with the help of co-opted opposition parties. In times of democratic backsliding, these constitutional and governmental arrangements are highly problematic, not least because they may encourage imitation.