Legislative war powers in time: a historical institutionalist approach to the Turkish Parliament’s weight on foreign policy making

ABSTRACT

On 1 March 2003, the Turkish government’s war power motion failed in Parliament even though most legislators had voted in favour of it, keeping Turkey out of the war in Iraq. This outcome reflected the anti-war sentiment among the Turkish public but confounded Turkish-American relations. The Turkish case shows that, contrary to one of the main assertations of the actor-specific perspectives, parliaments can play an important role in foreign policy decision making. How can Turkish legislative war powers be explained? This study argues that the distinct position of the Parliament can best be analysed by exploring the historical evolution of war powers across the constitutions since the late Ottoman period, focusing on several critical junctures during a long path that turned Parliament into a key veto player in foreign policy making, capable of frustrating the executive’s intention to join a war.

KEYWORDS:

• Legislative war powers
• Turkish Parliament
• Turkish-American relations
• historical institutionalism
• Iraq War

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No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Correction Statement

This article has been corrected with minor changes. These changes do not impact the academic content of the article.

Notes

1 See Henke 2018, pp. 120–121 and Bölükbaşı, 2008, pp. 68–74 for the full list of US financial aid measures and incentives to ensure Turkey’s cooperation.

2 President Özal of Turkey wished to provide full support to the US/UN war efforts, but his ambitions were blunted by the Parliamentary opposition and the resignation of key members of his war cabinet, including the Chief of Staff of the Turkish Armed Forces, the Minister of Defense, and the Minister of Foreign Affairs.

3 The resemblance could further be maintained as the English Parliament’s resistance on arbitrary taxation made it difficult for the King to seek expensive war endeavours, creating an effective legislative oversight on executive war powers.

4 A related section of Article 7 of the Ottoman Constitution reads: ‘Among the sovereign rights of His Majesty the Sultan are the following prerogatives: - … [H]e concludes treaties with the powers; he declares war and makes peace; he commands both land and sea forces; he directs military movements … ’.

5 As the Ottomans were facing a decisive defeat at the hands of the Russian army, one legislator from the Istanbul district, Astarcılar Kethudasi Ahmet Efendi, blamed the Sultan for initiating this disastrous war (Koçu, 1950, p. 180). In response, Sultan Abdülhamid II left the debate. Amid this havoc, Abdülhamid used his (constitutional) power and dissolved the first Ottoman Parliament, which would be reconvened 31 years later. One historian explains the shutting down of the Ottoman Parliament this way: ‘the Parliament was diverted from its main law-making duties and started to discuss the [Ottoman–Russian] war, which was beyond its authority’ (Karal, 1983, p. 232). Enver Ziya Karal’s interpretation of the situation is quite interesting, as it suggests that Parliament should not have discussed the war.

6 It has been argued that, after the forced abdication of Abdülhamid II, the power of the Sultan in the Ottoman State was reduced to symbolic authority. For more information on the Second Constitutional Monarchy Era in the Ottoman Empire (see Tanör, 2003, pp. 139–183; Aldıkaçtı, 1982, pp. 47–74).

7 Translation source: http://www.bilkent.edu.tr/~genckaya/documents1.html. (Last accessed on 7 November 2006).

8 Law No: 85. The Date of Amendment: 20 January 1921. Düstur, Üçüncü Tertip, Cilt 1, 196–199. The Official Gazette, February 1–7 (1921). For the text of the Teşkilatı Esasiye, see http://www.anayasa.gen.tr/1921tek.htm. (Last accessed on 7 November 2006).

9 Sadık Balkan, Ahmet E. Uysal, and Kemal H. Karpat translation. (https://www.anayasa.gen.tr/1961constitution-text.pdf). (Last accessed on 7 November 2006).

10 See Article 118 of the 1982 Constitution.

Additional information

Notes on contributors

F. Murat Ozkaleli

F. Murat Ozkaleli is an Assistant Professor, School of Public and International Affairs, ADA University, Baku, Azerbaijan. His most recent work includes ‘Allied but Deviating NATO in the Multipolar World: Exploring Time Profiles of Western Alliance Cohesion Using Ideal Point Estimates’ Global Governance (2021) and ‘De-Worlding IR Theory’, Postcolonial Studies (2021).