Revisiting the ‘boomerang effect’: the international relations of the trade unions in Turkey under the Justice and Development Party (AKP) rule

ABSTRACT

This article examines the international activities of trade unions in Turkey and the influence of the AKP government policies on these activities between 2002 and 2018. It addresses the question of the limits of the influence of international organizations in social mobilizations in an authoritarian context. The first part puts forward the conceptual framework and discusses existing literature. The second part explains how the international relations of the Turkish trade unions are influenced by government policies. The third part focuses on the sectoral level in order to analyse the concrete consequences of this transformation in different industries. This paper is based on the fieldwork conducted between 2012 and 2016 in Turkey composed of 111 interviews with trade union representatives and observations at the three main Turkish trade union confederations, completed by 12 interviews with IndustriAll, ETF, EFFAT, ETUC representatives in Brussels in April 2018.

KEYWORDS:

• Boomerang effect
• trade unions
• Turkey
• authoritarian regime
• social movements
• state

Disclosure statement

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

Notes

1 The approach adopted in this article goes against the approaches that aim to define and classify political regimes. The political regime in Turkey under the AKP rule was defined as ‘competitive democracy’, ‘hybrid regime’, ‘electoral democracy’, ‘illiberal democracy’ or ‘authoritarian regime’ by different scholars (Akkoyunlu & Öktem, 2017; Altındiş et al., 2018; Altınoğlu, 2013; Gümüşcü, 2016; Yazıcıoğlu, 2016; Tansel, 2018; Öniş, 2015). More precisely, this article aims to contribute to the analysis of the social basis of political domination, by considering the sociopolitical and transnational configurations and without trying to label the political regimes as democracy or authoritarianism. To do this, rather than identifying the way in which the Turkish case would correspond to one type of regime or another, the article tries to understand the specificities of political domination during the AKP period.

2 There are three major trade union confederations along which we can distinguish three main traditions of trade unionism. The Confederation of Turkish Trade Unions (Türkiye İşçi Sendikaları Konfederasyonu, Türk-İş), founded in 1952, defines itself as ‘apolitical’, ‘supra-political’ and ‘colorless’. The Confederation of Progressive Trade Unions (Devrimci İşçi Sendikaları Konfederasyonu, DİSK), founded in 1967 by socialist workers and activists, is a confederation of socialist / social-democratic tendencies. The Confederation of Real Trade Unions (Hak İşçi Sendikaları Konfederasyonu, Hak-İş) was founded in 1976 by the Islamist movement of Milli Görüş (National Vision), who also gave rise later in 2002 to the Justice and Development Party (AKP). The word ‘Hak’ is officially translated as ‘real’ in English but it has several meanings in Turkish, also referring to ‘God (Allah)’, ‘right’, ‘true’. All three confederations are ETUC and ITUC affiliates.

3 According to the legislation, a trade union can only become able to sign collective agreements in a company if it has recruited a certain number of workers working in the whole industry on the national level. This number corresponded to 10% of the workers according to the trade union and collective bargaining laws in place since 1982 and 3% according to the new law on collective industrial relations accepted in 2012. Also, the trade union must have recruited the majority of the workers at the workplace level. These statistics are published by the Ministry of Labour twice a year. A worker cannot benefit from the clauses of a collective agreement if he/she is not a member of the trade union who signed the agreement with the employer.

4 On the impact of Islam in industrial relations (see Durak, 2012).

5 For more information on the July 15th coup attempt (see Aras & Yorulmazlar, 2018).

6 On trade unionism as a high-risk activity (see Cano, 2014).

7 Ministry of labour, Union density rates, https://www.ailevecalisma.gov.tr/media/1262/2017_ocak_6356_duzenlenmis-3.pdf, consulted on 04.01.2021.

8 For another research on TÜMTİS and DHL (see Korkmaz, 2015).

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Isil Erdinc

Isil Erdinç is a PhD in political science. She is currently affiliated to the European Center for Sociology and Political Science of Paris 1 Panthéon-Sorbonne University and to Center for Turkish, Ottoman, Balkan and Central Asian Studies at the School of Advances Studies in Social Sciences (EHESS) in France. Her research interests are labour movements, sociology of work, political regimes, public policy and social movements. Publications: Syndicats et politique en Turquie. Les ressorts sociaux du pouvoir de l’AKP, Editions Dalloz, Paris, 2018; ‘Trade Union Strategies and Legacy of the 1960s in Student Mobilization in Turkey: The Case of the Student Youth Union Öğrenci Gençlik Sendikası (Genç-Sen)’, European Journal of Turkish Studies, 17, 2013.