Political parties, the political system and Turkey.

• Author: Saribay, Aliyasar
• Position: ARTICLE - Report

ABSTRACT Even though they are not the sole forms of organization in a democratic system, political parties constitute the most effective bodies of people's will. A large volume of empirical research has been conducted for a concrete clarification of the cyclical relationship between the types of election system, political party system and political system. This paper aims to examine this relationship by focusing on different states, with a special focus on Turkey. It is argued that the more democratic a political system is, the more democratically political parties will have to function, and that the higher the eagerness of political parties to function democratic

General Theoretical Outlook

Even though they are not the sole forms of organization in a democratic system, as the late French jurist Georges Bourdeau put long ago, political parties constitute the most effective bodies of people's will. With these features, political parties prioritize the institutions envisioned by the Constitution; and modern democracies without political parties are unthinkable. In this respect, political parties both sustain democracy and owe their existence to democratic systems. For this reason, democratic systems are obligated to provide both a legal and a political ground necessary for political parties to represent people. On the other hand, political parties should not harm this base to which they owe their existence and should not see it as an instrument only to meet the demands of their partisans.

Parties should have a democratic mindset and a democratic behaviour so that they equip the actual system with the requirements of democracy--the rule of law in particular--as a must for the existence of a strong democracy. In this context, political parties, first and foremost, unite people to accede government and while doing so, they must resort to statutory and legitimate means. Such a feature of political parties, at the same time, encourages competition, i.e. elections.

It is a rule of thumb for political parties to join elections although some of them refuse to participate in elections, believing that to do so will legitimize regimes (as in the example of the Communist Party of Ireland), or simply believing that elections are not rewarding for long-term objectives. Hence, in order to legitimize the political parties' which govern a country, elections are as equally indispensable for political mechanisms as political parties are for democracy. In fact, research on election systems have proven that which social, economic, political and cultural trends and demands dominate a society and require political representation, and which political leaders and administrators should be entrusted to put them into practice can be determined only by means of an election system. This is to the extent that, as some of the leading international institutions and research initiatives (e.g., Freedom House, POLITY IV) predicate the existence of political parties on the democratization level of a country's political system, they also consider whether or not the competition among political parties is fair, just and periodic.

Accordingly, for many political scientists, the relationship between political parties and an election system has been a key area of research in order to understand the type of democratic regime and the nature of political change in a country. All the research in this area commonly refers to the existence of a cyclical relationship between the political party system and the type of political system. Namely, the type of an election system (say, proportional representation) may determine the type of the political party system (multi-party system) which in turn may determine the type of political system in a country. However, the opposite may also be the case: the survival of a certain type of political system may require a certain type of political party system, and that may be achieved by a certain type of an election system. This is the reasoning behind the cyclical relationship.

A large volume of empirical research has been conducted for a concrete clarification of the cyclical relationship between the types of election system, political party system and political system. For example, Amanda L. Hoffman (1) examined two basic hypotheses and confirmed the existence of such relations based on the data she obtained. The first hypothesis states that the increase in the number of political parties in a country increases the level of democracy in that country. The second hypothesis states that the countries that use the system of proportional representation have a higher level of democracy compared to other countries that do not implement it. Similar results have been found by other experts, such as Arend Lijphart, Michael Parenti and Pippa Norris (2).

On the other hand, the more apluralist political structure--as an end result of proportional representation--increases the inclusiveness of a democratic system, the more it will increase government instability; and that is a matter of objection. Albeit such an objection has some valid points that cannot be ruled out in some countries; empirical studies, similar to those conducted by Arend Lijphart, (3) have proven that the objection is not strong enough to abandon 'proportional representation' in many democratic systems.

It has been consequently shown that extending the boundaries of pluralism through the type of election system in a democratic system is not the sole reason for political instability; and infact finding a balance between pluralism and political stability is a merit of mature democracies.

However, to ask the following is also appropriate: is it the factor of broader or narrower boundaries of pluralism (i.e. a comprehensive political representative) that causes instability in a democracy? For instance, Lijphart answers this question in favor of narrower boundaries of pluralism although the findings of studies on political representation and on rights of groups in general --minority rights in particular--differ.

As Florian Bieber (4) puts some researchers regard impacts of election systems on political representation as a matter of different arrangements. For instance, some are against the participation of minorities, while others remain "formally" neutral. Some incline to support the competition of minority parties and ensure their participation yet others defend ethnical regionalism.

As purported by the different approaches above, the matter is that the representation of minorities is not the only factor which determines the stability of a democratic regime. Without doubt, stability in a democracy depends on many factors (level of economic development, political culture, etc.) apart from political representation.

The type of political system in a country may be deduced from the way in which minority (group) rights are brought into effect via political representation. In this respect, political scientists examine political systems in two categories: consociational and liberal. The raison d'etre of consociational democracy (for which the leading theorist and advocate is Lijpart) is to reduce the potential political tension that may stem from "lack of democracy"; in particular due to a proportional representation election system, and representation via reinforcement of some political mechanisms (minority veto, autonomy, bloc representation, etc.).

Accordingly, the goal here is to ensure the participation of minority groups in a political process, and consequently, forestall attempts to seek solutions to problems outside parliament. On the other hand, the "liberal" type...