The Role of the Economic Rents in the Political Transformation of Turkey After the 1980s*

Abstract

It is claimed in this article that one of the main aims of the "bureaucratic tutelage" system in Turkey is to control the distribution of the economic rents created by the import -substituting industrialization. Thus, economic statism and the bureaucratic control over elected politicians were compatible with each other until economic liberalization in 1980. E ven a limit ed economic liberalization created great opportunities for the politicians to weaken the power of the bureaucratic elites, particularly military officers. Thus, there is a strong relationship between economic liberalization and democ ratization in Turkey after 1980. However, even though, bureaucratic tutelage is regressed, Turk ey is still far from having a transparent government and efficient public organizations. The conventional explanations are not adequate to grasp the intermingled relations between economic and political institutionalization in Turkey. Therefore, public choice may help to understand the role of the economic motivations of the political actors/elites in the context of shaping the political institutions. The political actors are seen as utility maximizers within the limits of institutional rules and practices, and the institutional change is explained with the help of changing interests and power relations of these actors. Enlarging economic liberties have gradually forc ed bureaucratic tutelage system to dissolve. For sure, dissolving the bureaucratic tutelage system is not a perfect or an intended process but examining this process from Turgut Ozal to Tayyip Erdogan gives us a theoretical framework to understand the political transformation of Turkey in the era of an open economy.