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Elections in Turkey are held for six functions of government: presidential elections (national), parliamentary elections (national), municipality mayors (local), district mayors (local), provincial or municipal council members (local) and muhtars (local). Apart from elections, referendums are also held occasionally.
The parliamentary elections are held every five years. The Parliament (Meclis) has 600 members, elected for a five-year term by a system based on closed list proportional representation according to the D'Hondt method. Political parties are subject to an electoral threshold of 7%. Smaller parties can avoid the electoral threshold by forming an alliance with bigger parties, in which it is sufficient that total votes of the alliance passes the 7%. Independent candidates are not subject to electoral threshold.
The presidential elections are held every five years. The president is elected for a term of office of five years and is eligible for one re-election. There is an exception when a president's second term ends prematurely through a decision of the Parliament. In this case, the president can be re-elected for a third term.
To put forward a referendum regarding constitutional amendments, a supermajority (three fifths of the votes) in the parliament is required first. These kinds of referendums are binding.
Turkey has a multi-party system, with two or three strong parties and often a fourth party that is electorally successful. Since 1950, parliamentary politics has mainly been dominated by conservative parties. Even the ruling Justice and Development Party (AKP) tends to identify itself with the "tradition" of Democrat Party (DP). While on the left side of the spectrum, parties like Republican People's Party (CHP), Social Democratic Populist Party (SHP) and Democratic Left Party (DSP) have enjoyed the largest electoral success.
The constitutional referendum of 2017 enhanced the powers of the president, and since 2018, the focus has shifted from parliamentary to the presidential elections. [1]
Past | Future | ||||||||||
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
2017 | 2018 | 2019 | 2020 | 2021 | 2022 | 2023 | 2024 | 2025 | 2026 | 2027 | 2028 |
Constitutional referendum | General (parliamentary & presidential) | Local | None | None | None | General (parliamentary & presidential) | Local | None | None | None | General (parliamentary & presidential) |
The following sections give list of key results. [2]
At first, Turkey had a unicameral legislature, with the main chamber being the Grand National Assembly of Turkey. This lasted until 1961, when the new Constitution of 1961 replaced the previous unicameral (one house) system with a bicameral (two house) one. The Grand National Assembly was downgraded to the position of the lower house whilst the newly founded Senate of the Republic became the upper house. However, the constitution of 1982 abolished the Senate and Turkey once again adopted a unicameral system.
Date | Election |
---|---|
21 July 1946 | 1946 Turkish general election |
14 May 1950 | 1950 Turkish general election |
2 May 1954 | 1954 Turkish general election |
27 October 1957 | 1957 Turkish general election |
15 October 1961 | 1961 Turkish general election |
10 October 1965 | 1965 Turkish general election |
12 October 1969 | 1969 Turkish general election |
14 October 1973 | 1973 Turkish general election |
5 June 1977 | 1977 Turkish general election |
6 November 1983 | 1983 Turkish general election |
29 October 1987 | 1987 Turkish general election |
20 October 1991 | 1991 Turkish general election |
25 December 1995 | 1995 Turkish general election |
18 April 1999 | 1999 Turkish general election |
3 November 2002 | 2002 Turkish general election |
22 July 2007 | 2007 Turkish general election |
12 June 2011 | 2011 Turkish general election |
7 June 2015 | 2015 Turkish general election (Jun) |
1 November 2015 | 2015 Turkish general election (Nov) |
24 June 2018 | 2018 Turkish general election |
14 May 2023 | 2023 Turkish general election |
Date | Election |
---|---|
15 October 1961 | 1961 Turkish senate elections |
7 June 1964 | 1964 Turkish senate elections |
5 June 1966 | 1966 Turkish senate elections |
2 June 1968 | 1968 Turkish senate elections |
14 October 1973 | 1973 Turkish senate elections |
12 October 1975 | 1975 Turkish senate elections |
7 June 1977 | 1977 Turkish senate elections |
14 October 1979 | 1979 Turkish senate elections |
The Turkish administrative system defines three different district types for local elections: villages, cities and metropolitan cities. The difference between cities and metropolitan cities derives from the size of the population. Cities with more than 750,000 residents are labeled as metropolitan cities while the rest are simply called cities. There are 31 metropolitan cities and 50 cities across Turkey, and voters in both will have a total of four votes. Citizens have the opportunity to vote for the following offices, depending on the type of area they reside: [3]
People living in metropolitan cities:
| People living in cities:
| People living in villages:
|
This is a summary of the past local elections:
If too many seats become vacant in the parliament or if elections in a district is not properly conducted, then a by-election is required to take place.
Date | Referendum |
---|---|
9 July 1961 | 1961 Turkish constitutional referendum |
7 November 1982 | 1982 Turkish constitutional referendum |
6 September 1987 | 1987 Turkish constitutional referendum |
25 September 1988 | 1988 Turkish constitutional referendum |
21 October 2007 | 2007 Turkish constitutional referendum |
12 September 2010 | 2010 Turkish constitutional referendum |
16 April 2017 | 2017 Turkish constitutional referendum |
The voter turnout for the average of 18 parliamentary election is 81.4%; of the local elections is 78.7% and of the referendums is 83.1%. Turkey relatively has a high voter turnout rate comparing to modern democracies. The participation rate in Turkey is also higher than the participation rates in countries where compulsory voting is loosely applied. With the exception of 1960–1970, voter turnout rate in Turkey is above the world average from 1950 to the present in Turkey. [4]
1950 | 1954 | 1957 | 1961 | 1965 | 1969 | 1973 | 1977 | 1983 | 1987 |
---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
89.3% | 88.6% | 76.6% | 81.4% | 71.3% | 64.3% | 66.8% | 72.4% | 92.3% | 93.3% |
1991 | 1995 | 1999 | 2002 | 2007 | 2011 | 2015 | 2018 | 2023 | |
83.9% | 85.2% | 87.1% | 79.1% | 84.2% | 83.2% | 85.2% | 86.2% | 87.1% |
The Republican People's Party is a Kemalist and social democratic political party in Turkey. It is the oldest political party in Turkey, founded by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk, the first president and founder of the modern Republic of Türkiye. The party is also cited as the founding party of modern Turkey. Its logo consists of the Six Arrows, which represent the foundational principles of Kemalism: republicanism, reformism, laicism (Laïcité/Secularism), populism, nationalism, and statism. It is currently the second largest party in Grand National Assembly with 128 MPs, behind the ruling conservative Justice and Development Party.
The Democrat Party, abbreviated to DP, is a liberal conservative Turkish political party, established by Ahmet Nusret Tuna in 1983 as the True Path Party. It succeeded the historical Democrat Party and the Justice Party, two parties with similar ideologies. Their sister party is the Good Party.
Deniz Baykal was a Turkish politician. A member of the Republican People's Party (CHP) who served as Deputy Prime Minister and Minister of Foreign Affairs from 1995 to 1996. Having served in numerous government positions, Baykal led the CHP from 1992 to February 1995, from September 1995 to 1999 and again from 2000 to 2010. Between 2002 and 2010, he also served as the Leader of the Opposition by virtue of leading the second largest party in the Parliament.
The multi-party period of the Republic of Turkey started in 1945.
The Democrat Party was a centre-right political party in Turkey, and the country's third legal opposition party, after the Liberal Republican Party established by Ali Fethi Okyar in 1930, and the National Development Party established by Nuri Demirağ in 1945. Founded and led by Celâl Bayar and Adnan Menderes, it was the first of the opposition parties to rise to power, de-seating the Republican People's Party during the national elections of 1950 and ending Turkey's one party era. The party ″facilitated the resurgence of Islam, especially at the popular level, in Turkey″.
General elections were held in Turkey on 3 November 2002 following the collapse of the Democratic Left Party–Nationalist Movement Party–Motherland Party coalition led by Bülent Ecevit. All 550 members of the Grand National Assembly were up for election.
General elections were held in Turkey on 22 July 2007 to elect 550 members to the Grand National Assembly. Originally scheduled for November, the elections were brought forward after parliament failed to elect a new president to replace Ahmet Necdet Sezer. The result was a resounding victory for the incumbent Justice and Development Party (AKP), which won 46.6% of the vote and 341 seats. The party's leader Recep Tayyip Erdoğan was consequently re-elected as Prime Minister of Turkey. The opposition Republican People's Party (CHP) came second with 20.9% of the vote and took 112 seats. The Nationalist Movement Party (MHP), which had failed to surpass the 10% election threshold in the 2002 election, re-entered parliament with 14.3% of the vote and 71 MPs. The election was fought mostly on Turkey's debate over laïcité that had been perceived to be under threat from the AKP's nomination of Foreign Minister Abdullah Gül, an Islamist politician, for the Presidency. Developments in Iraq, secular and religious concerns, the intervention of the military in political issues, European Union membership negotiations, the United States and the Muslim world were other main issues.
General elections were held in Turkey on Sunday 24 December 1995, triggered by the newly re-established Republican People's Party's (CHP) withdrawal from a coalition government with the True Path Party (DYP). The coalition had been in government for four years, having been formed by the Social Democratic Populist Party, the CHP's predecessor.
The Turkish local elections of 2004 were held throughout the eighty-one Provinces of Turkey on 28 March 2004 in order to elect both mayors and councillors to local government positions. All 16 metropolitan and 3,193 district municipalities were up for election, while 3,208 provincial and 34,477 municipal councillors were also elected. More than 50,000 neighbourhood presidents (muhtars) were also elected, though these do not have any political affiliations.
General elections were held in Turkey on 12 June 2011 to elect the 550 members of Grand National Assembly. In accordance to the result of the constitutional referendum held in 2007, the elections were held four years after the previous elections in 2007 instead of five.
The outcome of the Turkish general elections after 1983 is shown below. In the table below only the percentage of the votes received by the parties which were qualified to send representatives to the parliament are shown. So the summation of percentages may be lower than 100%. The winner is shown in color. The legend of abbreviations is shown at the end of the table.
The outcome (in %) of the Turkish local elections after 1980 is shown below.. In the local elections in addition to mayors and muhtars, members of local parliaments are elected. The voter base of the local parliaments and the national parliament is assumed to be identical. In the table, only those parties which received more than 1% are shown.
The outcome of the elections for metropolitan municipalities in Turkey is shown below. The number of metropolitan centers was three in 1984 and eight in 1989. In 1994, the number increased to 15 and in 2004 to 16. In 2014, 14 new metropolitan municipalities were established. The abbreviations for the names of the parties are shown in section abbreviations.
General elections were held in Turkey on 7 June 2015 to elect 550 members to the Grand National Assembly. This was the 24th general election in the history of the Turkish Republic, electing the country's 25th Parliament. The result was the first hung parliament since the 1999 general elections. Unsuccessful attempts to form a coalition government resulted in a snap general election being called for November 2015.
İsmet Sezgin was a Turkish politician who served as the Deputy Prime Minister of Turkey and Minister of National Defense from 1997 to 1999, as the Speaker of the Grand National Assembly in 1995, as the Minister of the Interior from 1991 to 1993, as the Minister of Finance from 1979 to 1980 and as the Minister of Youth and Sports from 1969 to 1971. Between 1999 and 2002, he served as the Leader of the Democrat Turkey Party, but did not contest any elections.
The Nation Alliance, abbreviated as NATION, was an electoral and political alliance in Turkey, made up of six opposition parties to contest the 2023 Turkish general election against its main rival, the People's Alliance. Originally established prior to the country's 2018 general election, the alliance had consisted of four opposition parties across the political spectrum, which had found common ground on withstanding Turkey's newly established presidential system. The alliance dissolved in 1 June 2023 following its narrow defeat in the 2023 elections, after the Good Party's announcement that they were no longer a part of it.
The Republican People's Party was founded in 1919 during the Sivas Congress.
The Justice Party is a liberal conservative political party in Turkey. The party is situated on the centre-right of the political spectrum, and considers itself a successor to the historical Justice Party of Süleyman Demirel, active from 1961 to 1981. The modern incarnation of the party was established on 9 October 2015 by Vecdet Öz, a former member of the centre-left Republican People's Party.