Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi

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Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi
Logo of the CHP
Party leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu
Party leader Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu

Previous Chair:
Mustafa Kemal Ataturk
İsmet İnönü
Bülent Ecevit
Hikmet Çetin
Altan Öymen
Deniz Baykal
Secretary General Akif Hamzaçebi
speaker Faik Oztrak
Emergence September 7, 1919 ( as a resistance organization )
founding September 9, 1923 (as a political party)
September 9, 1992 (re-established after being banned)
Place of foundation Ankara
Headquarters Anadolu Bulvarı 12,
06510
Söğütözü, Çankaya , Ankara
newspaper Yurt
Alignment Kemalism
Social Democracy (after 1965)
Secularism
Pro-Europeanism
Anti-Communism (historical)
Colours) Red White
Parliament seats
138/600
Metropolitan municipalities
11/30
mayor
240/1355
Local councils
4613/20745
Provincial Parliaments
184/1272
Government grants 79,874,759.00 YTL
(2007)
Number of members 1,257,753 (February 4, 2020)
Proportion of women 12.32% (in parliament)
International connections Socialist International
European party Party of European Socialists (PES / PES)
Website www.chp.org.tr

The Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi (short name: CHP ; Turkish for “Republican People's Party”) is a Kemalist party in Turkey that has been a social democratic party since the 1960s . It was founded in 1923 by the state's founder and first Turkish president, Mustafa Kemal Ataturk , and is thus the country's oldest active party.

As the largest opposition party , the CHP has been the most important parliamentary opposition faction since the 2002 elections . After the parliamentary elections in June 2018, the party has 138 of the 600 seats (as of June 12, 2020) in the National Assembly . Its chairman has been Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu since 2010 . The party is an associate member of the Social Democratic Party of Europe and a full member of the Socialist International .

The six arrows on the party logo represent the six principles of Kemalism : republicanism (as the most appropriate form of government), secularism (i.e. the separation between religion and state ), populism (as an expression of a policy aimed at the interests of the people, not a class), revolutionism (in the sense of a constant continuation of reforms), nationalism (as a turn against a multi-ethnic and religious state concept of Ottoman style) and statism (with partial state economic control).

history

İsmet İnönü , Prime Minister of the Republic of Turkey until 1937 and President until 1950, at a CHP congress in the 1930s

The CHP's predecessor was initially created in 1919 at the Sivas Congress of the Turkish National Movement (led by Mustafa Kemal Pascha ) as a resistance organization against the Greek occupation of Anatolia . In terms of content and personnel, she was the successor to the "Society for the Defense of the Rights of Rumelia and Anatolia", which was active in the then dissolved Ottoman Empire until 1923 . a. had been advised by German social democrats like Friedrich Schrader . In 1923 it declared itself a political party, which was the only party in the country until 1945.

At first the party was called خلق فرقه سی / Ḫalḳ Fırḳası  / 'People's Party' and was founded in 1924 inجمهوريت خلق فرقه سی / Renamed Cumhūrīyet Ḫalḳ Fırḳası . In 1927 she adopted the four principles of republicanism, "populism", nationalism and secularism. In 1935 the principles of statism and "revolutionism" were added and the party changed its name to Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi . Its first chairman was Mustafa Kemal Pascha. After his death in 1938 İsmet İnönü succeeded him as chairman and second president of the Republic of Turkey. He carried out the first multi-party elections in the republic in 1946 , where the CHP achieved almost 85%. In the 1940s, the CHP set up the village institutes, among other things, with the aim of ensuring that schools were provided throughout the country.

In the 1950 elections , however, it was the Democrat Parti which provided the majority in parliament and thus brought the CHP to the opposition role for the first time. After the military coup in 1960 , it was one of the two major Turkish parties alongside the Justice Party (AP) for 20 years . From 1966, the CHP began to introduce newer ideas under Bülent Ecevit . Although Ecevit did not rule out Kemalism, he tried to convert the party into a social democratic party, avoiding the word "social democratic". He announced that the party was now " left of center " on the political spectrum. Because of this statement, two groups of MPs left the CHP. The first established the Trust Party in 1967 , while the Republican Party (Cumhuriyetçi Parti) was founded by the second group in 1972 .

After the military coup in 1980 , the CHP, like others, was banned and closed. Many of the former members joined the new Populist Party ( Halkçı Parti , HP) or the Social Democratic Party (SODEP) Erdal İnönüs . Both parties united in 1985 to form the Social Democratic Populist Party (SHP). The word populism has a meaning of its own here, it is understood as an expression of a policy geared towards the interests of the people, not a class.

In addition, the Democratic Left Party (DSP), which also sees itself as a social democratic party, was founded by former CHP Prime Minister Bülent Ecevit in 1985 and achieved better results in 1995 and 1999 than the then newly formed CHP.

It was not until 1992 that the party was re-established under the same name; the SHP joined it in 1995. From 1996 to 1999, however, the Alevi Peace Party split off from the CHP. From 1999 to 2002 the CHP was no longer represented in the National Assembly due to competition from the DSP, which was the strongest parliamentary group at that time (in Turkey there is a ten percent hurdle).

Under the leadership of Deniz Baykal , the party increasingly turned away from the left and emphasized above all an uncompromising anti-Western Turkish nationalism . The advocacy of trade union rights, balancing out with minorities, freedom of expression and democratic participation were receded as goals and content of the party. Baykal was against the abolition of Section 301 of the Turkish Penal Code (degradation of the Turkish nation, the state of the Republic of Turkey, the institutions of the state and its organs) and saw the AKP's policy of rapprochement with the EU as the “sell-out” of the country. As for the Kurdish conflict , the party now relied on the military and supported a possible invasion of northern Iraq at the time . Baykal himself spoke out in favor of an invasion of Iraq . Through this development of the party under the leadership of Deniz Baykal, the nationalist, structurally conservative variant of Kemalism developed more strongly.

After Baykal's resignation in May 2010 due to the publication of a compromising video on the Internet, Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu took over the leadership of the party. At the 33rd party congress, which took place on May 22nd, he got 100% of the valid votes. Since then, the party has tended away from nationalist to more social-democratic politics. This has also been assessed by experts at home and abroad. Above all, she wants to address voters who have not benefited from the neoliberal , growth-oriented economic policy of the Erdoğan government . This stabilized the party's election results, but it remained limited to its core electorate in the urban-secular milieu in the west of the country.

For the 2014 local elections , in a political situation that was characterized by the open conflict between the AKP and the Gülen movement , the CHP also competed with politicians from religious or right-wing nationalist circles in important communities. In Ankara these include the former MHP politician Mansur Yavaş , in Hatay the incumbent but not re-elected AKP mayor of Antakya , Lütfü Savaş , and in Fatih with Sabri Erbakan the nephew of the former Prime Minister Necmettin Erbakan . This decision was not without controversy within the CHP. The long-time mayor of Şişli , Mustafa Sarıgül , who was expelled from the CHP in 2005 because he wanted to overthrow Baykal, the party leader at the time , ran for election in Istanbul .

In the parliamentary elections in June 2015 , the CHP was able to win a quarter of the votes, but the opposition at the time could not agree on any coalition, which meant that new elections had to be called. Although there was a slight increase in these, the majority in parliament was obtained by the AKP.

In April 2016, the chairman of the Turkish parliament , İsmail Kahraman of the Islamic conservative party AKP , called for a “religious constitution”. This met with criticism from the CHP:

“[...] Kahraman has shamelessly and openly attacked secularism, religious freedom and the republic . He did not utter these words without reason. The President of Parliament should resign immediately. We will defend our red line, laicism, down to the last CHP member [...] "

- CHP spokeswoman Selin Sayek Böke on April 27, 2016

In June and July 2017, chairman Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu held the “ Justice March” . This started the protest against the imprisonment of MP Enis Berberoğlu for the Cumhuriyet trial . According to the organizers, the final rally took place in front of two million people in Maltepe .

On July 18, 2016, Cemil Candas, CHP politician and deputy mayor of Şişli, was seriously injured in an attack in the head and died a few hours later. At the time of the attack, it was unclear whether this was related to the attempted coup on July 15 and 16, 2016.

For the presidential election on June 24, 2018 , Muharrem Ince was sent into the race, who achieved almost 30%, but had to admit defeat to incumbent Recep Tayyip Erdoğan . The CHP, on the other hand, suffered losses of almost three percent , which sparked a debate about the chairman in the party.

In the local elections on March 31, 2019 , the CHP won against both the AKP and the MHP in numerous large cities . Among others in the largest city of the country Istanbul , the capital Ankara and the tourist metropolis Antalya , whereby the party provides the mayor in eleven of the 30 metropolitan communities. In particular, the election victory in Istanbul with its prestigious significance and the previous cancellation caused an international sensation.

Party platform

Party founder Mustafa Kemal Ataturk (1935)

The party program of the CHP is under the motto Changes for a contemporary Turkey ( German  for Çağdaş Türkiye için değişim ). The party refers to its history and sees itself as the guardian of the principles of Mustafa Kemal Ataturk and his "revolutions" after the proclamation of the Republic of Turkey in 1923. The six arrows on the party logo are the ideological framework that comes from history: These represent republicanism , secularism , “ reformism ” (modernization of the state), statism , “ populism ” (in the sense of popular sovereignty ) and nationalism .

In its program, the party is committed to the republic, secularism and democracy. These principles are to be protected and developed with determination. The party regards a modern, self-determined and civilized nation with free citizens as the goal of its ideals. The program addresses the fact that one is against imperialism, systemic errors, inequalities, revisionism, exploitation and benefices. Turkey's accession to the European Union sought by the CHP is seen as the necessary completion of Ataturk's reforms to modernize Turkey.

electorate

Red and white party flags in Istanbul ahead of the 2009 local elections

The CHP finds its greatest approval among secular , religiously liberal Turks. In addition, there are the educated classes of the population and the Turkish Alevis , who played a key role when the republic was founded in 1923 . Its voters are particularly to be found in the European and urban and western-oriented regions in Eastern Thrace and on the coasts of the Aegean and Mediterranean . Its strongholds are the cities of Aydın , Muğla , Izmir , Tekirdağ , Çanakkale , Kırklareli , Edirne and the university town of Eskişehir .

International memberships

The party is a member of the Socialist International , the global association of social democratic and socialist parties, to which the German SPD , the Swiss SP and the Austrian SPÖ also belong, and is an associated member (observer status) of the Social Democratic Party of Europe (SPE).

Election results

Parliamentary and Senate elections

Until 1945, the CHP was the only approved party in Turkey. It was not until the 1946 elections that a competitor, the Democratic Party (DP), was added. In 1950 the CHP became second and was defeated by the Democratic Party. Between 1961 and 1980 the Turkish parliament consisted of two chambers, the National Assembly and the Senate of the Republic . On May 18, 2007, the CHP and the DSP decided to unite in an electoral alliance. The DSP candidates were supposed to compete on the CHP list in order to later form their own parliamentary group. In the 2007 election the party achieved a share of the vote of 20.88% and 112 seats in parliament . In the 2011 election , the election result improved to 25.95% and thus 135 seats in parliament. After the Kurdish party HDP joined the parliament, it won 132 seats again in June 2015.

The election results in detail are as follows:

year Total votes Votes in% Seats in parliament
1946 Not clear 85, 00 397
1950 3,176,561 39.45 69
1954 3,161,696 35.36 31
1957 3,753,136 41.09 178
National Assembly
year Total votes Votes in% Seats
1961 3,724,752 36.74 173
1965 2,675,785 28.75 134
1969 2,487,163 27.37 143
1973 3,570,583 33.30 185
1977 6,136,171 41.38 213
Senate of the Republic
year Total votes Votes in% Seats
1961 3,734,285 36.1 36
1964 1,125,783 40.8 19th
1966 877.066 29.6 13
1968 899.444 27.1 13
1973 1.412.051 33.6 25th
1975 2,281,470 43.4 25th
1977 2,037,875 42.4 28
1979 1,378,224 29.1 12
year Total votes Votes in% Seats in parliament
1995 3,011,076 10.71 49
1999 2,716,096 8.71 0
2002 6,114,843 19.39 177
2007 7,300,234 20.88 112
2011 11,142,541 25.98 135
June 2015 11,518,139 24.95 132
November 2015 12,111,812 25.32 134
2018 11,348,899 22.65 146

Presidential election

year Total votes Votes in% candidate
2014 15,434,167 38.57 Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu (together with the MHP )
2018 15,340,321 30.64 Muharrem Ince

literature

Web links

Commons : Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi  - collection of images, videos and audio files

Individual evidence

  1. ↑ Current membership numbers . Retrieved February 8, 2020 .
  2. ↑ Lea Frehse, Michael Thumann : Turkey: "The EU has alienated Turkish society". In: Zeit Online . May 18, 2016, accessed May 10, 2020 .
  3. ↑ Fatih Demirci: Kadro Hareketi ve Kadrocular , Dumlupınar Üniversitesi Sosyal Bilimler Dergisi, 2006, sayı 15.
  4. ↑ Ergüder, J. 1927 Komünist Tevkifatı, "İstanbul Ağır Ceza Mahkemesindeki Duruşma" , Birikim Yayınları, İstanbul, 1978
  5. ↑ Başvekalet Kararlar Dairesi Müdürlüğü 15 Aralık 1937 tarih, 7829 nolu kararname , accessed on February 15, 2019.
  6. ↑ Tasarım: Emre Baydur: TÜRKİYE BÜYÜK MİLLET MECLİSİ. Retrieved August 15, 2018 .
  7. ↑ Ilia Xypolia: British Imperialism and Nationalism Turkish Cyprus, 1923-1939 . Routledge, 2018, ISBN 978-1-138-22129-1 , pp. 11 .
  8. ↑ a b Michael Neumann-Adrian, Christoph K. Neumann: Turkey - A country and 9,000 years of history . Paul List Verlag, Munich, ISBN 3-471-78225-7 .
  9. ↑ Catching votes with Erdogan's wristwatch . derStandard.at ; Retrieved July 19, 2007.
  10. ↑ chance lots left . The standard online; Retrieved March 15, 2007.
  11. ↑ "The race to power has begun" . ( tagesspiegel.de [accessed on April 3, 2017]).
  12. ↑ CHP'de Mansur Yavaş tartışması , Milliyet, December 15, 2013 (Turkish)
  13. ↑ CHP'li Sabahat Akkiraz'a olüm tehdidi! , Cumhuriyet, December 19, 2013 (Turkish)
  14. ↑ Boris Kálnoky: The man who wants to teach Erdogan to fear, Die Welt, February 26, 2014
  15. ↑ a b Turn away from secularism? FAZ , April 27, 2016; accessed on July 24, 2016
  16. ↑ Selin Sayek Böke: CHP member Böke: Laicism is our red line. (No longer available online.) Milliyet , April 28, 2016, archived from the original on July 24, 2016 ; Retrieved on July 24, 2016 (press statement of April 27, 2016): “[…] Kahraman has shamelessly and openly attacked secularism, religious freedom and the republic. He did not utter these words without reason. The President of Parliament should resign immediately. We will defend our red line, laicism, down to the last CHP member [...] "
  17. ↑ Media: Vice-Mayor of Istanbul shot dead . eveningzeitung-muenchen.de, July 18, 2016; Retrieved July 18, 2016
  18. ^ Deutsche Welle (www.dw.com): The Turkish opposition abolishes itself | DW | 08/09/2018. Retrieved August 15, 2018 .
  19. ^ Party program of the CHP. ( Memento from January 24, 2011 in the Internet Archive ; PDF; 1.2 MB) (Turkish)
  20. ↑ LMd : Turkey - old forces, new fronts of July 9, 2015; accessed on October 30, 2015
  21. ↑ a b Republican People's Party (CHP) . Federal Agency for Civic Education , October 10, 2014; accessed on October 30, 2015
  22. ↑ Turkish left-wing parties form an electoral alliance . derStandard.at ; Retrieved May 19, 2007.