The Military Intervention: 27 May 1960 and its
aftermath (1960-1971)
W4
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The 1961 Constitution which ironically came
into effect in the aftermath of a coup d’etat
was the most liberal constitution of the
Turkish Republic.
It was the fundamental law of Turkey from
1961 to 1982. It was introduced following the
1960 coup d'état, replacing the earlier
Constitution of 1924. It was approved in a
referendum held on 9 July 1961, with 61.7%
of the nation voting in favor.
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The 1961 constitution brought novelties
including defining and securing basic rights
and freedoms, protecting national treasures,
mentioning of terms such as social state,
social justice and human dignity in the text
and the founding of a senate, the National
Security Council, or MGK; the State Planning
Organization, or DPT, and the Constitutional
Court.
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The period between 1960 and 1980 is
also significant as Turkey introduced
planned economics or the Import
Substitution Industrialisation model.
What was the importance of this period
in contemporary Turkish politics?
What are the links between the inherent
dynamics of this model and the two
military interventions of 1971 and 1980?
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What is ISI?
ISI can be defined as protecting the industry in order to
establish an industrial sector. Since competition with the
international capital is out of question, only the domestic
industrial sectors will be developed. Implementing ISI
does not mean that direct foreign capital investment will
be opposed. It neither means that domestic economy’s
integration with the world economy will be severed.
In fact ISI is dependent on the import of capital goods as
well as the raw materials and the intermediate goods. The
potential volume of the industrial production becomes
dependent on the potential volume of the imports that
constitute the input for industrial production.
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In this model, technology, capital goods (goods used
in the production of other goods or commodities.
Capital goods include factories, machinery, tools,
equipment) and inputs were imported and the final
product was domestically produced.
Finding foreign exchange has been the significant
determinant for the sustainability of this strategy
because the ISI was dependent on the import of
technology, primary and intermediary inputs.
These contradictions of the system became more
visible with the crisis that hit the world economy in
the 1970s, which led to an abandonement of the ISI
in 1980.
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Planning was the central pillar of this system.
Yet planning was not seen as something
peculiar to socialism. The Turkish bureucracy
which engaged in planning economy under
the auspices of the military saw the state
sector and the private sector complementary
rather than mutually exclusive and thus
antagonistic.
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Development plans envisaged a mixed
economic framework in which the interests of
the private sector was served by the services
and
production
provided
by
public
enterprises.
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In the new period that started, Turkey was still
dependent on imports for almost all industrial
goods apart from processed foodstuffs, textiles
and iron and steel: almost all consumer durables
had to come from abroad.
Therefore, there was a deliberate attempt during
the period 1963-73 to use trade policy to
promote import-substituting industrialization in
which heavy reliance was placed on controlling
imports through prohibitions.
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This era is also remarkable for it signifies the
beginning of Turkey’s relationship with the
European Economic Community (EEC) which later
evolved into the European Union.
Although Menderes government applied for an
associate membership in the European Economic
Community (EEC) in late 1950s, EEC only granted
this membership to Turkey under the Ankara
Agreement
of
1963
following
lengthy
negotiations.
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This agreement, which was put into effect in
December 1964, was a stage by stage integration
process towards eventual full membership in the EC.
The process was to start with preparations for
lowering of trade barriers and at later stages allow for
free mobility of labor between Turkey and the
Community.
Due to Turkey’s Import Substitution Industrialisation
Model (hereafter ISI) policies, there was not much
change in its economic relations with the EC during
the 1960s. Turkey’s trade flows with Europe and the
rest of the world were largely unchanged in this
period.
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As the ISI was built on a protection strategy
of the local industry, creating an internal
market became imperative. The manufacture
industry that was constructed in the 1930s by
the state and the private sector, constituted
the technological support and entrepreneurs
needed for the ISI.
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The State Economic Enterprises (SEE), which
aimed on the one hand to provide industry with
cheap inputs and on the other hand provide
cheap consumption goods for the wage earners,
contributed in the profits of the industry by
keeping the labour costs and price of the inputs
low.
Accumulation in the agriculture sector that
started in the 1950s was another factor that
contributed in the development of an internal
market.
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In this respect, an important product of the
ISI turned out to be the organised working
class. The ISI necessitated consumers with
sufficient discretionary income and wage
levels became an instrument of simulating
the internal demand.
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Yet it was not only the internal dynamics of the
ISI that led to the rise of an organised working
class. The 1961 Constitution provided the legal
framework for the working classes to establish
their own economic and political organisations,
albeit within certain limitations.
The Unions Law issued in 1963 brought the right
to union for all working people. This law also
provided a relative freedom in terms of the
union’s relations with politics. The unions are
permitted to become a pressure group in the
political arena without however, having any
organic relations with the political parties.
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Consequently,
the
real
wages
increased
significantly every year in the sectors where the
workers were organised.
Workers were organised best in these large scale
sectors that used modern technology and mostly
collaborated with foreign capital. These new
sectors permitted the working class to organize
and voice their demands, in order to integrate
them to the system both politically and by
making them an important component of the
internal market .
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On the contrary, workers who worked in
small-scale industries could not benefit from
the rights that were gained as a result of
unionization. They had no right to strike, no
right to collective bargaining, and in some
cases the employers tried to omit their social
insurance .
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The most important characteristic of the ISI was
the creation of an industrial bourgeoisie. The big
bourgeoisie that flourished in this era was either
monopolist or oligopolistic.
In the absence of external competition, the big
bourgeoisie enjoyed the benefits of protection.
The profit margin was high due to both the
prevention of competition and the establishment
of monopolies or oligopolies in the internal
market. The big bourgeoisie also benefited from
the subvention programs. These subventions
enabled the big bourgeoisie to benefit from low
priced inputs, low- cost credits and tax returns.
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The most important manifestation of the increasing
power of the big bourgeoisie is the foundation of
TÜSİAD in the year 1971.
The big industrialists could afford more liberal
economic measures and a less protected economy.
They sought a higher share of scarce foreign
exchange and credits to finance their large-scale
operations. Unlike the small industrialists they could
afford higher wages.
Because they were engaged in the production of
durable consumer goods they preferred levels of
income that could support increasing internal
demand. Lower wages would threaten the domestic
market on which they were dependent to sell their
goods.
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The period that started with the 1960
intervention became the stage for intensifying
class struggle that reached a pinnacle in the late
1970s. 1960s were the beginning of a process in
which the working class started to acquire a
political consciousness and raised not only
economic demands but social and political
demands as well.
Türkiye İşçi Partisi (TİP) (TLP) was established
after 1960 coup and the party benefited from the
support of growing student population and the
growing industrialized proletariat from mid
1960s onwards.
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The most important development in this
respect is the establishment of DİSK-
Devrimci İşçi Sendikaları Konfederasyonu-
(Revolutionary Workers Union Confederation).
DİSK was established in 1967 by a group of
unions which withdrew from Türk-İş, the only
workers confederation of the day.
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In contradiction to Türk-İş’s ineffective and at
times conformist position, DİSK developed an
active, militant struggle that put forward the
class interests in 1968-1970.
Although there was an
organisation in the
increasingly became
important workplaces in
effort to prevent its
public sector, it
organised in the
the private sector
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This period also witnessed the flowering of
extremist right wing and left wing groups in the
permissive environment of 1960 Constitution.
These groups later became responsible for
inflicting political violence which led to the death
of thousands of people.
Especially from the end of 1968 onwards and
increasingly during 1969 and 1970 the violence
of the Left was met and surpassed by violence
from the militant right, notably Türkeş’s Milliyetçi
Hareket Partisi (MHP) (NAP) and its commandos.
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By early 1971 the government, weakened by
defections,
seemed
to
have
become
paralysed. It was powerless to act to curb the
violence on the campuses and in the streets
and could not hope to get any serious
legislation on social or financial reform
passed in the assembly.
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This was the situation when, on 12 March 1971 the
chief of the general staff handed the prime minister a
memorandum, which really amounted to an
ultimatum by the armed forces. It demanded that a
strong and credible government be formed which
would be able to end the ‘anarchy’ and carry out
reforms ‘in a Kemalist spirit’.
If the demand were not met, the army would
‘exercise its constitutional duty’ and take over power
itself. The parliament was not dissolved but the
elected government in power was replaced with an
appointed one, and the declaration of martial law
provided the means for exercising repression.