23 - The Military in the Material Constitution of Turkey

Summary

The concept of material constitution is helpful to understand how particular constitutional orders are created and operate, inviting observers to look beyond the formal constitution, showing the shortcomings of the exclusive focus on the formal constitution and offering tools to enquire into the underpinning materiality. While the material study of a particular constitution requires a detailed thorough research of the forces that condition a material constitutional order, we can show the usefulness of the enquiry through selected aspects of a constitutional order. This chapter aims to do that by explaining the military’s role in constitution-making in Turkey. While the military is a defining constitutional actor in Turkey, recognition of this in the formal constitution is very limited. Only through accounting for the constitutional role of the military can the materiality of the Turkish Constitution be grasped and a more accurate description of the Turkish constitutional order be provided. Through an overview of its role in the making and re-making of the 1961 and 1982 Constitutions, the military is introduced as an ordering force in the Turkish Constitution, explaining the military’s constituent and ongoing authority over the constitutional order and its role in guaranteeing the fundamental political objectives of that order.