Date of Award

Spring 8-1-2003

Document Type

Dissertation

Degree Name

Master of Public Administration (MPA)

Department

Political Science

First Advisor

Glenn Perry

Abstract

In this paper, I study the Turkish political elite in terms of their social background and the legislative behavior. The study examines occupational, educational, and local birth connection status of the members of the 21 st term Turkish Grand National Assembly (TGNA) serving between 1999 and 2002. The study compares the parliamentary elites across the ideological inclinations and the demographical divisions of their constituencies. In terms of legislative behavior, I use questioning behaviors as a behavioral indicator for the 21st term TGNA members. I obtained the data from the Grand National Assembly official website. The website contains information concerning the social backgrounds and questioning information of all 534 deputies. I randomly selected 111 deputies for my analyses. I designed several tables to compare variables. I find that, in terms of occupational background, bureaucracy and business play a significant role in the political recruitment for the 21st TGNA. In terms of educational background, business, engineering, and law degrees are preferred. Findings of this study also indicate that the deputies from different ideological inclinations and demographical divisions have several differences in their social backgrounds. I also find that although local birth connections are an important recruiting factor for the Turkish deputies, they do not have a clear impact on deputies' local questioning behaviors. Moreover, I have found that the deputies representing some areas of Eastern Turkey, a less developed region, asked more locally related questions than those representing more developed regions. Though there surely are many factors that can affect deputies' questioning behavior, the level of development of constituencies represented by each deputy may also be a significant factor influencing the questioning behavior. However, the findings of this paper would be more meaningful if further research compares them to other nations. A comprehensive comparison of Turkey to other European Union countries will answer the vital question: how developed is the Turkish parliamentary system compared to those of European countries with parliamentary traditions? Considering the two continent position of Turkey. and the Europea11 Union integration period of Turkey by being a part of Middle East in tenns of her geographical, cultural, and religious ties, this question is crucial. This study can be perceived as a small attempt to answer this vital question.

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