Social anatomy of Turkish top political elites in contemporary turkey

Abstract

Turkey has a strategic place in world politics. As Ahmad (1991: 226 and 1993) said, Turkey's strategic location on the Straits and on the cross-roads between Europe and Asia will remain unchanged. Turkey is a meeting point between Europe and Asia not only geographically, but also ideologically between Eastern and Western civilisation The Turkish secular and democratic system has provided a model to both the Islamic Middle East and the new Turkish states of the former Soviet Union.
    The new state was created from the ruins of the Ottoman Empire in 1920s. Turkey has turned her face completely to the west since the foundation of the Republic. The economic and social development, as Hale examined (Hale, 1981), have proceeded in a predominantly liberal competitive political system since the 1940s.
    This paper will concern itself with the Turkish political leaders. Firstly, a brief information about the political structure of contemporary Turkey will be given. Then, the major findings on Turkish top political elites will be presented. The top political elites comprise all the presidents, presidents of the TGNA, prime ministers, and ministers who served in three or more cabinets during the whole modern Republican history of Turkey. In doing this, the variables of age, educational level, education type, occupation, foreign languages, gender and marital status, family size were used.