Does policy style shift when the political regime changes? Insights from Turkey

Abstract

This article applies the concept of 'policy styles' to Turkey in order to contribute to the scholarly debate on the relationship between policy styles and political regime. By uncovering the distinctive features of Turkey's policy processes through a within-case comparative approach, I advance two arguments. First, while policy styles are commonly viewed in literature as determined by administrative traditions, political institutions and policy paradigms, Turkey's policy style has been more responsive to electoral politics, and, until recently, problem situation, in particular crises. Second, policy style is both a cause and a consequence of regime change. Turkey's policy style has displayed both continuities as well as differences as it descended into authoritarianism. The characteristics of the policy style gradually undermine institutions of democracy. As democratic backsliding proceeds, government redesigns the institutional context of policy-making, reinforcing and consolidating the anti-democratic features of the policy style.