The role of women in CHP political activities and women's branches (1923-1960)

With the transition from the political single-party period to the multi-party period, important problems have emerged in the field of women's participation in political life. In order to eliminate these problems, women's branches were established within the headquarters of the Republican People's Party. In this article, the perspective of both society and political parties on women was taken into consideration, and the necessity of the women's branches in politics was emphasized in the context of women's participation in political life. The aim of the article is to collect the necessary information about women's branches, which form the basis of women's political work areas and to focus on how women can become active in the political scene. Focusing on the gender inequality between men and women that exists in society, it was emphasized that awareness comes only from biological creation and it was seen that it is necessary for a Turkey that has reached the grade of modern civilization for women to exist in either of the social, economic and political fields with their intelligence and attention to fine details as long as they wish. In this context, the struggle of women who gained public rights to participate in political life was emphasized and it was mentioned that their struggle yielded results with the establishment of women's branches. The establishment of women's branches, which are intended to be established in order to minimize the problem of under-representation of women in politics in Turkey and are integrated in the Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi (Republican People's Party) guideline for the first time, in order to make women's active in political life not in passive part of it. However, women's inability to take part in decision-making mechanisms in political party centers as desired and the current lack of representation in politics are among the most important women's issues in Turkey. In this article that we have prepared aims to examine the demographic characteristics, their political party activities and the factors that affecting their political activities which is been for the first time in Turkey's politics by Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi(Republican People's Party)'s guideline. In this article the purpose of the establishment of Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi(Republican People's Party)'s women's branches and their operating system were mentioned. And for signalize how important is the women's branches for political order, the political party line's, advertisement of party manifesto were mentioned either.