Change in the voting behavior of Turkish votes: From the economic voting model to nationalist-conservative populism (1983-2018)

In countries where democracy is dominant, the role of elections is important from a political science and historical point of view. In this study, the theories of the voting models that dominate the world and Turkey are examined. In accordance with the laws and regulations, the developments that are effective in the decision-making mechanism of one or more candidates or parties during the election period have been examined within the framework of emerging theories. The first general elections of the Turkish Republic were held in 1935. The first election, in which more than one party participated, took place in 1950. In this study, the general elections that took place between 1980-2018 are based on. It is obvious that the economic voting model was an important argument for Turkish voters in the process until 2008. However, with the economic crisis experienced in 2008, the importance of the economic voting model began to decline and the discourses of "nationalist-conservative populism" began to gain importance on the voters. In the Turkish political elections, a hypothesis has been put forward in order to explain what happened or how it happened on the basis of the change experienced in the decision-making process of the voters. The study was shaped around this hypothesis and used qualitative, quantitative and survey data together to prove its accuracy.