The republic of Turkey's political life and the changes on its political culture after 1980

The Turkish Republic was founded in 1923 by Mustafa Kemal Atatürk. He thenbecame the first president and started a process of changes in the country in orderto unlink it from the heritage of the Ottoman Empire. After his death in 1938, hewas replaced by Ismet İnönü in the presidency. But in 1946 and 1950 the Turkishpeople had the chance to choose their representatives in a multi-party system.The Turkish electorate began to show a preference for center-right parties, apreference that would last until the beginning of the 1990?s. Three times werewhen the order was not being assured in the country that the military intervenedthrough coups: 1960, 1971 and 1980. The one from 1960, through its liberalconstitution, started a process of political fragmentation and restored the multipartysystem in the country; the one in 1971 banned parties that were considereddangerous for the state and promoted some amendments in the constitution inorder to make it stricter; and the one in 1980 was considered the strictest one,since it banned all the political parties and wished to de-politicize the populationand avoid a new party fragmentation through a completely new constitution. Eventhough several new parties emerged in the 1980?s, the population seemed to stillsupport the center-right parties. But the 1990?s showed a new reality in thecountry?s political culture: the population started to move towards the extremeright,supporting parties with nationalist and Islamist programs.