The beginning of modernization in Turkish criminal procedure law

This study examines the beginning of modernization in Turkish criminal procedure law. The phenomenon of modernization in criminal procedure was established worldwide with the French Code d'instruction criminelle of 1808. In Turkey, as in other Continental European countries, this modernization process began with the adoption of the aforementioned code with certain modifications in 1879 under the name Usûl-i Muhâkemât-ı Cezâiye Kânûn-ı Muvakkati. The development and modernization of Continental European criminal procedure did not occur suddenly but emerged over time through a dialectical process. In this study, this process is described as the path leading to the Code d'instruction criminelle of 1808, and the stages of this path are indicated. The criminal procedure practices in ancient Rome, the criminal procedure practices of the Germanic tribes, and the inquisitorial procedure shaped around Canon law centered on the Roman Catholic Church were influential steps in the development of Continental European criminal procedure. The fact that the inquisitorial procedure deprived the accused of legal safeguards in the pursuit of material truth and systematically violated human rights by operating mechanisms like clockwork using torture as a tool eventually led to criticism, and with these criticisms being put into action after the French Revolution period, it gave rise to the search for a new criminal procedure system. The name of this path is the Code d'instruction criminelle, which directly influenced all Continental European criminal procedure law. The modernization process for Europe began with this code. The modernization process of Turkish criminal procedure law took place within a framework different from the internal dynamics of European criminal procedure. In this context, the development of Turkish criminal procedure law was shaped depending on time, geography, social living conditions, and political structure. In this regard, Turkish criminal procedure law in the pre-classical period carried a practical character brought by nomadic life, while in the classical period it transitioned to a more systematic paradigm with the institutionalization of Islamic law. Within the framework of legal reforms made after the Tanzimat Edict (Tanzimat Fermanı), the extensive adoption of the Code d'instruction criminelle from French law to improve criminal procedure law incorporated Turkish criminal procedure law into a new paradigm. This new paradigm is modern criminal procedure.