Ethics and transparency in the perspective of Turkish public administration

The concepts of ethics and transparency as fundamental principles of contemporary public administration, with a particular focus on the Turkish public sector. Ethics refers to the set of moral principles guiding the behaviors of public officials, while transparency ensures the accountability, accessibility, and openness of administrative processes to the public. These two principles are evaluated as mutually reinforcing elements that play a crucial role in promoting democratic governance, public trust, and service quality in public administration. The theoretical framework of the study provides a historical and philosophical overview of ethical thinking, focusing on major ethical theories such as deontological ethics, utilitarianism, and virtue ethics. The research also explores the nature of ethical dilemmas in public service and discusses various approaches for resolving them. Transparency is analyzed through the lenses of accountability, access to information, and citizen participation. Furthermore, modern public administration paradigms—including traditional public administration, new public management, governance, and public value management—are discussed in relation to ethics and transparency. In the context of Turkish public administration, the study evaluates the legal and institutional reforms implemented since the early 2000s, including the establishment of the Council of Ethics for Public Officials (Law No. 5176) and the enactment of the Right to Information Law (Law No. 4982). Despite these efforts, several challenges persist, such as the lack of a strong ethical culture, political interference, limited enforcement of ethical codes, and insufficient ethical training for civil servants.