Analysis of political budget fluctuations in Turkey

Political cyclical fluctuations are explained as the parties in power manipulating the economy by using monetary and fiscal policy tools in order to be re-elected due to elections. Political budget fluctuations are; It is expressed as the fluctuations that the ruling parties create in the budget by using fiscal policy tools in order to be re-elected. In this study, it will be analysed whether such manipulations took place in Turkey after 1990. It will be tried to determine the changes that the ruling parties made in the state budget by using fiscal policy tools before and after the elections. This study was limited to Türkiye and data from the period 1990-2023 was used. The study consists of 4 parts. In the first part; In the theoretical framework, general information about the political business cycle fluctuations literature will be given. In the second part of the study; By examining the empirical studies in the literature, it will be determined comparatively which methods and data were used in the studies and which results were reached. In the third part of the study; Information on Basic Data Regarding the Election and Information on Macroeconomic Variables will be given. Information will be provided about the central government and local government budgets in Turkey from 1990 until 2023. In the fourth part of the study; Econometric analysis is carried out to determine whether the opportunistic and partisan model is valid in Turkey. In the conclusion part of the study, theoretical and empirical findings are evaluated and suggestions based on these findings are given. As a result, the supporting years for public expenditures for the opportunistic model are 1999, 2018 and 2023. For Public Revenues; 1991, 2015 and 2018; For domestic debt, the election years that support the opportunistic model are 1991 and 2023. For external debt; Election years supporting the opportunistic model were found to be 2002 and 2011.