CHP’nin Sosyal Demokrasi Serüveni
The CHP's Social Democracy Adventure

Summary/Abstract: The philosophy of social democracy started to become widespread in the Western European countries especially after the Second World War. In the aftermath of the war, the level of employment increased, the wages raised, the social security services expanded and so the notion of “welfare state” emerged as a significant component of social democracy. However, social democratic parties have faced a severe crisis as of midst of the 1970s due to the rising costs of social services as well as in the 1980s due to the increasing pace of globalization and the dissolution of the Soviet Union. In order to overcome the crisis of social democracy, the notion of “the third way” was formulated as a result of which the social democratic parties began to come to power again. In Turkey, the social democratic politics is a relatively new phenomena compared with the Western Europe. The Republican People’s Party has defined itself as a social democratic party through adoption of the rhetoric of “left-of-center”“ in the 1960s, “democratic left” in the 1970s, “new left” in the 1990s and the “new CHP” since 2010. This study analyzes the party identity of the CHP as formulated in its program or bylaw in both the pre- 1980 and post-1980 periods to put forth to what extent it is compatible with the principles of social democracy.

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