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Ergun Özbudun is Professor of Political Science and Constitutional Law at İstanbul Şehir University, Turkey. He has also taught at the University of Chicago, Columbia University, and Princeton University. His books in English include Party Cohesion in Western Democracies: A Causal Analysis (Sage, 1970); Social Change and Political Participation in Turkey (Princeton University Press, 1976); Contemporary Turkish Politics: Challenges to Democratic Consolidation (Lynne Rienner, 2000); Islamism, Democracy and Liberalism in Turkey: The Case of the AKP (with William Hale) (Routledge, 2010); and The Constitutional System of Turkey: 1876 to the Present (Palgrave Macmillan, 2011). He has also coedited five books and contributed to such international journals as Comparative Politics, the International Journal of Middle East Studies, the Journal of Democracy, European Constitutional Law Review, European Public Law, South European Society, and Politics, Democratization, and Representation.
On September 30, 2013, Prime Minister Recep Tayyip Erdoğan announced his government’s long-awaited reform or “democratization” package. In Turkey’s highly polarized political atmosphere, responses ranged from describing the package as a historical victory for democracy that will finally free Turkey from heavy chains imposed upon it for decades, to an electoral ploy designed to polish the country’s badly damaged image as a result of the Gezi Park incidents, with no substantial improvements in democratic standards. As often is the case, the truth lies in the middle.
