A Critics of the Modernization Process of Political Campaigns in Turkey and A Trial of Periodization

Political campaign has begun to transform in the United States of America after 1950s, in Europe after 1970s, and almost all over the world after that. This process is named as modernization of political campaigns and it symbolises the big transformation of the relationship between media- politics- citizens and of course an alteration in the political area followed this process. In the few studies about Turkish political campaigns in Turkey, the transformation of political campaign is accepted as a given process and the election processes are viewed through this idea. In this study, I try to look in a critical perspective and claim that the global transformations affect the unique countries, but this occurs in an area that combines the countries political and cultural system. In this context, I tried to categorize the transformation of political campaigns in Turkey in three historical parts, first part is between 1983 and 1987, the second part is between 1991 and 1999, and the last one is between 2002 and 2011. In the study, I tried to consider the structural developments, the control methods of Turkish government on political participation, and the specific circumstances of the every period.