"Deciding which party to vote for" in 3 November 2002 elections : the case of Tire, Turkey

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Thesis Type: Postgraduate

Institution Of The Thesis: Middle East Technical University, Faculty of Economic and Administrative Sciences, Department of Political Science and Public Administration, Turkey

Approval Date: 2006

Thesis Language: English

Student: Özlem Gölgelioğlu

Supervisor: AYŞE AYATA

Abstract:

The aim of this thesis is to analyze the political behavior and party preferences of the voters at the 3 November 2002 elections in terms of the concept “New Political Behavior”. The structure of this thesis is as follows: In the first chapter, the basic theoretical framework of the concept political behavior is examined. In this chapter, the concept “new political behavior” is discussed in detail. In the second chapter, the political environment, institutions, traditions and transformation of the Turkish political system are analyzed. The empirical part of this thesis has examined the applicability of the concept “new political behavior” on 3 November 2002 with an analysis of the interviews which are made in Tire. The main conclusion of this study is that, the traditional approaches remained limited in explaining the picture that has emerged after 3 November 2002 elections, and the consequences of 3 November 2002 elections can be evaluated as evidence of a just occurring phenomena “new political behavior concept”, by emphasizing the similarities rather than differences between the findings and the concept.