I have looked at the arguments in the topic for some time. I've observed that people in Turkey doesn't have any clear grasp on how US government works well with a presidential system. It's ok. US government is much complicated then it looks and even some US citizens doesn't know how their government works. If you understand how presidential system works in US then the argument that Turkey can be a unitary presidential government will become invalid.
Well let me put this clearly. There would NOT be a presidential system in US government if US local governments weren't as federal as today.
As we all know presidential system wows to make a seperate election for electing executive branch of the government. In this election people directly elect a president to become responsible for the entire executive branch. Meaning there is no coalition. Not in the sense that we know it in Europe anyway. I've seperately explained the situation blow in paranthesis. If you're interested you can read below. However this is a very rare situation.
(Sometimes third party candidates gets large amount of votes, this results with no one getting the majority in Electoral College. To get majority candidates can agree to give executive positions to their competitors to get some from them. This is in a sense coalition. But unlike European type after forming the coalition there is no way to "break" it. Third party candidate has no way to withdraw it's support. It happens rarely. If Electoral College fails to select the president, the House of Representitives tries to elect one among the candidates in top three in popular elections. House of Representitives has no right to call for re-election. They will go on voting until they elect one President. In that situation vice-President is elected by Senate.)
This non-coalition type of winner takes all government has some drawbacks for the Presidents of course. In Turkey city governors are directly appointed by our Prime Minister. In US each state holds a seperate local election to elect their own governors. Additionally each state has it's own legislative and judiciary branches. Which means president can't appoint Michigan's governor or state attorney from Washington. Also each city in the state makes municipal elections to elect a mayor. Unlike Turkey elected mayor of the city picks the chief of police in this city. Each city has it's own police organization meaning that out of that city's border that city's police is just a regular folk without any authority. In Turkey our Prime Ministers simply appoints a chief of police for a city as they please. Relocate them as they want. Even relocate the police force under the chief of police. US police is composed of local people meaning you can't bring police from one state and make him work in a particular state and let alone from Washington it can't even be influenced by the governor in that state. In US the situation of the police force is very similar to
Zabıta in Turkey. Of course with much larger authority.
Another issue is education. Education system is local in US. There is no centeralized Federal control over education. The places where there is a school that location is defined as School District in US. Each school district is regarded like a seperate municipal entity. They make their own elections apart from city Mayor. Voters elect a school board in a city which is responsible for the school districts. Each school district collects their own taxes (doesn't seek fund from federal government or state government), manage their own budger, hire their own teachers, design their own curriculums, construct their own facilities and handle their own security. In Turkey our prime ministers can appoint teachers directly. Central government decides which teacher work in which school. Decides for the curriculum for every school, central government police is the only security in schools. Central government also decides the budget of every school and fund them.
And the final thing is attornies and judges in districts. There are different types of courts in US. There are Federal Courts which only looks at Federal crimes and managed by Federal Government - This is equivalent of old DGM in Turkey. There are state courts which handles handles vast majority cases and their officers are locally elected. There are district attorney elections in each US district. People elect an attorney to become the district attorney for a limited time. Of course this election has no universal suffrage. There are certain preconditions such as a law degree and certain amount of experience as attorney. District Attorney in US is equivalent to Turkish
baş savcı. Furthermore there is a local election for electing a judge. It's called Retention Election. In order to become a judge in a district court a judge should get majority vote in a retention election. Retention election works like a referandum.
A typical one :
Shall each of the persons listed be retained in office as Judge of the Appellate Court, First Judicial District?
Michael J. Gallagher, Yes or No
Margaret Stanton McBride, Yes or No
For each judge in that district they perform this election every cycle and that works like a vote of confidence. If a judge can't get majority vote that person loses it's judge status immediately in a state court. If a person wants to work as a judge in a certain district court that person enters this election from scratch and tries to get 51% vote of confidence for his/her first term. In Turkey judges and attornies are appointed by HSYK which is directly tied to Ministry of Justice in 2010 referandum. Central government appoints judges and attornies to each district court. Decides which district each judge and attorny will work and evaluates their performence. Even decides who will be a judge or attorney.
Now as you one can see such a localization takes away one of the most strategic tool in a leader's hand. Which is appointment. Each state elect their government seperately with respect to their own local culture. Each city in a state also elects their own schoold boards, judges, attornies etc. Police force is almost completely localized. US President mainly appoints for Federal positions. Even for those appointments the president should take approval from senate. Senate may reject a President's appointment. Senate also has the authority to make trials like a judge(called impeachment) against Federal officers appointed. In this type of situations House of Representitives works like an attorney and forms the case against the Federal employee. Senete takes the role of the judge looks at the allegations and tries the employee. Even President can be called for impeachment. In 1999 Bill Clinton was summoned for an impeachment. A more up to date example is impeachment of Hillary Clinton after Benghazi attacks in 2012. Senate can convict a Federal Employee (including President) for treason, bribery, misuse of power etc.
Therefore we can clearly see that localization in US effectively takes away appointment power of the president. Besides there is a primary process in each Party in US. That primary process not only ensures that party officers are elected directly by the voters. Besides lists of senators and congressmen are not determined by the party leaders. Meaning there may be multiple candidates from the same party for a certain seat in congress or Senate. In Turkey leader of the party decides the list of candidate parliament members. That puts a huge control on the ideological spectrum of the party. Besides elected parliament members eventually become like a robot. They know that if they goes against the will of their party, they won't be able to enter parliament again since they won't be shown as a candidate from their party in the concurrent election cycle.
Now this type of government clearly means that state control will virtually diminish in Kurdish inhabited areas. The local police will be subject to their ultimate boss which is the city mayor in US system. In such a situation the police force formed by HDP mayors will not only stop helping for the fight against PKK but also try to blockade the fight or help the terrorist. Heck we won't even be able to be sure that the police itself is PKK affiliate.
School district system will completely dimish Turkish government's promotion of single language education. As one can easily guess the school board elected in Diyarbakır will immediately change the language of education to Kurdish. They might not even give Turkish as a second language.
An elected judge and attorney in Şırnak can effectively destroy a military officer's life working in that city. There can be a lot of false allegations but since both judge and attorney will be elected by people of Şırnak they will most probably hate every person who is working for the central government. If a soldier kills a terrorist in Şırnak they may very well temper with the evidence easily and try the soldiers or officers who killed that terrorist easily for murder.
If Turkey goes on it's unitary state system, preventing coalitions and giving all the appointment power to president who also controls the entire political party that he is affiliated including candidacy lists is not a good idea. Clearly this means uncontrolled power. President's ultimate control over it's own political party will effectively dimish the role of the senate. Senators will know that if they ever gets on the way of the President that Senator's political life is over. That's why that check mechanism will be extremely biased. Furthurmore unitary system provides unprecedented power of appointment to President. We all know that as our latest coup shows central government is never good at appointing people. In order to make local offices as loyal as possible certain religious organizations are used which end up seeking their own agenda.
@LeveragedBuyout hey my friend. It's been a very long time. I hope you enjoy my comparison of Turkish and US governmental systems. I'd be glad to hear you opinions as well.
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