Human Rights in Turkey - Freedom of Association

Freedom of Association

The law provides for freedom of association. Under the law persons organizing an association do not need to notify authorities beforehand, but an association must provide notification before interacting with international organizations or receiving financial support from abroad, and must provide detailed documents on such activities.

The Constitution affirms the right of workers to form labor unions "without obtaining permission" and "to possess the right to become a member of a union and to freely withdraw from membership" (Article 51). Articles 53 and 54 affirm the right of workers to bargain collectively and to strike, respectively.

Until March 2008 a total of 26 political parties had been banned, two of them before the Constitutional Court (the place where such decisions are taken) was established on 25 April 1962. This figure does not include the 18 political parties that were banned immediately after the 1980 coup d'état and dissolved on 16 October 1981. The Grand National Assembly of Turkey passed Law 2533 on 19 June 1992 allowing these parties to be opened again.

The Foundation for social, economic and political research (TESAV) has detailed information on the closure of political parties. They list ten political parties (instead of two) that were closed before the Constitutional Court was established. The details are (in collapsible tables)

1. political parties closed before the Constitutional Court was founded:

2. Political parties closed by the Constitutional Court

For the number of associations, trade unions, political parties and cultural centres that were closed down or raided the Human Rights Association presented the following figure for the years 1999 to 2008: