Germany and Turkey: Successful Governance as a Function of History (Part 1)

Mohammed Sultan - محمد سلطان 

After the fall of the superpowers-world and the bipolar-based structure of the international political arena, several concepts and orientations have been brought to the surface focusing on new aspects of governance. The dilemma of how to keep the masses under control has been always the main attention of the politicians, and after the very high paced and swift changes in the international community and world order, particularly after the World Wars and the race of arms in a world dominated by the Realistic approach, new variables were seen as the determinants for the required political stability and prosperity. Accordingly, the liberal school after the new birth of the U.S as the one major power has been calling for the wise governance. Such call is mainly derived out of the Breton-Woods entities, The World Bank and the IMF formed by the major actors in the international society, and thus it depicted good governance as the process of governing a country contrary to what had been done before the decisive defeat of the Axis Powers, 1945 ( S, Edward & Robert, A, 1973 ). Such new way of governance came in loaded with many alternations and differences of models that ultimately accounted for having very wide politically and economically poor countries versus very advanced ones.

Thus, in my research paper I will try to deeply analyze the roots of such dramatic differences between Turkey and Germany through a timeframe starting from 1990 till 2014. Also, through out the entire paper I am adopting a historical approach considering governance as a function of time, meaning that the quality of governance is an outcome of the dedication and experience to the concept over a period of time. As for choosing the countries, both countries have been almost through the same political and social circumstances, namely, starting as nomadic tribes roaming un-purposely and ending up forming an empire. Yet, there are differences such as the role of religion and the escalations over the historical trajectory. Moreover, both countries are almost the same concerning the population and the type of the system, Parliamentary system. Finally, I will tackle the six criteria about governing for each country, yet I wont discuss in details the impact of the Government effectiveness because it is quite advanced in both countries and is being improved according the World Bank data.

The first question concerning analyzing the performance of Turkey and Germany is about the definition of governance. In my research, I based my hypotheses about -whether good/successful or bad/unsuccessful- governance upon the fact that both were initially derived out of the masses’ free consent. Governance according to the United Nations Development program, which I found the most inclusive for many aspects, does hinge upon three vital axises, namely, exercising power and managing the process and giving agency for the citizens. Politically speaking, it is when a country’s affairs, political, economic or administrative, are managed properly by the elected authority in a way that makes the structures and institutions harmoniously articulating and working for the interest of the citizens to lessen the unfair differences between them and improve the status quo.

Having said that, throughout the research I will hold the criteria set by the World Bank about governance as my measure stick by which I will examine and analyze the historical events in both countries that induced the current evaluation of the world bank and how that can resonate with improving or worsening the process of the successful governance. Moreover, my methodology for dealing with the criteria are based upon understanding them as affecting each other in a dynamic way in which in order to understand one criterion, the rest should be analyzed for the same timeframe. The World Bank sat 6 Criteria used to measure to the performance of governance:

1-                Voice and Accountability (VA): denotes to the different types of freedoms, like freedom of expression, belief, along with the free participation of the citizens in the decision-making processes.

2-                Political Stability and Absence of Violence/Terrorism (PV): It implies the likelihood of terrorist attacks or dreadful events derived out of the political orientation and belief, like terrorism.

3-                Government Effectiveness (GE): it shows how the government deals with the civil society and the quality of the public services. Also, it shows to what extent these services are independent form the political pressures.

4-                Regulatory Quality (RQ): it shows to what extent is the government keen to implement, improve and formulate the promised policies.

5-                Rule of Law (RL): “the quality of contract enforcement, property rights, the police, and the courts, as well as the likelihood of crime and violence”(World Bank Website).

6-                Control of Corruption (CC) – “capturing perceptions of the extent to which public power is exercised for private gain, including both petty and grand forms of corruption, as well as "capture" of the state by elites and private interests” (World Bank Website).

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