From the 1970s on, the UN began to promote the idea that “women’s rights are human rights”.
Thanks to the influence of UN’s world conferences on women, the newly developed international mechanisms such as the CEDAW treaty (1979), which is regarded as the international bill of women’s rights (cf. Chapter 3), and the rise of feminist women’s movement on the global level, national governments were pushed to remedy their gender rights regimes.
Besides these external forces, the feminist movement in Turkey began to emerge and to voice
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its gender specific demands for concrete policy changes. Against this backdrop, in 1985, Turkey signed and ratified the CEDAW agreement, albeit with reservations to Article 15 and 16 (Ertürk 2006: 96).65 This bill forced the Turkish state to adjust to the international women’s rights regime and to establish the goal of gender equality. Accordingly, in 1990, the Turkish government took a major step and established a state body responsible for women’s issues: ‘the General Directorate on the Women’s Status and Problems’ (Kadının Statüsü ve Sorunları Genel Müdürlüğü, KSSGM) under the authority of the Prime Ministry (Acuner 2007: 128). KSSGM’s primary goal has been to engage in activities to improve the status of women and to secure existing gender rights.
To this end, it collaborated with women’s organizations, activists, universities, local governments, and bar associations to increase gender awareness of society (Kardam 2006:12).
Both Turkey’s CEDAW obligations and the advocacy efforts of the feminist movement pushed the Turkish government to annul some of the discriminatory articles in existing statutes.
In 1990, the Turkish Parliament repealed Article 438 of the Penal Code, which granted a reduced sentence (one third of the existing term) for rapists if the victim of rape was a sex worker (Anıl et al. 2002; Arat 1994; Ertürk 2006). In 1992, the Constitutional Court annulled aforementioned Article 159, allowing women to work without the legal permission of their husbands. Another important step in strengthening women’s rights to economic independence was the amendment to the ‘Income Tax Act’ (1998), which enabled married women to make independent income tax declarations (Anıl et al. 2002: 23). In 1994, a parliamentary commission was formed to prepare a new draft for the Civil Code, but the social and political conflicts at the time (cf. Chapter 4) hindered the reform process. Meanwhile, feminist activists and KSGM’s feminist bureaucrats called for the full implementation of the CEDAW, but Turkey did not lift its reservations to the aforementioned Articles 15 and 16 until September 1999 (Kardam 2006: 14).
In the mid-1990s, some feminist and Kemalist women’s organizations conducted a campaign for the annulment of the articles on adultery in the Penal Code. The Penal Code stipulated different sentences for adultery committed by men and women. In 1996, Article 441
65 Articles 15 stipulates: “State Parties shall accord to women equality with men before the law”. Article 16 states:
“State Parties shall take all appropriate measures to eliminate discrimination against women in all matters pertaining to marriage and family relations, and in particular shall ensure, on a basis of equality of men and women.” The Turkish government at the time claimed that these articles would threaten the traditions and customs of Turkish society, see further: Kardam (2006).
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regulating adultery committed by men and, in 1998, Article 440 regulating adultery by women were annulled by the Constitutional Court on account of violating the constitutional principle of equality before the law (Anıl et al. 2002: 18). Furthermore, in 1999, the Ministry of Justice passed a statute eliminating virginity testing, which had been employed by schools, universities or families to prove of ‘unchastity’ of women (Ibid.: 29).
As a result of two decades of women’s activism, the Turkish Parliament approved the
‘Law on the Protection of the Family’ (No. 4320) in January 1998. The law institutionalized the state’s responsibility to interfere in cases of domestic violence (Coşar and Onbaşi 2008: 330).
Under Law 4320, any member of the family exposed to domestic violence could file a suit for a
‘protection order’ against the perpetrator of the violence (Anıl et al. 2002: 26). The law also gave public prosecutors the right to file against abusive partners and to prevent further harassment of the victim (Arat 2008: 406). The public prosecutor could take precautionary measures against the perpetrators to ensure the protection of the victims: to leave the abode shared with the spouse and children, not to damage the property of the spouse, surrender his/her weapon, not to cause distress to the spouse and children, not to approach the house under the influence of alcohol or any other intoxicating substances (Anıl et al. 2002: 26). Indeed, the enactment of this law has institutionalized the combat against domestic violence on the state level.
In addition to implementing protective laws, the Turkish state also acknowledged the need to develop mechanisms to protect women and children from violence. In the mid-1990s, the ‘Agency of Social Services and Child Protection’ (Sosyal Hizmetler ve Çocuk Esirgeme Kurumu, SHÇEK) – affiliated with KSSGM – began to establish governmental services and to develop programs to overcome violence against women and children. To this end, SHÇEK has established
‘guesthouses’ and ‘counseling centers’ for women and children experiencing domestic violence (Işık 2007: 65).
As will be delineated in the coming chapters, women’s rights organizations have been influential in pushing for changes in laws and regulations in women’s rights. However, the Turkish state began to pay more attention to the demands of organized women when Turkey was granted an official candidate status for the EU in 1999. Since the Turkish laws relating to women rights had to be adopted to the EU’s acquis communautaire, the Turkish government
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established parliamentary working groups to eliminate the discriminatory provisions in the Civil and Penal Codes.
The New Civil Code (2002)
As demonstrated above, the Civil Code assigned women a secondary role in the family. Despite minor changes, the Civil Code from 1926 remained mostly intact for seven decades. But in April 2000, the Justice Commission of the Turkish Parliament, which consisted of the representatives of the coalition government (DSP-ANAP-MHP), began working on a new draft of the Civil Code in cooperation with legal experts from women’s rights organizations. KSSGM also took an active role in the drafting process of the Civil Code (Kardam 2006: 15).
The nationalist and religious-conservative members of the Justice Commission were highly critical of several proposed laws and argued that equality between spouses would
“threaten the foundation of the traditional Turkish family” (Anıl et al 2002: 7). The most contentious issue between women’s rights organizations and lawmakers was the division of property in case of divorce (Article 202). The opposing lawmakers claimed that equal property sharing would change the structures of the Turkish family “from a matrimonial union to a corporation” (Anıl et al 2002: 7). As a result of the strong campaigning of women’s CSOs, the opposing MPs eventually accepted the new property regime.66 The new Civil Code was approved on 22 November 2001, and became effective on 1 January 2002. The new Civil Code (2002) abolished the supremacy of men in marriage and established equality of rights and obligations between spouses (Article 21). Thus, the law stipulated:
The husband is no longer the head of the family.
Spouses have equal rights over the family abode.
Spouses have equal rights over property acquired during marriage.
Spouses have equal representative powers. (Anıl et al. 2002: 7f)
Furthermore, the new Civil Code has corrected the previous discriminatory provision that stipulated different minimum age for women and men and increased the minimum age for legal marriage to eighteen for both women and men (Article 124). It also provides the same
66 The role of each group of women’s CSOs in policy-making processes, which led to legal changes in the Civil Code will be closely explored in the coming four chapters. Here, I only present changes in laws.
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inheritance rights to children born out of wedlock as those born within marriage (Article 498).
This clause recognizes de facto couples who are not legally married as a family, which is a remarkable achievement considering the conservative structures of Turkish society and culture.
Adopted children also acquired equal rights of inheritance (Article 500). Although the new Civil Code recognizes the equal division of property in case of divorce (Article 202), it applies only to marriages that took place after the renewal of the Civil Code; i.e., after January 2002 (Arat 2008:
404). In sum, the new Civil Code guarantees equality between men and women in the family and, thereby, improved women’s legal status.67 In October 2001, during the amendment process, the clause on ‘equality in the family’ was also enshrined in Article 41 of the Turkish Constitution (1982): “The family is the foundation of the Turkish society, and is based on equality between spouses” (Amend. 3.10.2001-4709/clause 17).
Drawing upon their success in reforming the Civil Code, women’s CSOs shifted their focus to reforming the Penal Code. Meanwhile, the incumbent government lost in the parliamentary election in 2002, and the Islamist AKP came to power in the midst of the reform process (cf.
Chapter 4). Despite initial suspicion from both international and domestic actors, the newly established AKP government continued the institutional reform process to adopt the EU’s acquis communautaire, and began to work with women’s CSOs to eliminate the discriminatory provisions in laws.