İZMİR’DE 21 TEMMUZ 1946 GENEL SEÇİMLERİNİN(HİLELİ SEÇİM) PROVASI: 1946 BELEDİYE SEÇİMLERİ

The multi-party system in Turkey began on July 18, 1945 with the foundation of the National Development Party by Nuri Demirağ. The second party, which was founded after the National Development Party, was the Democrat Party. The Democrat Party, shortly after its foundation, managed to gather a strong public support and ended the 27- year government of the Republican People’s Party and came into power. After these two parties, other parties also participated in the Turkish politics. The Republican People’s Party at first welcomed the foundation of the National Development Party and the Democrat Party. However the Democrat Party’s rapid organization and its enthusiastic embracement by the people, troubled the ruling party. These developments led the ruling party to hold the local election, which was supposed to happen in 1947, one year early. The Democrat Party protested against this move of the ruling party by not participating in the local election. Although the Democrat Party did not participate in the election, the election was closely monitored. This local election gives important clues about the governmentopposition relations before the general election of July 21. In this study the local election of 1946 in Izmir will be analysed in terms of government-opposition relations and the ruling party’s attitude against the opposition will be examined.