Turkey, the Kurds, and the Legal Contours of the Right to Self-determination

Within international law, the concept of self-determination has evolved over the years so as to reveal an external dimension, often associated with secession, and an internal dimension, entailing participatory democracy, minority protection in the context of pluralist co-existence within the territories of a state. An examination of the interpretation of self-determination by the Constitutional Court in Turkey shows, however, that the Court has statically endorsed the former, conservative viewpoint, which reinforces Turkey’s militantly nationalist, democracy. This article explains the development of the right of self-determination in international law and examines the Turkish Constitutional Court’s case law in that light. In a study of the case law on party closures in Turkey, it evaluates the extent to which the Constitutional Court’s archaic and anti-democratic interpretation has created a legality undermining the ethno-cultural a and political demands for the rights of Kurds in Turkey.