Embed Size (px)
This article was downloaded by:[ANKOS 2007 ORDER Consortium]On: 6 November 2007Access Details: [subscription number 772814175]Publisher: RoutledgeInforma Ltd Registered in England and Wales Registered Number: 1072954Registered office: Mortimer House, 37-41 Mortimer Street, London W1T 3JH, UK
Third World QuarterlyPublication details, including instructions for authors and subscription information:http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t713448481
The neoliberal discourse on corruption as a means ofconsent building: reflections from post-crisis TurkeyPinar Bedrhanoğlu aa Department of International Relations, Middle East Technical University, Ankara,Turkey
Online Publication Date: 01 October 2007To cite this Article: Bedrhanoğlu, Pinar (2007) 'The neoliberal discourse oncorruption as a means of consent building: reflections from post-crisis Turkey', ThirdWorld Quarterly, 28:7, 1239 - 1254To link to this article: DOI: 10.1080/01436590701591770URL: http://dx.doi.org/10.1080/01436590701591770
PLEASE SCROLL DOWN FOR ARTICLE
Full terms and conditions of use: http://www.informaworld.com/terms-and-conditions-of-access.pdf
This article maybe used for research, teaching and private study purposes. Any substantial or systematic reproduction,re-distribution, re-selling, loan or sub-licensing, systematic supply or distribution in any form to anyone is expresslyforbidden.
The publisher does not give any warranty express or implied or make any representation that the contents will becomplete or accurate or up to date. The accuracy of any instructions, formulae and drug doses should beindependently verified with primary sources. The publisher shall not be liable for any loss, actions, claims, proceedings,demand or costs or damages whatsoever or howsoever caused arising directly or indirectly in connection with orarising out of the use of this material.
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
The Neoliberal Discourse onCorruption as a Means of ConsentBuilding: reflections from post-crisisTurkey
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
ABSTRACT This article draws attention to the ideological role that theneoliberal discourse on corruption has fulfilled in the promotion of the secondgeneration reforms in Southern countries since the 1997 East Asian financialcrisis. This discourse is ahistoric insofar as it fails to recognise corruption as aproblem of modernity; biased insofar as it associates corruption with Southerncountries’ historical and cultural specificities only; contradictory in terms of itscounter-productive anti-corruption strategies; and politicised as it has redefined‘corruption’ as ‘rent-seeking’. In the absence of alternative radical conceptua-lisations, this essentially competition-induced neoliberal orthodoxy on corrup-tion has been easily articulated within morality-based popular concerns indomestic politics and hence acquired a hegemonic capability. The articlesubstantiates these arguments by examining the trajectory of the neoliberalanti-corruption agenda in Turkey with a particular focus on the developments ofthe post-2001 financial crisis period.
The neoliberal restructuring of states through the principles of transparencyand good governance has been legitimated by the post-Washingtonconsensus as a requirement to combat corruption in Southern and so-called‘transition’ countries. This has been managed by the articulation of a specificconception of corruption into the neoliberal discourse, which fits well with itsmain assumptions on the state. As will be problematised in the first part ofthis article, the neoliberal conception of corruption is ahistoric, biased,contradictory and politicised, and has been induced by concerns over marketcompetition rather than morality. A dramatically increasing number ofacademic articles and media news items published since the mid-1990s hascontributed decisively to this discourse,1 whereas critical approaches tocorruption have remained rather limited.2
Pinar Bedırhano�glu is in the Department of International Relations, Middle East Technical University,
Ankara, Turkey. Email: [email protected].
Third World Quarterly, Vol. 28, No. 7, 2007, pp 1239 – 1254
ISSN 0143-6597 print/ISSN 1360-2241 online/07/071239–16 � 2007 Third World Quarterly
DOI: 10.1080/01436590701591770 1239
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
Corruption as a research area deserves, however, more critical attention,since its specific neoliberal conception has fulfilled significant ideological andpolitical functions within the post-Washington consensus, particularly atmoments of financial crisis. As a matter of fact, the 1997 East Asian financialcrisis was a defining moment in the formation of this conception. The IMF, inresponse to the criticisms directed at the Washington consensus, argued thatthe crisis had to be explained by the lack of important domestic preconditionsin the regional countries for successful financial liberalization, such as ‘asound financial system, and the removal of economic distortions, as well asprogress in transparency and disclosure on the part of governments andfinancial institutions’.3 Once this strategic counter-attack had provedsuccessful in shifting attention from the ills of financial liberalisation to thecrony state – business relations in East Asia, corruption and/or its lessdisturbing expression ‘transparency’ have become important references toensure the continuation of the second generation of neoliberal reforms inSouthern countries. One of the important implications of this development,however, has also been the articulation of a rather politicised definition ofcorruption, focusing on international efforts so far concentrated on fightingagainst legally definable forms of corruption such as bribery or money-laundering.4
Persistent claims of corruption in many countries have provided anappropriate basis for the vigorous implementation of this neoliberal strategy.As many recent country-specific studies show, corruption has been one of theleading and most discussed issues since the early 1990s in all parts of theworld.5 Shore and Haller confirm this account from an anthropologicalperspective and, quoting from Sian Lazar’s study on Bolivia, state that‘people just talked about corruption non-stop: corruption was how theymade sense of politics and state’ everywhere, in including parts of Europe.6
Hence this suitable political context has enabled the emergent neoliberalorthodoxy on corruption to be easily articulated with present popularconcerns.Certainly, the central role that corruption has played in setting the political
agenda in favour of the post-Washington consensus needs to be substantiatedwithin the historical specificities of different countries. Additionally, theexplicitly negative and de-legitimating connotations of corruption make itsarticulation to the neoliberal project of state restructuring particularlyproblematic as well. The second part of the article aims to deal with thesequestions within the Turkish context by developing some preliminaryanalyses on how corruption has played a central role in the initiation ofthe second generation of reforms in Turkey in the aftermath of the 2001financial crisis. Resemblance of the Turkish experience to that of the EastAsian countries has therefore to be noted in advance.It needs to be emphasised that the paper does not attempt to propose a
well thought out alternative conception of corruption as a specific problem,although this should obviously be the task of further comprehensive research.However, drawing attention to the biases, inconsistencies, contradictions andpeculiarities of the neoliberal discourse on corruption might be an initial step
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1240
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
in this respect, as it will help us formulate the right questions asked from acritical Marxist perspective.
Peculiarities of the neoliberal discourse on corruption
Ahistoric conception of corruption
The most peculiar characteristic of the neoliberal conception of corruption isits ahistoric nature. Although corruption is predominantly defined as the ‘useof public office for private gain’,7 this modern definition is frequently used ina rather ahistoric way by neoliberals to refer to the political problems of pre-modern times. The former director of the IMF Fiscal Affairs Department,Vito Tanzi, refers to corruption in India 2000 years ago for instance to showhow it ‘is not a new phenomenon’.8 This problem stems from anotherahistoric liberal assumption of the ‘profit-maximising rational individual’that rests at the heart of the neoliberal conception of state. On the basis of itsindividualistic methodology, the neoliberal approach not only conceives ofthe state as nothing but the simple sum of profit maximising bureaucrats andpoliticians,9 but also associates the reasons for corruption with the rentscreated by states, and the discretionary powers that public officials enjoy togain advantage from these rents for their own private interests.10
Hence neoliberalism, by promoting an individual-based universal concep-tion of corruption, neglects to see it as a historically defined problem specificto modernity and capitalism. However, the differentiation of the political andthe economic spheres is determinant in separating the public from theprivate in modernity, which is a unique historical development specific tocapitalism.11 In an excellent article in Turkish, entitled ‘The invention ofcorruption: 1840 Criminal Law, power and bureaucracy’, Kırlı shows howthe public and the private spheres were constructed in a ruptural way in theOttoman Empire by the 1840 Criminal Law, for that law redefined previouslylegitimate acts of power such as gift-giving to the Sultan’s officials as illegaland corrupt. Kırlı argues that the succeeding corruption trials of somefamous Ottoman bureaucrats, who were accused of ‘corrupt’ activitiesconducted before the enactment of the law, fulfilled an educative hencehegemonic function in Gramscian terms to establish a new political order inthe Empire.12
Corruption as a problem of Southern and ‘transition’ countries
It is interesting to note that the reasons for the growing interest in questionsof corruption are generally associated with the increase of the importance ofcorruption rather than its quantitative rise. It has been argued thatcorruption is attracting more attention now because of the processes ofglobalisation and democratization, which have reinforced the increasingtransparency of states as well as the de-monopolisation of the media sinceend of the Cold War.13 A strange confession made by Tanzi with respect tothe corruption problem abetted by Cold War politics is that ‘the end of the
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1241
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
Cold War has stopped the political hypocrisy that had made the decisionmakers in some industrial countries ignore the political corruption that existedin particular countries’.14 This rather bold statement expresses an importantbias insofar as it considers corruption more of a problem for Southern or‘transition’ countries, while it is assumed to be largely eliminated in Northernones. According to Transparency International (TI), a prominent NGO in thefield, ‘if the matters are serious in industrialised countries, they are in crisis inmuch of the developing world and in countries in transition’.15
According to another neoliberal argument that complements this position,the sources of corruption need to be investigated within the historical orcultural specificities of the countries concerned. As the World Bank states,‘the causes of corruption are always contextual, rooted in a country’spolicies, bureaucratic traditions, political development, and social history.Still, corruption tends to flourish when institutions are weak and governmentpolicies generate economic rents. Some characteristics of developing andtransition settings make corruption particularly difficult to control.’16 Thesewords might refer to the heritage of the ‘strong state tradition’ in Turkey, ‘thecommunist past’ in Russia, or the ‘corporatist past’ in Latin America.17
Obviously, this biased perspective that puts the burden of corruption onindividual countries’ domestic conditions—rather than on the processes offinancial liberalisation or privatisation as many critics argue it should forinstance—represents a contemporary version of the modernisation proble-matic that serves to reproduce an idealised market economy model associatedwith the West as an end to be attained by the rest of the world.18
One might have thought that the 2001 Enron and 2002 Worldcom scandalsin the USA would have provided strong counter-arguments against thisbiased position. The scale and complexity of corruption in these scandals19
were so much greater than those seen in Southern and ‘transition’ countriesthat they could be defined as complex and ‘developed’ forms of corruption,the recognition of which requires a particular expertise.20 Notwithstandingan increased and unavoidable recognition of corruption in the developedcapitalist countries, however, these scandals have been interpreted in a waythat strengthens the extant Western bias. As Gledhill states, ‘both Enron andWorldcom are sometimes represented as ‘‘rogue’’ enterprises emerging on theperiphery of established metropolitan capitalist institutions’.21 The neoliberalconcern to treat corruption as an isolated and Southern problem rather thanas a systemic one seems to be confirmed through such examples.
Neoliberal policies: remedy or cause?
The neoliberal ‘sensitivity’ displayed towards the specificities of differentcountries in explaining the causes of corruption can hardly be observed in thesolutions proposed to fight against it, for they simply refer to the institu-tionalisation of neoliberal policies that have been launched in the name oftransparency and good governance. According to the World Bank, a multi-pronged strategy has to be pursued to combat corruption. Such astrategy aims at ‘enhancing state capacity and public sector management,
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1242
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
strengthening political accountability, enabling civil society, and increasingeconomic competition’.22 The best tools to attain these goals are defined as‘deregulation and the expansion of markets’,23 hence standard neoliberalrestructuring strategies for states. The apparent contradiction in theneoliberal orthodoxy on corruption between the complexity and specificityof the sources and the simplicity and the universality of the solutions wasvery confidently settled by the former Managing Director of the IMF, MichelCamdessus, in his speech on the second generation of reforms to Argentinebankers. There he concluded that all these efforts aimed to ‘resolve thetension between the individuality of each country’s institutions in the social,cultural, and political domains and the apparent demands of globalisationfor harmonisation of standards and norms’.24
Contrary to these arguments that propose neoliberal policies as a remedyfor corruption, liberal institutionalist studies have associated the aggravationof corruption in developing countries since the 1990s with the implementationof neoliberal reforms themselves through numerous empirical studies.25 Whilethe initial neoliberal response to such criticisms was to explain this as theimperfect implementation of reforms, many neoliberals have had to recognisethe ‘increased government involvement in the process of liberalisation’26 as aproblem, a point which had already been defined by Kahler much earlier asthe ‘orthodox paradox’ of neoliberal reforms. Kahler had based this paradoxon the tension between the politically rational but economically irrationalpolicy choices in the hands of the reforming governments and he pointed tothe challenges they had to face while following the dictates of the market.27
Hence, as Manzetti and Blake argue, this paradox was resolved in LatinAmerica by the strengthening of the executive during the reform process—adevelopment which can also be observed in Turkey—at the cost of theemergence of a new form of corruption.28 Indeed, even though limited withinthe framework of its analyses on corruption in the former Eastern Bloc, theWorld Bank also accepts that in the transition countries ‘the simultaneousprocesses of developing a market economy, designing new political and socialinstitutions and redistributing social assets have created fertile ground forcorruption’.29
What all these analyses are still unable to think of is the possibility of aconscious attempt to use corruption as a strategy for enabling neoliberalpolicies. Two of Russian President Yeltsin’s advisors in the early 1990s,Andrei Shleifer and Maxim Boycko, who had been alarmed by the formernomenklatura’s acquiring control of state assets in Poland and Russia duringthe privatisation process, nevertheless did not hesitate to confess that unlessthese people ‘are appeased, bribed, or disenfranchised, privatisation cannotproceed’.30 This example invites one to think upon the possibility of thepromotion of corruption as a necessary policy option during the imple-mentation of a neoliberal agenda as a conscious political strategy within thecontext of ‘transition’.31
All these harsh criticisms that associate neoliberal policies with theaggravation of corruption can nonetheless be weakened by a Machiavellianposition that would propose the legitimacy of attaining a right end through
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1243
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
all means available. Against such an argumentation one may need to think ofsome recent problems experienced by many countries, like the developmentof informal markets particularly for labour in the name of labour marketflexibility, or the increasing abuse of ‘performance criteria’, which is the cruxof new public management proposed to ensure efficiency within the state.These new types of corruption, rather than being temporary developments,seem to be the permanent features of the neoliberal restructuring whichcannot be overcome by the institutionalisation process.32
Transformation of the scope of corruption
Another important point to be emphasised on the peculiarities of theneoliberal discourse on corruption is its changing scope across time, with the1997 East Asian financial crisis representing a crucial turning point.It has to be recognised that international concerns over corruption before
1997 used to focus more on administrative corruption, specifically bribery.Starting with the OECD Working Group on Bribery in 1994 which aimed to‘end the tax deductibility of bribes and criminalize the bribing of foreignofficials’,33 the foundational international initiatives on corruption, such asthe Council of Europe Programme of Action Against Corruption adopted inNovember 1996, the United Nation’s Declaration against Corruption andBribery in International Commercial Transactions adopted in December1996, and the European Commission’s Communication to the Council andthe European Parliament on a Union Policy against Corruption in May 1997,all dealt with corruption as a legally definable, hence technical, problem.34 AsTanzi informs us, these initiatives were brought to the fore essentially by USpoliticians and exporters who were trying to level the playing field in theircompetition with other OECD countries and exporters. Their main target ofcriticism in these initiatives was some OECD exporters’ legal ability to deductthe bribes they paid from their business costs, while this was illegal for USexporters according to US laws.35
It has to be recognised that this rather technical and competition-inducedconcern over corruption was transformed into a more political andideological one after the 1997 East Asian crisis. After the crisis the cronystate – business relations in East Asia which were made a scapegoat by theinternational financial institutions not only became a new and hot researcharea for neoliberal researchers but also helped extend the scope of corruptionto encompass rentier activities. Concomitantly, the problematic implicationsof the capitalist transformation processes in the former Eastern Bloc coun-tries have also helped neoliberals to produce a new category of corruption,labelled ‘state capture’.36
One has to recognise the importance and political implications of this newand broader definition. Corruption before this epochal change used to bedefined as either ‘bureaucratic’ or ‘administrative’ corruption to refer to thecorrupt activities which represent ‘the intentional imposition of distortions inthe prescribed implementation of existing laws, rules, and regulations’.After 1997 it acquired a new meaning with the redefinition of rent-seeking in
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1244
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
a non-problematic way as corruption, and the inclusion of ‘state capture’ asone of its categories. Thereafter ‘the actions of individuals, groups, or firmsboth in the public and private sectors to influence the formation of laws,regulations, decrees, and other governmental policies to their own advantage’started to be labelled as corruption, paving the way for a political andambiguous, rather than legal and concrete analysis of corruption.37 AsHutchcroft’s comparative study on rents, corruption and clientelismindicates, however, corruption used to be identified more with such illegalactivities as bribery or fraud, and considered as the most primitive form ofrent-seeking rather than vice versa.38
It can be argued that this defensive reflex that has upgraded corruption toa category that encompasses rent-seeking after the East Asian crisis has hadtwo important implications. First, by making rent-seeking tautologicallyboth the main cause and the most developed form of corruption,39 neoli-beralism has left the causes of corruption practically non-examined. Second,as this new interpretation turned rentier activities non-problematically intocorruption, exploitation and corruption have become intrinsic characteristicsof the state itself rather than representing its abuse.
Implications of the state as means and end in the fight against corruption
The last but not the least peculiarity of the neoliberal orthodoxy on cor-ruption is the central role attached to the state in the launching of anti-corruption policies. From a neoliberal standpoint this is to ‘put the foxes incharge of the chicken house’ if it is recalled that corruption is assumed to beintrinsic to the state in rentier state theories. The question of why both‘historically’ and ‘naturally’ corrupt Southern states would launch a processthat would ultimately eliminate their raison d’etat is a theoretically un-resolved question in neoliberal studies on corruption.It might be proposed that this deadlock could be overcome with the help of
some form of external pressure, as exemplified in the conditionalities imposedby international financial institutions. Such a solution, however, has becomeideologically unacceptable within the context of the post-Washingtonconsensus that has transformed the language of ‘conditionality’ into one of‘ownership’. Since 1997 the World Bank has been at pains to highlight that‘the sustained reduction of systemic corruption requires committed leader-ship and support from citizens and civil society. External actors like theWorld Bank can help, but aid conditionality cannot substitute if political willis missing’.40
It has to be also recognised that the scope of corruption in this discussion isnot extended in a way to include these external actors or civil society. For,despite the growing criticisms of the transparency of the IMF and the WorldBank and these institutions’ lip service to these concerns, there is still littlemention of their rent-creation capacity, which rests on their practicalmonopoly of ‘technical expertise’, exemplified best in the IMF- or WorldBank-proposed lists of international advisory institutions, many set by theirformer experts. A similar criticism can be directed at the unquestioned belief
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1245
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
in the capacity of civil society in the fight against corruption. Growing con-cerns over, for instance, the possible corrupt implications of the ‘autonomousregulatory agencies’, or the newly set ‘regional development agencies’ inmany countries do not seem to attract serious attention in corruptiondebates, since such a realisation would untimely weaken the well set hysteriafor good governance.41
Corruption debates and the neoliberal anti-corruption agenda in Turkey
As the discussion above illustrates, the neoliberal orthodoxy on corruptionlinks the strategies to combat it to the institutionalisation of the ongoingeconomic and political reforms in many Southern and ‘transition’ countries,despite their contradictions, biases and inconsistencies. This becomesproblematic if it is recognised that popular concerns over corruption havesubstantially increased in these countries during the implementation ofneoliberal policies themselves, especially during privatisation processes.Moreover, contrary to the market-based and competition-induced neoliberalconcerns on corruption at the international level, these domestic debates oncorruption have rested on openly moral ground. Hence corruption hasbecome one of the most important political problems in Turkey since theearly 1980s, in Latin America since the late 1980s, and in Russia sincethe early 1990s, and been criticised as an expression of immoral andunacceptable state – business relations in these countries. This divergencebetween the morality-based concerns expressed in domestic politics andcompetition-based technical concerns in the international field has to beunderlined to indicate different attitudes of capital and popular classestowards corruption, although they seem to talk about the same problem inpublic debates.In Turkey it is possible to identify two parallel processes of restructuring
that have been going on in line with the neoliberal anti-corruption agendasince the turn of the century. On the one hand, there has been the ratificationof international treaties or conventions on corruption, such as the OECD
Convention on Combating Bribery ratified in 2000, the UN Convention onCorruption ratified in 2003, and the Council of Europe Civil LawConvention on Corruption again ratified in 2003. Open and direct referenceto corruption, understood as a legally definable and criminal problem such asbribery or money laundering, has been an important characteristic of thisspecific process. These ratifications generally attract quite formalisedattention in the Turkish media, and have been mentioned as unquestionablygood developments to prevent corruption. On the other hand, the second-generation reforms to ensure transparency and good governance haverepresented a complementary path in the neoliberal anti-corruption agenda,although the role and the definition of corruption have not been fixed nor arethey non-problematic within this process. Some legal amendments or theintroduction of new legislation, such as the Law on the Establishment of aPublic Procurement Authority in 2002, or the Public Information Act in 2003as well as the not yet approved initiatives such as the Law on Public
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1246
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
Administration, or the Law on the Financing of Political Parties, can bementioned in this respect.42 As the scope of these initiatives is quite wide andnot directly related to corruption, the problem has not always been explicitlymentioned as a target in this process.This particular neoliberal agenda has largely proceeded in line with
Turkey’s intensifying relations with the EU and the IMF after 1999. Twoimportant historical developments were decisive in this respect, namely theHelsinki Summit of the EU in which Turkey was granted candidate status,and the signing of a three-year stand-by agreement by the IMF, both of whichtook place in December 1999.43 Both the Accession Partnership Documentprepared by the European Commission in March 2001 to specify the EU’sexpectations from Turkey during the accession process and the TurkishTreasury’s Letter of Intent to the IMF for the stand-by agreement comprisedprovisions on corruption, which was apparently associated with legallydefinable criminal activities in the field of finance.44
Although the disciplinary impact of these international developments wasdecisive, the anti-corruption agenda in Turkey has not simply been anexternally imposed process. The Turkish Industrialists and Businessmen’sAssociation (TUSIAD), the representative of the most competitive inter-nationalised business groups in the country, has a clearly neoliberal approachto the problem of corruption and considers rentier activities the biggestproblem of the Turkish economy, distorting conditions of fair competition inthe market.45 Moreover, the governing Justice and Development Party (AKP)has a special incentive to remain loyal to the neoliberal programme—andhence to the anti-corruption agenda—for it intends to ensure a powerfulexternal support for its rule from the USA, the EU and the IMF to overcomeits vulnerabilities in domestic politics that stem from the party’s Islamistimage.46 This external support has also been crucial in AKP’S securing anuninterrupted short-term capital inflow to Turkey so that no financial crisiswill be experienced during its rule, and TUSIAD’s political support is ensured.As a party that came to power under the extraordinary political conditionsfollowing the 2001 financial crisis, the AKP is well aware of the destructiveimplications of such developments.Ironically—or as expected—progress in the anti-corruption agenda has
hardly referred to an improvement in corrupt state – business relations inTurkey. Various corruption scandals and claims have remained as hot issuesin political debates, or even accelerated during AKP rule. It has been arguedthat the marketisation processes in health and education, privatisations, anddecentralisation have provided the AKP with a chance to enhance its powerbase by transferring wealth from the state to Islamist business groups on aselective basis, so that corruption has increased, rather than decreased,during its rule.47 This paradoxical rise in corruption claims, despite the anti-corruption agenda, can be explained partly by the distortions made in thelegislation and implementation of the new laws. As various critical analyseson the new Public Procurement Law in Turkey imply, for instance, the scopeof the law was substantially narrowed after its enactment so that purchasesmade by or related to the energy sector, social security institutions,
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1247
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
enterprises to be privatised such as Turkish Telekom or Turkish Airlines, andfunds provided from international institutions or capital markets have allbeen excluded from this regulation as a result of undisclosed deals betweenthe government, the IMF, the World Bank, and transnational capital.48 Therestructuring of the sugar and tobacco markets in Turkey brought to theagenda other corruption claims, the scope of which was again not limited tothe domestic sphere.49 Since analysing corruption as an ontological problemin terms of its causes and solutions is beyond the limits of this article, thisdiscussion will not be advanced here. However, as Ercan and O�guz’s analysesalso imply, it can be stated that corruption in recent decades has to beexamined in association with the internationalisation of the Turkish state, aprocess which has been shaped by the conflicts and compromises of differentclasses and class fractions at the global and domestic scales.50
The 2001 financial crisis and the discourse on corruption
Turning back to the role of corruption as a political discourse, one shouldrecognise that, although various corruption claims have always been on theagenda as an integral aspect of daily political struggles in Turkey, theneoliberal discourse that associates anti-corruption with the implementationof the second generation reforms started appearing in public debatesparticularly in the aftermath of the 2001 financial crisis.51 After the crisis theWorld Bank vice president Kemal Dervis, now the head of the UnitedNations Development Programme, was appointed as the minister of state forthe economy to ‘save’ the country from financial instability, and heunhesitatingly explained the causes of the crisis with reference to the corruptbanking structure in Turkey. He emphasised that struggling against cor-ruption was the most important pillar of his ‘National Programme’,52 andargued that ‘politics should not lead to accidents in economics through illegalgains. Politics and economics should be separated from each other.’53 On thebasis of this criticism, the post-crisis period, rather than becoming a period ofcritical evaluation of financial liberalisation, saw the acceleration ofneoliberal institutionalisation in Turkey, a process which had already startedin the mid-1990s but which had been proceeding back and forth becauseof the resistance of various social forces. Within such an atmosphere ofemergency, 12 of the 15 new laws (none of them directly related tocorruption) were speedily approved by the Turkish National Assembly in thetwo months from April to early June 2001.Kemal Dervis was definitely neither alone nor wrong in his claims of
corruption in the banking sphere. Liberalisation of finance was one of theinitial steps in the implementation of the first-generation neoliberal reformsin Turkey in the 1980s, which led to many corruption claims as well as tosome well known banker failures and bankruptcies as early as that decade.54
Systematic abuse of state banks was in fact another much criticised aspect ofthis process in which corruption claims in the Emlak Bank, which was thebiggest creditor in the profitable construction sector in Turkey, had attractedgreat attention. Moreover, various technical-cum-political problems in the
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1248
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
sector had already led to the transfer of 11 insolvent banks to the SavingsDeposits Insurance Fund from 1997 to the 2001 financial crisis. HenceDervis’s concerns over corruption in the banking sector acquired publicsupport, and were largely shared by various media columnists in Turkey.55
What has not been unproblematically appreciated, however, was hisattempt to explain the financial crisis on the basis of corruption. Manycritical studies on the 2001 financial crisis in Turkey have placed more blameon the short-term financial flows and the government’s debt managementpolicies, as they have considered the implementation of neoliberal policiesneither inevitable nor politically acceptable.56 Such criticisms could find onlylimited space in the oligopolised Turkish media, however, while Dervis’saccount was enthusiastically shared by some foreign institutions as well suchas the Washington-based think-tank, the Center for Strategic and Interna-tional Studies (CSIS). A CSIS report entitled ‘Turkey’s Crisis: Corruption atthe Core’ argued that ‘with the questionable and allegedly illegal practices ofthe collapsed private banks creating an additional and perilous exposure ofbillions of dollars for the public banks controlled by the government, andgrowing doubts over the management and lending practices of the publicbanks themselves . . . crisis was perhaps inevitable’.57 Evidently this neoliberalanalysis, which was similar to the ones developed after the 1997 East Asiancrisis, considered financial liberalisation a given policy option for allcountries, and was based on the idea of ‘confidence building’ to ensurecapital inflow. Thus corruption was defined as a problem insofar as itdisturbed market competition and threatened foreign capital.The neoliberal strategy to explain financial crisis as an outcome of
corruption in Turkey became successful, as this technical and competition-induced concern over corruption was articulated within the extant morality-based debates in domestic politics. The post-crisis period saw the promotionof a neoliberal discourse which placed all the blame for the crisis on thewrong domestic policies pursued by governments. While the main message ofthis discourse was well internalised, the contradictory nature of this apparentcommon sense made itself explicit in the flaws observed in public statementsmade even by some business representatives. The president of the Union ofChambers and Commodity Exchanges of Turkey (TOBB) argued for instancethat ‘underdevelopment, poverty, corruption, bad income distribution,political and economic instability, violation of laws, bad government anddependency should no more be the fate of the Turkish people. To overcomethese problems, legal and structural adjustments should be made in line withthose made in developed countries.’58 The head of the Confederation ofEmployers’ Trade Unions of Turkey (TISK), addressing an audience ofbusinessmen in a meeting with Kemal Dervis, also underlined that ‘Turkeyhas been passing through very hard days. This sin is not yours. This sin is notthat of the people, either. This sin is where wrong policies and wrongapplications brought us to.’59
Despite such supportive declarations of various business groups, however,Kemal Dervis was possibly well aware of the still limited capability of thecorruption discourse to ensure the continuation of neoliberal policies.
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1249
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
Hence he frequently had to ‘show the stick’ by reminding peopel of thepossibility of another financial crisis as a threat. In his comments on the IMF’semergency credit of US$10 billion to Turkey, he stated in April 2001 that ‘ifwe don’t use it properly it will be hard for us to find another such support. Ifwe experience another crisis in six or 12 months time, finding financialsupport will be hard.’60 Later in May, while emphasising the need for ‘acleaning up operation’ in the banking sector, he was confessing that ‘theTreasury has serious debt payment requirements [soon]. . . Before thesepayments, we have to receive the funding. I know that this is not a healthyapproach. I am sorry as well. But there is an obvious fact. We need thisfunding.’61 As such comments imply, the continuation of neoliberal policies,despite the destructive implications of the 2001 financial crisis, could beensured in Turkey through a political discourse that was based on consentbuilt on corruption, and coercion ensured through IMF conditionalities.Bringing corruption to the fore in the process of neoliberal state restruc-
turing was in fact a risky strategy, as this would lead to the delegitimation ofthe government that was in fact required to launch the necessary policyinitiatives. Such risks were managed by the technocratic mission Dervisfulfilled with the help of his position as the man ‘in between’; de jure he was amember of the government, although de facto he was the voice of theinternational markets, the expectations of which were proposed as‘the standards’. While commenting on the reform programme in May2001, he was clearly distancing himself from the government, though within asupportive context: ‘The programme was worked out very quickly. Thegovernment supported it at every step. Of course, support has to continue.’62
With the help of this ‘in between’ position, he comfortably underlinedgovernments’ responsibility in the making of corruption, although politiciansin government would have preferred to talk about corruption as an agentlessproblem, such as an ‘illness’, as previous experience shows.63 The urgencycreated by Dervis around the idea of the corrupt state structure was explicitin the letter of intent of the new IMF stand-by agreement on 18 January 2002,which committed the Council of Ministers to adopt ‘a strategy for increasingtransparency and combating rent-seeking’ in Turkey by the end of the samemonth. The neoliberal inclination to define rent-seeking as corruption wasapparent in the Turkish translation of the same text, where ‘rent-seeking’ wastranslated as ‘illegal gains’.64 As long as fighting against corruption was notan end in itself but an ideological means, however, such confusions, nomatter how important, would not really have mattered.
Conclusion
This article has underlined the crucial role the neoliberal conception ofcorruption has played as a political discourse to ensure progress in theneoliberal restructuring process, particularly at periods of financial crisis. Asthe analysis of the recent Turkish experience illustrates, the biases,inconsistencies and peculiarities of the neoliberal orthodoxy on corruptionhave created no obstacles to the effective implementation of this strategy
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1250
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
probably for two important reasons. First, although there is already a hugeliterature on the definition of and the reasons for corruption, the practicalutility of many of these studies is quite limited, for the real intention of theanti-corruption programme has not been to deal with the problem directlybut to work the neoliberal reform agenda through it.65 As the neoliberalconcern with corruption has been largely political and symbolic, presentneoliberal studies have turned out to be ideological tools of the class struggle,despite and/or with the help of their inconsistencies and biases.On the basis of the predominantly agreed definition of corruption as ‘the
use of public office for private gain’, one would argue that the anti-corruptionagenda has been, in practice, a process in which the public and privatespheres are delineated through complex relations of conflict, competition andcompromise among classes at different scales. In this struggle the neoliberalposition has aimed to redefine the ‘public’ in line with transnational capitalistinterests, while labelling all forms of non-market association of the people,and the locally or nationally operating producers with the state asexpressions of ‘private interest’, hence as corrupt. Once conditions for globalcompetitiveness have been made antithetical to corruption in such a broadcontext, the neoliberal room for manoeuvre with this discourse as a means toempower capital has substantially increased.The neoliberal strategy to articulate a particular discourse of corruption to
the second generation of reforms has been successful, second, thanks to thelack of alternative and radical conceptualisations of corruption. As men-tioned in the discussion above, there is a limited number of critical studies thatquestion the relationship between neoliberal policies and corruption,including those made from a liberal institutionalist perspective. The limitsof the liberal institutionalist criticisms lie in their separated conceptions of thestate and the market while bringing the state back in. The institutionalistemphasis on the inevitable but neglected role of the state in the neoliberalreform process has definitely been important, although the underlyingstate –market dichotomy has led it to reproduce an understanding ofcorruption primarily as a problem of the state. Other theoretical or empiricalstudies, including this one, on the other hand, have remained largely at thelevel of criticism. While all these critical contributions are crucial in terms offormulating appropriate questions on corruption at both abstract andconcrete levels, a concentrated effort is still required to fulfill their unfinishedwork and develop radical conceptualisations of corruption that can resonatewith the morality-based popular concerns about the problem.
Notes
For their invaluable intellectual and editing support during the preparation of this article, the authorwould like to thank Tevfik Do�gan Toker, Biray Kırlı, Cengiz Kırlı, Julian Saurin, Funda Hulagu andDimitri Tsarouhas. For their encouraging comments, acknowledgement is also due to those participants inthe ‘Historical Materialism Conference: New Directions in Marxist Theory’ held on 8 – 10 December 2006in London, to whom an earlier draft of this paper was presented.1 Vito Tanzi, ‘Corruption around the world: causes, consequences, scope, and cures’, IMF Staff Papers,45 (4), December 1998, p 560; and Arvind K Jain, ‘Corruption: a review’, Journal of Economic Surveys,15 (1), 2001, pp 102 – 103. Having considered the mid-1990s as a turning point in terms of increasing
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1251
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
concerns over corruption, Tanzi recalls that the Financial Times described 1995 as the year ofcorruption. Jain, while providing a long bibliography of recent articles on corruption, informs us thatthe media’s interest in it has quadrupled since 1995 in comparison to the early 1980s.
2 Besides some of the empirical ones mentioned in footnote 4, critical theoretical studies on corruptioninclude Barry Hindess, ‘Investigating international anti-corruption’, Third World Quarterly, 26 (8),2005, pp 1389 – 1398; Chris Shore & Dieter Haller, ‘Introduction—sharp practice: anthropology andthe study of corruption’, in D Haller & C Shore (eds), Corruption: Anthropological Perspectives,London: Pluto Press, 2005, pp 1 – 26; Ed Brown & Jonathan Cloke, ‘Neoliberal reform, governanceand corruption in the South: assessing the international anti-corruption crusade’, Antipode, 36 (2),2004, pp 272 – 294; Heather Marquette, ‘The creeping politicisation of the World Bank: the case ofcorruption’, Political Studies, 52, 2004, pp 413 – 430; Joel S Kahn & Francesco Formosa, ‘The problemof ‘‘crony capitalism’’: modernity and the encounter with the perverse’, Thesis Eleven, 69, 2002,pp 47 – 66; Robin Theobald, ‘So what really is the problem about corruption?’, Third World Quarterly,20 (3), 1999 (special issue), pp 491 – 502; and Barbara Harriss-White & Gordon White,‘Editorial introduction: corruption, liberalization and democracy’, IDS Bulletin: Liberalization andthe New Corruption (special issue edited by Barbara Harriss-White & Gordon White), 27 (2), 1996,pp 1 – 5.
3 IMF, Annual Report 1998, Washington, DC: IMF, p 27.4 Marquette provides a comprehensive analysis of the reasons for and consequences of this politicisationin the World Bank. See Marquette, ‘The creeping politicisation of the World Bank’.
5 Just to mention a few of many editions on corruption that bring together valuable empirical research,see the special issue of Third World Quarterly, 20 (3), 1999 edited by Robert Williams; Alan Doig & RTheobald (eds), Corruption and Democratisation, London: Frank Cass, 2000; IDS Bulletin, 27 (2), 1996;and Haller & Shore, Corruption.
6 Shore & Haller, ‘Editorial: introduction’, p 6.7 Jeff Huther & Anwar Shah, ‘Anti-corruption policies and programs: a framework for evaluation’, athttp://econ.worldbank.org/files/1311_wps2501.pdf., 2000, p 1; and Jain, ‘Corruption’, p 73. This rathergeneral definition is not a non-problematically accepted one of course. An act can be defined as corrupton different bases, such as whether it is intentional, or against the law, or violates the public interest, oris accepted by people as corrupt. As the definition of ‘public interest’, which lies at the heart of thedefinition of corruption, is itself rather ambiguous, defining corruption becomes a very subjectiveendeavour. On problems with defining corruption, see Mark Philp, ‘Defining political corruption’, inPaul Heywood (ed), Political Corruption, Oxford: Blackwell, 1997, pp 23 – 25; R Theobald, Corruption,Development and Underdevelopment, Hong Kong: Macmillan, 1990, p 12; and Robert Williams,‘New concepts for old?’, Third World Quarterly, 20 (3), 1999, p 504.
8 Tanzi, ‘Corruption around the world’, pp 559 – 560.9 Douglas North, ‘A framework for analyzing the state in economic history’, in John A Hall (ed),The State: Critical Concepts, Vol I, London: Routledge, 1994, pp 326 – 327.
10 See Susan Rose-Ackerman, Corruption and Government: Causes, Consequences, and Reform,Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1999, p 2; World Bank, Anticorruption in Transition: AContribution to the Policy Debate, Washington DC: World Bank, 2000, p xvi; and Jain, ‘Corruption’,pp 79 – 80.
11 Ellen Meiksins Wood, ‘The separation of the ‘‘economic’’ and the ‘‘political’’ in capitalism’, in EMWood, Democracy against Capitalism: Renewing Historical Materialism, Cambridge: CambridgeUniversity Press, 1995, pp 19 – 48.
12 Cengiz Kırlı, ‘Yolsuzlu�gun ıcadı: 1840 Ceza Kanunu, ıktidar ve burokrasi’, Tarih ve Toplum, 4, 2006,pp 45 – 119.
13 George T Abed & Sanjeev Gupta, ‘The economics of corruption: an overview’, in Abed & Gupta (eds),Governance, Corruption and Economic Performance, Washington, DC: IMF, 2002, pp 2 – 4.
14 Tanzi, ‘Corruption around the world’, p 560, emphasis added.15 Transparency International, quoted in Hindess, ‘Investigating international anti-corruption’, p 1390.16 World Bank, Helping Countries Combat Corruption: Progress at the World Bank since 1997,
Operational Core Services and Poverty Reduction and Economic Management, Washington DC,2000, p 12.
17 See Demet S Dinler, ‘Turkiye’de guclu devlet gelene�gi tezinin elestirisi’ (Critique of the argument forthe strong state tradition in Turkey), Praksis, 9, 2003, pp 17 – 54; Pınar Bedirhano�glu, ‘Rusya’dakapitalist donusum sureci, yolsuzluk ve neoliberalizm’ (Capitalist transformation process, corruptionand neoliberalism in Russia), Toplum ve Bilim, 92, 2002, pp 217 – 233; and Charles Jones, ‘TheArgentine debate’, IDS Bulletin, 27 (2), 1996, pp 71 – 77.
18 See also Theobald, ‘So what really is the problem about corruption?’, p 492.19 Worldcom’s accounting fraud was around $9 billion. John Gledhill, ‘Introduction: old economy, new
economy; old corruption, new corruption’, Social Analysis, 47 (3), 2003, p 130.
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1252
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
20 For an excellent comparison of the different characteristics of corruption in the developed and lessdeveloped capitalist countries, see Theobald, ‘So what really is the problem about corruption?’,pp 497 – 499.
21 Ibid, p 131, emphasis added.22 World Bank, Anticorruption in Transition, p 39. See also World Bank, Helping Countries Combat
Corruption: The Role of the World Bank, Poverty Reduction and Economic Management, WashingtonDC, 1997, pp 21 – 23.
23 World Bank, Helping Countries Combat Corruption: Progress at the World Bank since 1997, p 35.24 Michel Camdessus, ‘Second generation reforms: reflections and new challenges’, Opening speech at the
IMF ‘Conference of the Second Generation Reforms’, 8 November 1999, at http://www.imf.org. Seealso Hindess, ‘Investigating international anti-corruption’, p 1396.
25 See Harriss-White & White, ‘Editorial introduction’, pp 2 – 3; Jones, ‘The Argentine debate’; and LuigiManzetti & Charles H Blake, ‘Market reforms and corruption in Latin America: new means for oldways’, Review of International Political Economy, 3 (4), 1996, pp 662 – 697.
26 Jain, ‘Corruption’, p 79.27 Miles Kahler, ‘Orthodoxy and its alternatives: explaining approaches to stabilization and adjustment’,
in Joan M Nelson (ed), Economic Crisis and Policy Choice: The Politics of Adjustment in the ThirdWorld, Princeton, NJ: Princeton University Press, 1990, p 41.
28 Manzetti & Blake, ‘Market reforms and corruption in Latin America’, p 673. As the Chilean andTurkish experiences show, the turn towards authoritarian regimes—sometimes in the form of militaryinterventions—was also among the effective means to resolve this paradox.
29 World Bank, Anticorruption in Transition, p vii.30 Olivier Blanchard, Maxim Boycko, Marek Dabrowski, Rudiger Dornbusch, Richard Layard & Andrei
Shleifer, Post-Communist Reform: Pain and Progress, Cambridge, MA: MIT Press, 1993, p 39.31 For a similar discussion on the positive role of neo-patrimonialism in political stability, see Theobald,
‘So what really is the problem about corruption?’, p 493.32 See also ibid p 498; and Harriss-White & White, ‘Editorial introduction’, p 4.33 The initiative produced by the OECD International Convention on Combating Bribery of Foreign
Public Officials in International Business Transactions in 1997.34 World Bank, Helping Countries Combat Corruption: Progress at the World Bank since 1997, pp 60 – 61.35 Tanzi, ‘Corruption around the world’, pp 561 – 563.36 World Bank, Anticorruption in Transition, p xv.37 Ibid, pp xv – xvii, all emphasis in the original.38 Paul D Hutchcroft, ‘The politics of privilege: assessing the impact of rents, corruption, and clientelism
on Third World development’, in Paul Heywood (ed), Political Corruption, Oxford: BlackwellPublishers, 1997, pp 226 – 227.
39 Rose-Ackerman, Corruption and Government, p 2; and World Bank, Anticorruption in Transition,pp xv – xvi.
40 World Bank, Helping Countries Combat Corruption: The Role of the World Bank, p 5. See alsoCamdessus, ‘Second generation reforms’. On the basis of his analysis of Transparency International,Hindess defines this strategy as ‘an updated version of the older system of capitulations’ whereinternational agencies are given a tutelary position. Hindess, ‘Investigating international anti-corruption’, p 1397.
41 For comprehensive criticisms of the establishment in Turkey of regulatory agencies, see SonayBayramo�glu, Yonetisim Zihniyeti: Turkiye’de Ust Kurullar ve Siyasal _Iktidarın Donusumu (The Idea ofGovernance: Regulatory Agencies and the Transformation of Political Power in Turkey), _Istanbul:_Iletisim, 2005. For criticism of the regional development agencies, see Menaf Turan (ed), BolgeKalkınma Ajansları: Nedir, Ne De�gildir? (Regional Development Agencies: What Are They? WhatAren’t They?), Ankara: YAYED, 2005.
42 Ulusoy provides a comprehensive overview of these initiatives in Turkey in his unpublished article. SeeKıvanc Ulusoy, ‘Turkey’s fight against corruption: a case for Europeanization, 1999 – 2005’, in progress.
43 See Galip Yalman, ‘Rethinking the nature of the beast: the Turkish state and the process ofEuropeanization’, in Ahmet Hasim Kose, Fikret Senses & Erinc Yeldan (eds), Globalisation as NewImperialism: Reconstruction of the Periphery, New York: Nova Science Publishers, 2006.
44 Full texts of these documents are available at the websites http://www.deltur.cec.eu.int and http://www.hazine.gov.tr.
45 ‘TUSIAD’dan yolsuzlukla ‘ba�gımsız’ savas onerisi’ (TUSIAD’s proposal for an ‘independent’ fight againstcorruption), Hurriyet, 21 June 2003.
46 _Ilhan Uzgel, ‘AKP: neoliberal donusumun yeni aktoru’ (AKP: the new actor in neoliberaltransformation), Mulkiye Dergisi, XXX (252), 2006, pp 7 – 18.
47 Fikret Gulen, ‘AKP’nin ıktidar oldu�gu donemde kabul edilen yasalar hakkında de�gerlendirme’(Evaluation of the laws passed during AKP’s rule), Mulkiye Dergisi, XXX (252), 2006, p 151.
THE NEOLIBERAL DISCOURSE ON CORRUPTION
1253
Dow
nloa
ded
By:
[AN
KO
S 2
007
OR
DE
R C
onso
rtium
] At:
09:0
7 6
Nov
embe
r 200
7
See also Ba�gımsız Sosyal Bilimciler 2007 Yılı Raporu, 2007 _Ilkyazında Dunya ve Turkiye EkonomisineBakıs, Haziran 2007 (2007 Annual Report of the Independent Social Scientists: Overview of the Worldand Turkish Economy in Early Summer 2007), pp 75 – 80, at http://www.bagimsizsosyalbilimciler.org/Yazilar_BSB/BSB2007_Final.pdf.
48 See Bayramo�glu, Yonetisim Zihniyeti, pp 326 – 330; and Fuat Ercan & Sebnem O�guz, ‘Rescaling as aclass relationship and process: the case of public procurement law in Turkey’, Political Geography, 25,2006, pp 641 – 656.
49 For a critical discussion on how the new legislation in the tobacco market in Turkey has been finalisedin line with US tobacco producers’ interests, see Huricihan _Islamo�glu, ‘Direnis mi yoksa yeni birsiyaset mi?’ (Resistance or a new politics?), in Ceyhun Gurkan, Ozlem Tastan & Oktar Turel (eds),Kuresellesmeye Guney’den Tepkiler (Acts of Resistance from the South against Globalisation), Ankara:Dipnot, 2006, pp 357 – 362. A similar analysis of the restructuring of the sugar market is provided inBayramo�glu, Yonetisim Zihniyeti, pp 367 – 374.
50 Ercan & O�guz, ‘Rescaling as a class relationship and process’, p 654. See also Ba�gımsız SosyalBilimciler 2007 Yılı Raporu, pp 74 – 75.
51 For a similar argument, see Ba�gımsız Sosyal Bilimciler 2007 Yılı Raporu, pp 69 – 70; and Umit Cizre &Erinc Yeldan, ‘The Turkish encounter with neo-liberalism: economics and politics in the 2000/2001crises’, Review of International Political Economy, 12 (3), 2005, pp 390 – 393.
52 Later to be called the ‘Programme for Transition to a Powerful Economy’ in Turkey.53 ‘Dervis: bizim programın en onemli aya�gı yolsuzluk’ (Dervis: Corruption is the most important pillar
of our programme), Hurriyet, 29 April 2001.54 See Gulten Kazgan, Tanzimattan 21: Yuzyıla Turkiye Ekonomisi (The Turkish Economy from
Tanzimat to the 21st Century), Istambul: _Istanbul Bilgi Universitesi Yayınları, 2002, p 135. Kazganrecalls cases such as the failure of Banker Kastelli and the bankruptcies of Hisarbank, Odibank and_Istanbul Bank.
55 For an example, see Cuneyt Ulsever, ‘Zina da, yolsuzluk da tek basına olmaz’ (Neither adultery norcorruption can happen alone), Hurriyet, 18 June 2001.
56 The publications of the Independent Social Scientists, an initiative which was established by a group ofcritical academicians and researchers in November 2000, have systematically criticised the imple-mentation of neoliberal policies in Turkey and other Southern countries. Individual and jointpublications of the group can be found at http://www.bagimsizsosyalbilimciler.org.
57 The report, dated 21 March 2001, is available at http://www.csis.org/media/csis/pubs/tu010305.pdf.58 ‘TOBB: Umutlar gelece�ge ertelendi’ (TOBB: hopes are postponed to the future), Hurriyet, 19 May 2001,
emphasis added.59 ‘‘‘Milletvekili abim’’ donemini unutun’ (Forget the ‘Brother Deputy’ period), Hurriyet, 9 May 2001,
emphasis added.60 ‘Dervis: bizim programın’.61 ‘Dervis: bankacılıkta temizlik operasyonu sart’ (Dervis: a cleaning up operation in banking is
necessary), Hurriyet, 10 May 2001.62 ‘‘‘Milletvekili abim’’ donemini unutun’.63 Such a discourse of corruption as ‘illness’ was frequently used in the debates raging during the
establishment of the Banking Regulation and Supervision Agency, which was defined as a ‘BankHospital’. See ‘Banka batıranlara kisisel iflas yolu acıldı.’ (Personal bankruptcy now available for thosewho run down banks), Hurriyet, 19 June 1999.
64 The letter is available in both languages at http://www.hazine.gov.tr/standby/imf_standbyeng.htm.65 For a similar argument see Hindess, ‘Investigating international anti-corruption’, p 1393.
PINAR BED_IRHANO �GLU
1254
