Establishment: 1919–1923 The Republican People's Party has its origins in the resistance organizations, known as
Defence of Rights Associations, created in the immediate aftermath of
World War I in the
Turkish War of Independence. In the
Sivas Congress,
Mustafa Kemal Pasha (Atatürk) and his colleagues united the Defence of Rights Associations into the
Association for the Defence of National Rights of Anatolia and Rumelia (
Anadolu ve Rumeli Müdâfaa-i Hukuk Cemiyeti) (A–RMHC), and called for
elections in the
Ottoman Empire to elect representatives associated with the organization. Most members of the A–RMHC were previously
Young Turks associated with the
Committee of Union and Progress, and veterans of the tumultuous politics of the
Second Constitutional Era. After the
forced dissolution of the
Chamber of Deputies, A–RMHC members proclaimed the
Grand National Assembly as a counter government from Istanbul, which was
appeasing the
Allied powers. After Grand National Assembly forces militarily defeated
Greece,
France, and
Armenia, they overthrew the Ottoman government and
abolished the monarchy. After the
1923 election, the A–RMHC was transformed into a political party called the People's Party (
Halk Fırkası) soon changing its name to Republican People's Party (
Cumhuriyet Halk Fırkası, and then
Cumhuriyet Halk Partisi) (CHP). With a united parliament, the
republic was proclaimed with Atatürk as its first president, the
Treaty of Lausanne was ratified, and the
Caliphate was abolished the next year. For the next two decades Turkey was under a
paternalist one-party authoritarian dictatorship, with one interruption; another brief experiment of opposition politics through the formation of the
Liberal Republican Party. statue in the garden of the
Grand National Assembly during the 4th Republican People's Party Ordinary Convention, 1935 From 1924 to 1946, the CHP
introduced sweeping social, cultural, educational, economic, and legal reforms that transformed Turkey into a
republican nation state. Such reforms included the adoption of Swiss and Italian legal and penal codes, the acceleration of industrialization, land reform and
rural development programs, nationalization of foreign assets,
forced assimilation policies,
strict secularism, women's suffrage, and switching written Turkish from
Perso-Arabic script into
Latin script, to name a few. In the party's second ordinary congress in 1927, Atatürk delivered a thirty-six hour long
speech of his account of the pivotal last eight years of Turkish history, which ended with an
appeal to the Turkish youth to protect the Republic. Its narrative has served as the basis of a growing
cult of personality associated with Atatürk and the
historiography of the transition to the Republic from the Sultanate. In the period of 1930–1939, Atatürk's CHP clarified its ideology from a vague left-wing-
unionism for '
The Six Arrows':
republicanism,
reformism,
laïcité (secularism),
populism,
nationalism, and
statism, as well as borrowing tenets from
communism and
(Italian) fascism. They defined
Atatürk's principles, which were soon known as
Kemalism, and were codified into the
constitution on 5 February 1937. With the
Ottomanism question settled, Turkish
nation-building was prioritized which saw nationalist propaganda,
language purification, and
pseudo-scientific racial theories propagated. Opposition to Atatürk's reforms were suppressed by various
coercive institutions and military force, at the expense of religious conservatives, minorities, and communists. The party-state cracked down on Kurdish resistance to assimilation, suppressing
multiple rebellions and encouraging the
denial of their existence.
Anti-clerical and
anti-veiling campaigns peaked in the mid-1930s. In the party's third convention, it clarified its approach towards the
religious minorities of the
Christians and the
Jews, accepting them as real Turks as long as they adhere to the national ideal and
use the Turkish language. However under the state sanctioned secularist climate
Alevis were able to make great strides in
their emancipation, and to this day make up a core constituency of the CHP. With the onset of the
Great Depression, the party divided into statist and liberal factions, being championed by Atatürk's prime minister İnönü and his finance minister
Celal Bayar respectively. Atatürk mostly favored İnönü's policies, so economic development of the early republic was largely confined to
state-owned enterprises and
five-year plans. Further left-wing Republicans centered around the
Kadro circle were deemed to be impermissible, so they were closed down.
İnönü era On 12 November 1938, the day after Atatürk's death, his ally
İsmet İnönü was elected the second president and assumed leadership of the Republican People's Party. İnönü's presidency saw heavy state involvement in the economy and further rural development initiatives such as
Village Institutes. On foreign affairs, the
Hatay State was annexed and İnönü adopted a policy of neutrality despite attempts by the
Allies and
Axis powers to bring Turkey into
World War II, during which extensive conscription and
rationing was implemented to ensure an
armed neutrality. Non-Muslims especially suffered when the CHP government implemented discriminatory "
wealth taxes,"
labor battalions, and
peon camps. Over the course of the war, the CHP eventually rejected
ultranationalism, with
pan-Turkists being purged in the
Racism-Turanism Trials. In the aftermath of World War II, İnönü presided over the democratization of Turkey. With the crisis of war over, factionalism between the liberals and statists again broke out. The
Motion with Four Signatures resulted in the resignation of some CHP members, most prominently Bayar, who then founded the
Democrat Party (DP). İnönü called for a
multi-party general election in 1946 – the first multi-party general election in the country's history, in a contest between the DP and CHP. The result was a victory for the CHP, which won 395 of the 465 seats, amid criticism that the election did not live up to democratic standards. Under pressure by the new conservative parliamentary opposition and the United States, the party became especially
anti-communist, and retracted some of its rural development programs and anti-clerical policies. The period between 1946 and 1950 saw İnönü prepare for a pluralistic Turkey
allied with the West. A more free and fair general election was held in
1950 that led to the CHP losing power to the DP. İnönü presided over a
peaceful transition of power. The 1950 election marked the end of the CHP's last majority government. The party has not been able to regain a parliamentary majority in any subsequent election since.
Road to the center-left: 1950–1980 Due to the
winner-take-all system in place during the 1950s, the DP achieved landslide victories in elections that were reasonably close, meaning the CHP was in opposition for 10 years. In the meantime, the party began a long transformation into a
social democratic force. Even before losing power İnönü created the
Ministry of Labour and signed workers protections into law, and universities were given autonomy from the state. Though the DP and CHP were rivals, the DP was founded by Republicans and mostly continued Kemalist policies. But despite its name, the Democrat Party became increasingly authoritarian by the end of its rule. İnönü was harassed and almost lynched multiple times by DP supporters, and the DP government confiscated CHP property and harassed their members. The DP blocked the CHP from forming
an electoral alliance with opposition parties for the
1957 snap election. By 1960, the DP accused the CHP of plotting a rebellion and
threatened its closure. With the army concerned by the DP's authoritarianism, Turkey's first
military coup was performed by junior officers. After one year of
junta rule the DP was banned and Prime Minister
Adnan Menderes and two of his ministers were
tried and executed. Right-wing parties which trace their roots to the DP have since continuously attacked the CHP for their perceived involvement in the hanging of Menderes. İnönü favored Ecevit's controversial faction, resulting in
Turhan Feyzioğlu leaving the CHP and founding the
Reliance Party. When asked about his reasoning for his favoring Ecevit, İnönü replied: "Actually we are already a left-to-center party after embracing Laïcité. If you are populist, you are [also] at the left of center." With Feyzioğlu's departure, the CHP participated in the
1969 election with a Democratic Left program without qualms, though it achieved a similar result as its performance from last election due to the growing perception that the party primarily appealed to the educated urban elite. İnönü remained as opposition leader and the leader of the CHP until 8 May 1972, when he was overthrown by Ecevit in a party congress, due to his endorsement of the
military intervention of 1971. with
Nicolae Ceaușescu, 1978 Ecevit adopted a distinct
left wing role in politics and, although remaining staunchly nationalist, attempted to implement
democratic socialism into the ideology of CHP. His arrival saw support for the party increase in the
1973 election. After establishing a
coalition arrangement with
an Islamist party, Ecevit made the decision to
invade Cyprus in an atmosphere of deteriorating order on the island. The 1970s saw the party solidify its relations with
trade unions and leftist groups in an atmosphere of
intense polarization and political violence. The CHP achieved its best ever result in a free and fair multi-party election under Ecevit, when in
1977, the party received 41% of the vote, but not enough support for a stable government. Ecevit and his political rival
Süleyman Demirel would constantly turnover the premiership as partisan deadlock took hold. This ended in a
military coup in 1980, resulting in the banning of every political party and major politicians being jailed and banned from politics.
Recovery period: 1980–2002 Both the party name "Republican People's Party" and the abbreviation "CHP" were banned until 1987. Until 1999, Turkey was ruled by the
centre-right Motherland Party (ANAP) and the
True Path Party (DYP), unofficial successors of the Democrat Party and the Justice Party, as well as, briefly, by the
Islamist Welfare Party. CHP supporters also established successor parties. By 1985,
Erdal İnönü, İsmet İnönü's son, consolidated two successor parties to form the
Social Democratic Populist Party (SHP), while the
Democratic Left Party (, DSP) was formed by
Rahşan Ecevit, Bülent Ecevit's wife (Bülent Ecevit later took over the DSP in 1987). After the ban on pre-1980 politicians was lifted in 1987,
Deniz Baykal, a household name from the pre-1980 CHP, reestablished the Republican People's Party in 1992, and the SHP merged with the party in 1995. However, Ecevit's DSP remained separate, and to this day has not merged with the CHP. From 1991 to 1996, the SHP and then the CHP were in coalition governments with the DYP. Baykal supported
Mesut Yılmaz's
coalition government after the collapse of the
Welfare-DYP coalition following the
28 February "
post-modern coup." However, due to the
Türkbank scandal, the CHP withdrew its support and helped depose the government with a
no confidence vote. Ecevit's DSP formed an interim-government, during which the
PKK leader
Abdullah Öcalan was captured in
Kenya. As such, in the
election of 1999, the DSP benefited massively in the polls at the expense of CHP, and the party failed to exceed the 10%
threshold (8.7% vote), not winning any seats.
Main opposition under Baykal: 2002–2010 In the
2002 general election, the CHP came back with 20% of the vote but 32% of the seats in parliament, as only it and the new
AKP (Justice and Development Party) received above the 10% threshold to enter parliament. With DSP's collapse, CHP became Turkey's main Kemalist party. It also became the second largest party and the
main opposition party, a position it has retained since. Since the dramatic 2002 election, the CHP has been racked by internal power struggles, and has been outclassed by the AKP governments of
Recep Tayyip Erdoğan. Many of its members were critical of the leadership of CHP, especially Baykal, who they complained was stifling the party of young blood by turning away the young who turn either to apathy or even vote for the AKP. Baykal proclaimed the party to be the
secularist establishment's bulwark as he pivoted the party away from the center-left towards the center. in
Anıtkabir, Atatürk's mausoleum In 2007, the culmination of tensions between Turkey's
secularist establishment and AKP politicians turned into a
political crisis. The CHP assisted undemocratic attempts by the
army and judiciary to shut down the newly elected AKP. The crisis began with
massive protests by secularists supported by the CHP in reaction to the AKP's candidate for
that year's presidential election:
Abdullah Gül, due to his background in Islamist politics and
his wife's wearing of the
hijab. The CHP's campaign focused on the alleged
İrtica (Islamic reaction) that the AKP victory would bring into government, which served to alienate liberals and democrats from the party. The CHP chose to boycott the (
indirect) election. Without
quorum, Erdoğan called for
a snap election to increase his mandate, in which the CHP formed an electoral alliance with the declining DSP, but gained only 21% of the vote. During the campaign season, a
memorandum directed at the AKP was posted online by the
Turkish Armed Forces. The CHP boycotted Gül's second attempt to be voted president, though this time Gül had the necessary quorum with
MHP's participation and won. The swearing-in ceremony was boycotted by the CHP and the
Chief of the General Staff Yaşar Büyükanıt. The party also voted against a package of constitutional amendments to have the president elected by the people instead of parliament, which was eventually
put to a referendum. The "no" campaign, supported by the CHP, failed, as a majority of Turks voted in favor of direct presidential elections. The final challenge against the AKP's existence was a
2008 closure trial which ended without a ban. Following the decision, the AKP government, in a covert alliance with the
Gülen movement, began a purge of the Turkish military, judiciary, and police forces of secularists in the
Ergenekon and
Sledgehammer trials, which the CHP condemned. CHP leadership briefly held a soft
Euroscepticism as the AKP government came close to an ascension plan with the
European Union. Kılıçdaroğlu returned the CHP to its traditional social-democratic image and cast away its secularist-establishmentalist character. This involved building bridges to voters it has traditionally not attracted: the devout, Kurds, and right-wing voters. However even with Kılıçdaroğlu at the helm, after five general elections, the CHP still did not win an election, receiving between only 22 and 26% of the vote in parliamentary elections. The CHP supported the unsuccessful "no" campaign in the
2010 constitutional referendum. In his first general election in
2011, the party increased its support by 25% but not enough to unseat the AKP. The
2013 Gezi Park protests found much support in the CHP. during the
2017 March for Justice The
2014 presidential election was the first in which the position would be directly elected and came just after
a massive corruption scandal. The CHP and MHP's joint candidate
Ekmeleddin İhsanoğlu still lost to Erdoğan with only 38% of the vote. The two parties were critical of the government's
negotiations for peace with the PKK, which lasted from 2013–July 2015. In the
June 2015 general election, the AKP lost its parliamentary majority due to the debut of the pro-Kurdish
People's Democratic Party (HDP), which was possible because of
strategic voting by CHP voters so the party could pass the 10% threshold. This support went so far as to help the government pass a law to lift
parliamentary immunities, resulting in the jailing of MPs from the HDP, including
Selahattin Demirtaş, as well as CHP lawmakers. The party lead the unsuccessful
"no" campaign for the
2017 constitutional referendum. , Leader of CHP
Kemal Kılıçdaroğlu and Mayor of Istanbul
Ekrem İmamoğlu By 2017, dissidents from MHP founded the
Good Party. Kılıçdaroğlu was instrumental in the facilitating the rise of the new party by transferring MPs so they would have a parliamentary group to compete in the 2018 election. In the
2018 general election the CHP, Good Party,
Felicity, and
Democrat Party established the
Nation Alliance to challenge the AKP and MHP's
People's Alliance. Though CHP's vote was reduced to 22%, strategic voting for the other parties yielded the alliance 33% of the vote. Their candidate for president:
Muharrem İnce, lost in the first round, receiving only 30% of the vote. The Nation Alliance was re-established for the
2019 local elections, which saw great gains for the CHP, capturing nearly 30% of the electorate. A tacit collaboration with the HDP allowed for CHP to win the municipal mayoralties of
İstanbul and
Ankara.
Main opposition under Özel: 2023–present The party won a major victory in the
2024 local elections. CHP mayors were reelected in Istanbul and Ankara, along with new victories in rural Aegean and Central Anatolian provinces. Since
1977, this was the first time the CHP won the popular vote winning 37.8% of the electorate, and was the AKP's first nation-wide defeat.
Ekrem İmamoğlu, the CHP mayor of Istanbul,
was detained and later arrested by police in March 2025, along with over 100 other individuals.
Major protests occurred immediately following the arrests across the country, with CHP officials backing the protesters.
The party's primary election to choose its nominee for president in 2028 took place on 23 March, the day of İmamoğlu's arrest, which he won in a landslide. == Factions ==