Tarık Zafer Tunaya was an academic, law professor, writer, and the Istanbul Representative of the 1961 Constituent Assembly (b. 1916, Istanbul – d. 29 January 1991). He graduated from Saint Benoit French High School (1936) and Istanbul University Faculty of Law (1940). He worked for a period as a French teacher at Beykoz Middle School and later became a faculty member at the institution from which he had graduated.
In 1946, he earned his doctorate with his dissertation “The Element of Thought in Institutional Theory and Its Certain Characteristics.” He became an associate professor in the Chair of General Public Law with his thesis “Intellectual Currents of the Second Constitutional Era in Terms of Turkish Public Law” (1950) and was promoted to professor of constitutional law in 1959. In 1953–54, he was sent to Europe for professional research by decision of the Faculty Council. Upon the invitation of the Rockefeller Foundation, he conducted research in the United States for one year.
After the 27 May 1960 military coup, he served as the Istanbul Representative of the Constituent Assembly (06.01.1961 – resignation: 13.07.1961). He took part as a member of the Constitution Committee formed by the coup leaders (1961). He was removed from this position following disagreements with Committee Chairman Sıddık Sami Onar.
Following the decree of the National Unity Committee dated 27 October 1960, which dismissed 147 professors, associate professors, and assistants from the university, he was assigned to duty in Paris under NATO.
Tunaya also served as dean of the Faculties of Istanbul Law (1968–69) and Istanbul Political Sciences (1979). He became widely known for his writings and lectures on constitutional law and political parties. Three months before his retirement, he was removed from his position by the military administration established after the 12 September 1980 coup.
He was awarded the Legion d’Honneur by the French government. Tunaya was chosen as one of the “Ten Monumental Jurists” by the Balıkesir Bar Association on the 60th anniversary of the Republic. With the third volume of his work Political Parties in Turkey, he received the 1989 Sedat Simavi Political Science Award.
Works
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Political Parties in Turkey (1952; new ed., 3 vols., 1986)
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The Law on the Election of Members of Parliament (1954)
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Perspectives on the Political Life of the Second Constitutional Era (1959)
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Series on Political Science (1959)
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The Proclamation of Liberty, Westernization Movements in Turkey’s Political Life (1960; new ed. 2010)
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The Islamist Current (1962; new ed. 2004 under the title The Islamic Movement)
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Atatürk and Kemalism within Revolutionary Movements (1964)
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Political Institutions and Constitutional Law (1964)
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Political Developments in Turkey / 1876–1938
(2 vols: The Armistice–Republic and Atatürk Era and The Ottoman Constitution and Constitutional Period, 1965) -
The Constitution Covered with Human Skin (1969)
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In the Waiting Room of Civilization (1989)
The Tarık Zafer Tunaya Cultural Center was opened in the Beyoğlu district in June 2020.
His personal and academic archive is preserved within the Maltepe University private archive collection.
