Citations to the International and Comparative Law in the Decisions of the Constitutional Court: An Empirical Analysis

Citations to international and comparative law by national supreme courts has been an important topic of discussion in recent years. It is within this context that this study empirically examines citations made to the international and comparative law by the Turkish Constitutional Court (TCC) in its rulings with regard to abstract and concrete review and political party closure cases. To this end, we address the following questions: Which sources of foreign law are cited by the TCC? Why and how are they cited and used? Is there any difference in citations in terms of the subject matter of the case? We have conducted a logit analysis to investigate whether litigators’ the identity, the subject-matter, the outcome and the direction of the case influence citation practices of the TCC. We have found that while the direction and the subject-matter of the case have no impact on the use of foreign citations, the identity of the litigator and the outcome of the case have a weak influence on it. The TCC employs foreign sources of law as a supportive norm in its decison-making proces