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GENDER AND POLITICS
SERIES EDITORS: JOHANNA KANTOLA · SARAH CHILDS
Feminist Framing of
Europeanisation
Edited by
Rahime Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm · F. Melis Cin
Gender and Politics
Series Editors
Johanna Kantola
University of Tampere
Tampere, Finland
Sarah Childs
Royal Holloway, University of London
Egham, UK
The Gender and Politics series celebrated its 7th anniversary at the 5th
European Conference on Politics and Gender (ECPG) in June 2017 in
Lausanne, Switzerland having published more than 35 volumes to date.
The original idea for the book series was envisioned by the series editors
Johanna Kantola and Judith Squires at the first ECPG in Belfast in 2009,
and the series was officially launched at the Conference in Budapest in
2011. In 2014, Sarah Childs became the co-editor of the series, together
with Johanna Kantola. Gender and Politics showcases the very best inter-
national writing. It publishes world class monographs and edited collec-
tions from scholars - junior and well established - working in politics,
international relations and public policy, with specific reference to ques-
tions of gender. The titles that have come out over the past years make key
contributions to debates on intersectionality and diversity, gender equal-
ity, social movements, Europeanization and institutionalism, governance
and norms, policies, and political institutions. Set in European, US and
Latin American contexts, these books provide rich new empirical findings
and push forward boundaries of feminist and politics conceptual and theo-
retical research. The editors welcome the highest quality international
research on these topics and beyond, and look for proposals on feminist
political theory; on recent political transformations such as the economic
crisis or the rise of the populist right; as well as proposals on continuing
feminist dilemmas around participation and representation, specific gen-
dered policy fields, and policy making mechanisms. The series can also
include books published as a Palgrave pivot. For further information on
the series and to submit a proposal for consideration, please get in touch
with Senior Editor Ambra Finotello, ambra.finotello@palgrave.com.
Feminist Framing
of Europeanisation
Gender Equality Policies in Turkey and the EU
Editors
Rahime Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm F. Melis Cin
Department of Political Science and Department of Educational Research
International Relations Lancaster University
Bahçeşehir University Lancaster, UK
Istanbul, Turkey
© The Editor(s) (if applicable) and The Author(s), under exclusive licence to Springer
Nature Switzerland AG 2021
This work is subject to copyright. All rights are solely and exclusively licensed by the
Publisher, whether the whole or part of the material is concerned, specifically the rights of
translation, reprinting, reuse of illustrations, recitation, broadcasting, reproduction on
microfilms or in any other physical way, and transmission or information storage and retrieval,
electronic adaptation, computer software, or by similar or dissimilar methodology now
known or hereafter developed.
The use of general descriptive names, registered names, trademarks, service marks, etc. in this
publication does not imply, even in the absence of a specific statement, that such names are
exempt from the relevant protective laws and regulations and therefore free for general use.
The publisher, the authors and the editors are safe to assume that the advice and
information in this book are believed to be true and accurate at the date of publication.
Neither the publisher nor the authors or the editors give a warranty, expressed or implied,
with respect to the material contained herein or for any errors or omissions that may have
been made. The publisher remains neutral with regard to jurisdictional claims in published
maps and institutional affiliations.
This Palgrave Macmillan imprint is published by the registered company Springer Nature
Switzerland AG.
The registered company address is: Gewerbestrasse 11, 6330 Cham, Switzerland
Acknowledgements
v
vi ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
vii
viii CONTENTS
Index 283
Notes on Contributors
xi
xii NOTES ON CONTRIBUTORS
Table 7.1 Women MPs in the Turkish parliament and party competition
(1935–2018)142
Table 7.2 Parliamentary work of women deputies in the Turkish
parliament (26th/27th terms) 150
Table 10.1 Demographic characteristics of participants 213
Table 11.1 Girls’ schooling ratio 239
xv
PART I
Conceptual Framework
CHAPTER 1
R. Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm (*)
Department of Political Science and International Relations, Bahçeşehir
University, Istanbul, Turkey
e-mail: rahime.kurum@eas.bau.edu.tr
F. M. Cin
Department of Educational Research, Lancaster University, Lancaster, UK
e-mail: m.cin@lancaster.ac.uk
beyond its borders given the attractiveness of its economic power. The
conceptual and empirical chapters explored in this book illustrate the rela-
tive weight of the EU compared to other international organisations and
its power to trigger changes either through direct pressure on the govern-
ment in question or by empowering civil society organisations/women’s
movements. Yet, the EU is not a normative gender actor as it fails to dis-
play a feminist rationale in promoting gender equality abroad, diluting its
impact such that this remains at rhetorical level.
The book includes 13 chapters and offers a deliberately eclectic set of
articles. The rationale behind these diverse chapters was to focus on a wide
range of areas where the EU has been found to have influence and the task
followed in this book is to explore the ways in which the EU produces this
given impact. Each empirical chapter will start with a presentation of the
EU’s policy template as relevant to their chapters. The review of this tem-
plate will include areas in which the EU has the highest policy template
such as employment policy, social policy and anti-discrimination policy.
gender plays a central role in designing these, so some policy areas such as
gender-sensitive budgeting are more theory driven, accounting particu-
larly for the interests of women, whilst some are less so (e.g., asylum poli-
cies) due to the lack of overall gender concern both at the EU level and
where policies in migration are in their infancy in Turkey, though feminist
theory is still implicit in such chapters.
Turning now to Part I, the chapters provide a fertile basis and theorisa-
tion for EU and gender studies bringing the resources that have been
pooled by the literature on Europeanisation of gender equality policies,
gendering EU studies which collectively enrich our understanding of the
scope, nature and the priorities of the EU’s promotion of gender equality
through its external relations, how they influence the EU’s impact on
gender policies on different clusters of countries, and how the EU’s spe-
cific demands on Turkey shapes the ways in which the domestic-level
actors are setting their gender equality agendas.
In Chap. 2, Soyaltın-Colella and Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm present an in-
depth analysis of the Europeanisation process, its mechanisms and scope,
as well as the potential outcomes. They map the EU’s evolving gender
equality policy template with a particular emphasis on the EU’s employ-
ment policy, social policy and anti-discrimination policy and discuss how
the different enlargement waves (UK, Scandinavia, Southern Europe and
Central and Eastern Europe) shaped the EU’s gender equality policy tem-
plate. Subsequently, the chapter offers in-depth discussion of the indepen-
dent variables for each mechanism and their operationalisation for the case
of Turkey, which incorporates an extensive discussion of the Turkish polit-
ical context and the cyclical nature of the EU-Turkey relations. In Chap.
3, Anagnostakis looks at gender and EU foreign policy and provides an
overview of how the EU tries to promote the gender perspective in its
external relations. This chapter discusses the rationale behind the develop-
ment of the EU’s gender equality policy template, illustrates the gap
between the rhetoric and practice hinting at the normative power/prag-
matic power debate, highlights the impact of multi-level nature of the EU
governance and its impact on the EU’s internal coherency and consistency
on gender issues, and how this in turn shapes the EU’s ability to project
its gender norms externally. In Chap. 4, Cin and Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm
set out to bring alternative explanations from key feminist philosophers’
work to build a feminist framework for the Europeanisation process.
Drawing on the insights from the previous two chapters, this chapter pro-
ceeds to a feminist reading of the theoretical approach used to study
14 R. SÜLEYMANOĞLU-KÜRÜM AND F. M. CIN
the World Bank and the UN, has been an important actor in improving
and establishing gender equality policies in Turkey since 1997. The chap-
ter traces the impact of the EU through the screening process and finan-
cial instruments on the gender equality policies in Turkey whilst opening
the discussion on how and why the EU and Turkey should broaden their
understanding of gender equality in education to create sustainable
changes. Lastly, Tabur (Chap. 12) addresses the much-debated issue of
the external dimension of EU migration and refugee policies with a spe-
cific focus on gender-specific challenges. The chapter analyses the extent
to which gender considerations are incorporated into recent EU migra-
tion and refugee policies, both at the level of norm adoption and norm
application. She draws on a qualitative content analysis of the EU’s asylum
policy from a gendered perspective and discusses the mechanisms of
Europeanisation to explain recent trends towards third country coopera-
tion. The concluding chapter, Chap. 13 by Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm and
Cin, returns to the ideas and emerging common arguments that form the
threads between the chapters, and further responds to the questions of
whether EU can be a feminist actor by drawing on the findings of the
seven empirical chapters in Part II.
It has not been possible, within the boundaries of this single book, to
cover all the policy areas for gender equality analysis. Nonetheless, we
hope that the policy areas presented in this book provide sufficient cover-
age to allow the reader to pull out lessons by which to consider the femi-
nist agenda of the EU and, indeed, that of Turkey.
References
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Ahrens, P. (2018). Actors, institutions, and the making of EU gender equality pro-
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Ansorg, N., & Haastrup, T. (2018). Gender and the EU’s support for security
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Jacquot, S. (2015). Transformation in EU gender equality: From emergence to dis-
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Kantola, J. (2010). Gender and the European Union. Basingstoke: Palgrave
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Kenny, M. (2013). A feminist institutionalist approach. In Gender and political
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King, G., Keohane, R. O., & Verba, S. (1994). Designing social inquiry: Scientific
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18 R. SÜLEYMANOĞLU-KÜRÜM AND F. M. CIN
Digdem Soyaltin-Colella
and Rahime Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm
Introduction
Europeanisation is broadly defined as the impact of the EU in national
policies, structures, policy processes and actors, as well as changes in the
role and functioning of interest groups (Kröger 2018). It is concerned
with ‘how Europe matters’ and looks at how the EU generates domestic
changes. The literature has shown that the process of Europeanisation in
the EU’s own member states is a bottom-up process as member states
D. Soyaltin-Colella (*)
Department of Political Science and Public Administration, Altınbaş University,
Istanbul, Turkey
e-mail: digdem.soyaltin@altinbas.edu.tr
R. Süleymanoğlu-Kürüm
Department of Political Science and International Relations, Bahçeşehir
University, Istanbul, Turkey
e-mail: rahime.kurum@eas.bau.edu.tr
mechanisms and scope of the EU’s domestic impact. The chapter is divided
into two main sections. The first section introduces the domestic and
EU-level independent variables guiding three theoretical models or path-
ways of the EU’s influence, namely the interest-driven, norm-driven and
lesson-driven, whilst operationalising these variables in the case of Turkey.
The second part of the chapter discusses the outcomes of the processes
driven by the aforementioned three pathways. These outcomes were norm
adoption and norm application, both of which are also measured with
respect to their direction and magnitude in terms of being positive, nega-
tive and selective changes.
enlargement and following the signing of the Beijing Platform for Action
in 1995. Nevertheless, in the enlargement of post-communist states, the
EU has given priority to socio-economic development and only added
gender equality to the negotiation process at a rather late stage (see
Dobrotić et al. 2013). Therefore, compliance with the EU’s gender equal-
ity turned into a ‘mechanical’ process, also due to an inconsistent imple-
mentation among the member states which significantly diminished the
EU’s leverage ( Dobrotić et al. 2013: 221; see also Havelková 2010).
Secondly, size, credibility, and speed of the EU’s incentives are often
regarded as important determinants of the effectiveness of the EU’s con-
ditionality. The EU offers a series of incentives such as financial aid, asso-
ciation, and trade and cooperation agreements, accession to the common
market, increasing participation in the decision making at the EU level
and full membership (Schimmelfennig 2007). However, these incentives
should be credible to both the government and the public (Checkel 2005;
Schimmelfennig and Sedelmeier 2005) and delivered within a reasonable
timeframe (Tocci 2005). The EU rewards compliance through material
and other political benefits (Kelley 2006) whilst merely holding such
rewards in cases of non-compliance. The credibility of the EU’s incentives
in Turkey varies in parallel with the cyclical nature of EU-Turkey relations.
The main positive turning points include the signing of the Association
Agreement in 1963, which led to the establishment of the Customs Union
in 1995 and finally the acceptance of Turkey as an official candidate in
Helsinki European Council in December 1999. A further positive turning
point was the decision of the European Council in December 2005 to
open accession negotiations with Turkey on 3 October 2005. There were
also points where the credibility of the EU’s incentives declined. First is
the Luxembourg European Council in December 1997 which rejected
Turkey’s official candidacy status and the suspension of negotiations in
eight Chapters by the decision of the European Commission in 2006 and
the subsequent French and Greek Cypriot vetoes on additional Chapters.
Nevertheless, the credibility of the EU’s incentives was always debatable,
even in times of good EU-Turkey relations. Even the decision to open
accession negotiations in December 2004 came with statements declaring
negotiations ‘open-ended’ with no promise of full membership at the end
of the process, as well as the growing emphasis on ‘privileged partnership’
with Turkey. Credibility declined even further following the negotiation
of the readmission agreement between the EU and Turkey in 2011 and
̇
2012 (Içduygu and Aksel 2014) and the EU-Turkey refugee deal as the
2 ENLARGEMENT STRATEGY OF THE EU: A FRAMEWORK FOR ANALYSIS… 25
identification of its members requires them to detach from the EU and its
gender equality conditionality, the EU can exert pressure on governments
and influence domestic identities and norms by empowering domestic
actors. In such cases, as discussed above with the insights from Avdeyeva’s
(2010) research, ruling parties change national legislation regardless of
their ideology when they are pressured by women’s movements and facili-
tate the social learning of the political elites.
In Turkey, identification of the domestic political elites with the EU has
been considerable except for during two particular periods. The first was
the Welfare Party (WP) which served in a coalition with the secular and
Kemalist party, the True Path Party (TPP), from 1996 to 1997. The sec-
ond is the current ruling JDP party. Kumbaracıbaşı (2016) illustrates that
although the JDP emerged as a pro-European party, this was a strategy
designed to negate suspicions about its Islamic roots within secular circles
(Dikici Bilgin 2017). Rather, like the policymakers in Greece and Portugal
who exploited the ESS to promote their own agendas (Zartaloudis 2015),
the JDP treated the EU instrumentally to pursue its own agenda such as
ending the headscarf ban in universities and public offices and also elimi-
nating veto players. In fact, the JDP combined the ideologies of pro-
Islamist parties with ultra-nationalist discourses to form a political alliance
between them, but also to close the gap between the extreme right and
the centre-right. Kumbaracıbaşı’s (2016) definition of extreme right
incorporates radical versions of Islam, radical and exclusionary national-
ism, as well as the variants of anti-Western ideologies such as Pan-
Ottomanism and Pan-Islamism. Hence, the JDP can ultimately be
identified with an ideology that is anti-Western/European.
The second domestic-level factor is the resonance of the domestic
norms and values that define the domestic culture with European ones. It
refers to the closeness to Europe and the attractiveness of the EU norms
to the domestic historical and cultural heritage (Schimmelfennig and
Sedelmeier 2005, 2005). Hence, this refers to the presence of a normative
fit which is a factor that facilitates the adoption of EU norms (Cortell and
Davis 2000: 69). Ansorg and Haastrup (2018) illustrate that the EU’s
promotion of the integration of the UN’s Women, Peace and Security
Agenda (WPS) in the Security Sector Reform (SSR) in Afghanistan was
curtailed by societal constraints. Likewise, Dobrotić et al. (2013) illustrate
that, in the socialist period, norms related to the labour market (right to
work, equal treatment and equal pay, protective provisions for pregnancy
and maternity, working conditions for women; see Dobrotić et al. 2013:
2 ENLARGEMENT STRATEGY OF THE EU: A FRAMEWORK FOR ANALYSIS… 31
220–221) were state imposed and resonated with the EU norms, making
their acceptance easier. On the contrary, norms related to the private
sphere such as domestic violence, the gendered division of labour and
LGBT rights had never previously been addressed by policy measures and
imposing gender equality in these areas was more difficult (see also
Havelková 2010). Likewise, in the Western Balkans, particularly in
Macedonia and Croatia, implementation of the EU’s gender equality leg-
islation stalled due to the informal social mechanisms that prevent women
from using their rights effectively, among other things (Spear 2012). In
Turkey, empirical analysis in this volume also highlights the fact that the
gender norms associated with the culture serve as the main obstacle to the
adoption, but in particular to the implementation, of the EU’s gender
equality norms.
In sum, the effectiveness of this model is determined by the intensity of
interactions, legitimacy of EU rules and their domestic resonance, and
identification of the domestic political elites with the EU and their sense
of novelty.
Lesson-Driven Change
The third theoretical model, which we conceptualised as the lesson-driven
pathway, refers to the voluntary and ideal type of policy transfer in contrast
to coercive forms of transfer, as in the interest-driven model (Rose 1991;
Dolowitz and Marsh 2000: 13). It comes as a response to domestic dis-
satisfaction with the status quo and motivates policymakers to engage in a
process of learning from abroad (Rose 1991: 10–12). This pathway has a
rationalist and a sociological variant. In the rationalist variant, this learning
is a simple process, that is, new information leads to change in the means
but not in ends; in the sociological variant, complex learning includes the
modification of underlying goals (Deutsch 1963: 92). This pathway is
particularly relevant to post-communist states which have been going
through a triple transition (political, economic and state/nation-building)
and which have sought to cooperate more closely with other countries and
the international/supranational organisations to find solutions to com-
mon problems or to achieve other policy goals (e.g., membership of the
EU). In fact, drawing on the research by Avdeyeva (2009) as well as Karu
and Pall (2009), Dobrotić et al. (2013) found cases of policy learning, that
is, transferring policies from neighbourhood countries (e.g., Estonia and
Lithuania from the Nordic countries). In this pathway, governments adopt
32 D. SOYALTIN-COLELLA AND R. SÜLEYMANOĞLU-KÜRÜM
EU rules if they expect these rules to solve domestic policy problems effec-
tively. Whether a state draws lessons from EU rules depends on the follow-
ing conditions: a government has to (1) search amongst rules abroad, (2)
direct its research at the political system of the EU (and/or its member
states) and (3) evaluate EU rules in terms of their suitability to drive
domestic consequences. These conditions depend on four factors: policy
dissatisfaction, EU-centred epistemic communities, rule transferability
and veto players.
This model simply starts with a policy dissatisfaction or failure in the
domestic context which increases the likelihood of rule adoption.
Policymakers might be particularly concerned about the threat of domes-
tic sanctions by maintaining the status quo, or the threat that dissatisfac-
tion discredits the idea underpinning the policy. In this case, policymakers
direct their search towards the EU or its member states since they do not
have the time or capacity to search elsewhere, and further have the advan-
tage of geographical proximity and professional contacts. In the case of
Turkey, the policy dissatisfaction concerning the violence against women
pushed the government to conduct a comprehensive ‘Research on
Domestic Violence Against Woman in Turkey’ in 2008 and adopt legisla-
tion on the Protection of the Family and the Prevention of Violence
against Women in 2012. In the implementation phase of the law, Turkish
policymakers exchanged policies and actions with their counterparts in
Italy and Spain (Palmén et al. 2016).
The EU can also encourage lesson-drawing by empowering domestic
actors (Bauer et al. 2007), especially in policy areas that depend on techni-
cal expertise and the specialist knowledge of epistemic communities (Haas
1992). Epistemic communities reduce potential conflict on policy-specific
issues by providing the government with the expertise, scientific advice,
and deliberative and consensual interpretations, thereby increasing the
receptiveness of domestic structures to new ideas and change of voluntary
compliance (Haas 1992: 3). The literature on the Europeanisation of gen-
der equality policies highlights the critical role played by epistemic com-
munities and femocrats in breaking the informal practices of gendered
institutions. In post-communist Europe, the EU gender equality agenda
opened discussions on gender equality and offered a ‘window of opportu-
nity’ for feminist movements and women’s organisations which used the
EU as a legitimising actor to accelerate reforms even for some ‘non-
binding’ issues on the national agenda such as domestic violence and
LGBT rights (Dobrotić et al. 2013; Bútorová 2009). In the Western
Another random document with
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existe de hecho necesariamente sin sufrir interrupción, y al verificar e
lustrum no se tenían en cuenta las variaciones ocurridas entre e
momento de fijar los censores la situación de las personas y bienes de
los ciudadanos y aquel en que el lustrum se celebraba; y con mayo
razón hay que decir esto de las variaciones que hubieren acontecido
entre el lustrum y el momento en que se aplicara prácticamente e
censo. Por consecuencia de lo cual, el censo vino a ser considerado
en general meramente como un acto preparatorio, y jamás pudo se
aplicado sino tomando en consideración las modificaciones aludidas
Ya se comprende también que cada censo no se aplicaba más que
hasta que empezaba a regir el siguiente. Entre los varios censos
habría de transcurrir por tanto, necesariamente, un intervalo, que
dado lo complicado del negocio, no podía ser muy breve. En Roma
este intervalo, en cuanto nosotros sabemos, no fue nunca fijado
legalmente; mas, a lo que parece, la duración normal del mismo fue de
cuatro años en un principio, y de cinco después. El determinar en cada
caso particular cuándo había de procederse a la formación de un
censo nuevo correspondió en los más antiguos tiempos a la
magistratura suprema, puesto que ella era la que hacía listas nuevas
cuando las que hasta el presente habían servido no se juzgaban
utilizables por más tiempo; después, quien resolvía de hecho acerca
de este particular fue el Senado. Por el contrario, lo que sí estaba
fijado por la ley era el plazo concedido para la práctica de las
operaciones preparatorias al colegium encargado del desempeño de
este negocio; mientras el mismo formó parte de las atribuciones de los
cónsules, estos magistrados, cuando procedían a formar el censo
habían, sin duda, de formarlo por sí mismos y dejarlo concluido, y en
caso de no ocurrir esto, sus sucesores no podían continuarlo, sino que
tenían que comenzar uno nuevo; después que se creó el cargo
independiente de censor, los censores, igual que el dictador, tenían
que abandonar su cargo una vez practicado el lustrum, o a lo más a
los diez y ocho meses de haber entrado en el cargo, de manera que
entre las funciones de unos y otros censores fue cada vez existiendo
mayor plazo de años de intervalo. No estaba jurídicamente
determinado el día en que había de tomarse posesión del cargo, pero
de hecho se realizaba esta, la mayoría de las veces, en la primavera, y
el lustrum en el verano del año siguiente.
Los derechos honoríficos del censor estaban sometidos al influjo de
la diferente manera como era apreciado el cargo, tanto
jerárquicamente como por la costumbre. No se le concedían fasces, n
tampoco de derecho la silla curul; en cambio, él fue el único de todos
los funcionarios al que se le concedió el uso de todo el vestido de
púrpura, cuando menos en los funerales.
La competencia de los censores era de más limitada intensidad
que la concedida a la magistratura suprema para la formación de
censo. Al ciudadano que descuidase cumplir con sus obligaciones
relativas a esta formación, o que diere informes falsos, podía el cónsu
castigarle por sí mismo con penas sobre el cuerpo y la vida, en tanto
que el censor, el cual carecía del derecho de coerción plena, solo
podía exigir responsabilidad por medio del cónsul; por tanto, la
institución de este cargo público no fue una mera segregación de la
magistratura suprema, como sucedió con la pretura, sino una
debilitación de la intensidad de aquella. También se advierte la
diferencia existente entre la formación del censo por los cónsules
como una de sus atribuciones y la facultad concedida a los censores
como cargo independiente, considerando que el censor carecía, sí, de
imperium, pero, sin embargo, convocaba al ejército de ciudadanos
para verificar la lustración. — De lo ya dicho resulta que todo acto
realizado por los censores, como tales, revestía por fuerza un carácte
provisional. Ellos eran los que concedían o negaban el derecho de
ciudadano y el derecho de sufragio, los que regulaban de esta o de la
otra manera la obligación del servicio militar y la de los impuestos
pero todas sus disposiciones no eran otra cosa, en el sentido jurídico
sino proposiciones hechas a aquellos magistrados a quienes tocaba
decidir sobre ellas por razón de su cargo. Como las variaciones
producidas realmente después de la formación y aceptación de las
listas censoriales habían de ser apreciadas por los censores mismos
estos podían, so pretexto de tomarlas en cuenta, apartarse, aun po
otros motivos, de los hechos censorialmente consignados, sin por eso
infringir el derecho, y menos todavía estaban obligados los censores
posteriores a atenerse al «juicio» de sus predecesores.
La competencia de los censores no se limitaba a la práctica de
negocio del cual recibían su denominación, o sea a la catalogación de
los ciudadanos obligados al servicio de las armas y al pago de los
impuestos, parte integrante de lo cual era la formación de la caballería
de ciudadanos, y posteriormente del orden de los caballeros; sino que
además les correspondía dar reglas sobre la vida económica de la
comunidad, así en lo relativo a los ingresos como a los gastos, en
tanto en cuanto pudiera hacerse esta regulación para largos plazos
Mas aquellas facultades que para este último efecto era preciso esta
ejercitando de un modo continuo, no le fueron quitadas a la
magistratura suprema, como se le quitó la de formar el censo; antes
bien, en los momentos en que no funcionaba la censura, esas
facultades eran ejercitadas por los cónsules. De todo lo demás
referente a esta materia trataremos en el libro siguiente, al cual nos
remitimos, al ocuparnos de la administración del patrimonio de la
comunidad. Del derecho de confirmar o de nombrar a los senadores
concedido a la censura por la ley ovinia en el siglo V, trataremos con
más detenimiento en el capítulo consagrado al Senado.
El tribunal de honor de los censores merece ser examinado aparte
Fue este tribunal un derivado de la facultad que los censores tenían
para organizar el ejército de ciudadanos, pues las personas infamadas
eran excluidas de las centurias de caballeros y de la ciudadanía
obligada a prestar el servicio militar ordinario de a pie; y como quiera
que las votaciones de la ciudadanía se verificaban conforme a esta
organización militar, las personas dichas perdían, por consecuencia
su derecho de sufragio. Este tribunal de honor adquirió mayo
importancia cuando los cargos senatoriales dejaron de ser vitalicios y
se encomendó a los censores la formación de la lista de los
senadores, pues a partir de este instante, los censores estuvieron
obligados a no incluir en la nueva lista de senadores a las personas
infamadas. De conformidad con su propia naturaleza político-militar
este tribunal de honor se aplicó únicamente a los varones. Las
consecuencias jurídicas que la existencia de ese tribunal trajo consigo
se proyectaron, ante todo, en las clases privilegiadas, porque las
personas sobre quienes hubiera recaído nota de infamia no podían
seguir perteneciendo a la caballería ni al Senado; a los demás
ciudadanos, el censor solo podía privarles del derecho de sufragio, o
mermárselo, y postergarles en el ejército; mas tampoco en este
respecto se hallaba obligado el magistrado poseedor de imperium a
respetar lo que el censor hubiera hecho.
Lo que desde luego estaba sometido al tribunal de honor era la
conducta del ciudadano en el cumplimiento de sus obligaciones
políticas; pero también dependía de la apreciación de los censores la
honorabilidad de la vida privada. Tanto la determinación de cuáles
acciones habían de considerarse deshonrosas, como la clase de
pruebas que había de ser suficiente para juzgarlas tales, fueron cosas
entregadas a la conciencia del magistrado; de hecho, sin embargo
hubieron de aplicarse con frecuencia a esta materia algunas
formalidades procesales. Este tribunal de honor, cuyo órgano se
nombraba en atención tan solo a la consideración moral y política que
gozaba la persona en quien recaía el nombramiento, y que aun en los
mejores tiempos de la República en este sentido fue en el que se hizo
uso de él, ese tribunal de honor, repetimos, solo puede decirse que
tuviera limitaciones legales en su obrar en cuanto que para privar de la
honra a una persona debía hacerse constar en la lista los fundamentos
de ello, y en cuanto era indispensable además el consentimiento
expreso de ambos colegas. La resolución dictada tocante al particula
no era tampoco definitiva, como hemos dicho que no lo era ningún otro
acto censorial; antes bien, todas las decisiones anteriormente
pronunciadas perdían su fuerza al formarse cada nuevo censo, y para
seguir teniéndola en lo sucesivo, era necesario que las repitiesen
expresamente los nuevos censores.
El cargo de censor romano, especialmente en la forma de cargo en
cierto modo superior al Senado que con el tiempo hubo de adoptar
pertenecía al número de los órganos más propios y privativos de la
comunidad romana, pero también fue de aquellos que más pronto
desaparecieron. Después de Sila, la censura, aun cuando no fue
propiamente abolida, solo funcionó en casos excepcionales. A este
resultado cooperaron distintas causas: la supresión de hecho de
impuesto de ciudadano; la variación en la manera de formar el ejército
empleándose, en lugar de la antigua leva, predominantemente e
alistamiento voluntario; la antipatía del estricto gobierno de los
optimates contra la facultad que los censores tenían de dispone
libremente de los puestos de senadores, que en realidad solo de
hecho eran vitalicios; y sobre todo la circunstancia de habe
encomendado la formación del censo a los municipios que constituían
la unión de todos los ciudadanos del Reino, circunstancia que fue la
necesaria secuela de la transformación del antiguo derecho de
ciudadano de la ciudad romana en el derecho de ciudadano del Reino
El censo del Reino desde entonces no pudo ser nada más que una
reunión de estos particulares registros municipales, y al aflojarse la
administración imperial y faltarle la unidad en lo penal, la reunión
dicha, que no dejaba de reportar alguna utilidad práctica, hubo de
interrumpirse; por otra parte, la intervención que en la administración
del patrimonio de la comunidad correspondía a la censura en la época
republicana fue trasladada a un cargo especial que funcionaba
constantemente, y la composición del Senado y del orden de los
caballeros se apoyó en bases distintas de aquellas en que se apoyaba
mientras los censores funcionaron.
CAPÍTULO VII
la edilidad
la cuestura