Non-Contractual Claims: Turkish Law Guide
Tort Claims and Applicable Law
When someone wrongs you outside of a contract, Turkish law provides clear rules about which country's laws apply to your case. Generally, the law of the country where the wrongful act happened governs your claim. However, if the damage occurs somewhere else, that location's law takes precedence. This flexibility ensures justice isn't lost due to technicalities about where exactly the harm began versus where it was felt.
Location-Based Jurisdiction Rules
Turkish courts follow a practical approach: if your tort case has stronger connections to a different country than where the act occurred, that country's law may apply instead. For example, if two Turkish citizens have an accident while vacationing in France, Turkish law might govern their dispute despite the foreign location. This "closest connection" testprevents artificial results and ensures the most relevant legal framework applies to your situation.
Insurance Direct Action Rights
Here's valuable protection: if someone's insurance policy allows it, you can sue their insurance company directly rather than chasing the person who harmed you. This right depends on whether the applicable tort law or the insurance contract permits direct claims. It's particularly helpful when dealing with drivers who might flee or lack sufficient assets to cover your damages.
Post-Incident Law Selection
After a tort occurs, both parties can agree on which country's law should govern their dispute. This flexibility allows for strategic choices—perhaps selecting a jurisdiction with more favorable damage calculations or clearer liability rules. However, this choice must be made explicitly and after the incident happens, ensuring both parties understand the implications of their decision.
Personality Rights Media Violations
Media violations of your privacy, reputation, or personal rights through press, television, radio, internet, or other mass communication channels give you significant control over legal proceedings. Turkish law recognizes that media can harm people across borders instantly, so you get to choose from several legal frameworks depending on your specific situation and strategic preferences.
Victim's Choice of Law Options
As the victim, you can choose from three legal frameworks:
Your own country's law (if the wrongdoer could reasonably foresee harm there)
The wrongdoer's business or residence country's law
The law where damage actually occurred (again, if foreseeable)
This choice empowers you to select the most favorable legal environment, whether that means better damage awards, stronger privacy protections, or more accessible courts.
Right of Reply Requirements
For periodical publications, your right to respond or correct false information follows the law of the country where the publication was printed or the broadcast originated. This rule ensures media outlets cannot escape accountability by distributing content internationally. The principle keeps responsibility tied to the source, making it easier for you to enforce your rights where the media company actually operates.
Personal Data Protection Claims
Violations involving personal data processing or restrictions on your right to access information about yourself follow the same choice-of-law rules as other personality rights violations. This coverage is particularly relevant in our digital age, where your personal information crosses borders constantly through websites, apps, and online services that might misuse or restrict access to your data.
Product Liability Determination
When defective products cause you harm, Turkish law gives you strategic options for pursuing compensation. Rather than forcing you into potentially unfavorable foreign legal systems, you can choose between different jurisdictions based on practical considerations like where the manufacturer operates or where you purchased the dangerous item.
Injured Party's Jurisdiction Choice
You can choose to apply either:
The law of the manufacturer's home country (where they live or do business)
The law of the country where you acquired the defective product
This choice lets you compare legal systems and select the one offering better protection, higher damage awards, or more favorable liability standards for your specific situation.
Acquisition Location Rules
To use the law of where you bought the product, there's an important requirement: the manufacturer cannot prove they introduced their product into that country without their consent. This prevents manufacturers from escaping liability by claiming they never intended their products to reach certain markets, especially in cases involving grey market or parallel imports.
Manufacturer Burden of Proof
The law places the burden on manufacturers to prove their products reached certain countries without their permission or knowledge. This burden protects consumers by making it difficult for companies to disclaim responsibility for products that harm people in markets they knew about or should have anticipated. It prevents manufacturers from selectively avoiding accountability in countries with stronger consumer protection laws.
Competition Law Violations
Competition law violations—whether unfair competition practices or anti-competitive behavior—follow specific territorial rules based on market impact. Turkish law recognizes that modern business operates across borders, so it focuses on where competitive harm actually occurs rather than where companies are based. This approach protects local markets while providing clear rules for international business disputes.
Unfair Competition Market Rules
For unfair competition claims, the governing law comes from the country whose market faces direct impact from the unfair practices. However, if the harm only affects your specific business interests rather than the broader market, then the law of your business location applies instead.
This distinction helps courts focus on whether the problem is:
Market-wide competition distortion, or
Targeted business interference
Anti-Competition Enforcement
Anti-competitive behavior follows the law of the country with the directly affected market. This rule ensures that cartels, monopolistic practices, and other competition restrictions are governed by the legal system of the economy they're actually harming. It prevents companies from escaping antitrust liability by operating from countries with weaker competition laws while targeting protected markets.
Damage Limitation Provisions
When foreign law applies to competition violations in Turkey, there's an important protection: courts cannot award more damages than Turkish law would provide for the same violation. This ceiling prevents excessive liability while still allowing foreign competition law to govern the case. It balances international legal cooperation with protection of businesses operating in Turkish markets.
Unjust Enrichment Recovery
Unjust enrichment occurs when someone gains benefits at your expense without legal justification. Turkish law provides systematic rules for determining which country's law governs your recovery claim, prioritizing existing legal relationships first, then falling back to location-based rules. This approach ensures consistent treatment while respecting the realities of cross-border transactions.
Underlying Legal Relationship Test
The primary rule examines whether there's an existing or claimed legal relationship that caused the enrichment. If such a relationship exists, the law governing that relationship also controls your unjust enrichment claim. This approach maintains consistency—if a contract dispute leads to unjust enrichment, the same law handles both issues, preventing contradictory results from different legal systems.
Enrichment Location Priority
When no underlying legal relationship governs the situation, the law of the country where the enrichment actually occurred takes control. This location-based rule provides a clear fallback that's usually connected to the facts. For example, if someone mistakenly transfers money to the wrong account abroad, the law of where the recipient's account is located would typically govern the recovery claim.
Retroactive Law Selection Rights
After the unjust enrichment occurs, both parties can explicitly agree on which country's law should govern their dispute. This post-enrichment choice allows for strategic considerations and potentially faster resolution through agreement on favorable legal frameworks. The selection must be clear and made after the enrichment happens, ensuring both parties understand the implications of their choice.
