Ümit Kartoğlu
In one country, a train derails, killing dozens. In another, a mine collapses, burying hundreds beneath the earth. The same question echoes across both tragedies: Who is responsible?
This question does more than assign blame — it reveals the moral backbone of a society. The way a nation answers it tells us how it understands accountability, conscience, and power. In one place, the answer is short: “I am.” In another, it grows long and twisted: “It has nothing to do with me, but necessary steps will be taken.” Between those two sentences lies the story of how differently nations define responsibility.
THE THREE FACES OF RESPONSIBILITY
In public administration, responsibility has three dimensions: criminal responsibility, political responsibility, and moral accountability.
The first belongs to the realm of law — determining who violated a rule, who neglected a duty. Guilt is individual, so is punishment. The second belongs to the realm of public conscience — not who broke the law, but who betrayed public trust. The third lies outside both the judiciary and politics; it is a sphere governed by society’s moral norms.
Even if a person has not directly committed a crime, they are expected to assume political responsibility if negligence, injustice, harm, or wrongdoing has occurred within their sphere of authority. Such a resignation is a political acknowledgement of failure and a step that opens the way for a proper investigation of subordinate staff. When the top official refuses to resign, it signals that they are protecting the faulty structure beneath them; in that case, the criminal process should evolve into a prosecution that includes them as well. Resignation means that the leader dissociates themselves from the wrongdoing and the wrongdoers. Mature democracies understand this distinction; others prefer to search for culprits rather than accept responsibility.
Moral responsibility, on the other hand, is a duty recognized by society’s conscience, beyond law and politics. Political responsibility often brings moral responsibility with it. Moral responsibility also comes into play in developed democracies when consumers boycott products whose production involves child labor, forced labor, or animal cruelty.
THE QUITE DIGNITY OF ACCOUNTABILITY
In Greece in 2023, two trains collided near Tempi, killing fifty-seven people. In the aftermath, Transport Minister Kostas Karamanlis announced his resignation after returning from his visit to the site of the train accident at Tempi, adding in his statement that “the pain cannot be worded sufficiently.”
His resignation was not an admission of crime but an affirmation of honor. It is an act of purification — the acknowledgment that something went wrong under one’s watch, and that public trust must be restored not through excuses but through humility. When he resigned, the system remained standing precisely because someone had the decency to bow and leave.
In his resignation statement, Karamanlis said, “I have just returned from the scene of the railway tragedy in Tempi. The pain is unspeakable.”
“It is a fact that we received the Greek railway in a state that does not suit the 21st century. In these 3.5 years, we made every effort to improve this reality. Unfortunately, these efforts were not enough to prevent such an accident. And this is very heavy for all of us and for me personally.
“When something so tragic happens, it is not possible to carry on as if it didn’t happen. I have been in politics for a few years, but I consider it a necessary element of our democracy that the citizens of our country trust the political system. This is called political responsibility.
“For this reason, I am resigning from the position of Minister of Infrastructure and Transport. It is what I feel my duty to do as a minimal sign of respect to the memory of the people who left so unjustly and to take responsibility for the timeless mistakes of the Greek state and political system.
“From the bottom of my heart, I once again express my pain and support to the families of the victims.”
Greek Transport Minister Kostas Karamanlis resigned following the train crash tragedy
It was one of the clearest expressions of moral accountability in European politics. Karamanlis was not personally to blame, nor was he under legal pressure. Yet he understood that the system’s failure carried an ethical burden he could not ignore. His resignation was not an escape, but a declaration that leadership and morality cannot be separated. In Greece, his act was seen not as political weakness but as public maturity — proof that a state can still feel shame and turn it into dignity.
THE POLITICS OF EVASION
In Türkiye, the picture is almost the reverse. When a tragedy occurs, the reflex is predictable: “Those responsible will be punished.” The subtext is always the same: “But I am not among them.”
After the 2018 Çorlu train massacre, the families of the victims called for broader accountability. Mısra Öz — whose husband and nine-year-old son died in the crash — became the most visible face of this pursuit of justice. She was later prosecuted on charges of insulting state officials and was fined 8,840 lira (about $1,250 at the time). Öz had described the court panel as “a panel that prefers to play the three monkeys.” The fine was later overturned by the Court of Cassation.
The train disaster in Çorlu district of Tekirdağ, which claimed 24 lives and injured 341 people
Transport Minister Cahit Turhan accepted neither political nor moral responsibility. Following an internal investigation, he stated that it had been concluded that Turkish State Railways or its personnel were “not responsible or at fault.” On the contrary, thirteen Turkish State Railways officials were put on trial for “causing death and injury by negligence.” Four were acquitted after a six-year-long trial, while others were sentenced to a total of 108 years in prison.
In Türkiye, criminal responsibility trickles down the hierarchy, while political accountability evaporates before it reaches the top. Ministers often defend themselves by saying, “My signature isn’t on it,” as if responsibility were a matter of paperwork rather than oversight. The question of conscience is replaced by the ritual of denial. When journalists ask, “Will you resign?” the answer rarely changes: “I will continue to serve my nation.” And thus, the chain of accountability breaks at its highest link.
THE SOYLU EPISODE
The only instance in recent Turkish politics where a minister openly assumed political responsibility came in April 2020, when Interior Minister Süleyman Soylu offered his resignation after chaos erupted during a hastily announced COVID-19 lockdown.
“I take full responsibility for this mistake,” he declared — a rare moment of moral clarity in Turkish public life. For a brief instant, the country seemed stunned; it was as if the spirit of the resigned Greek minister had momentarily drifted through Ankara. Yet the next day, the Presidency announced that “Mr. Soylu’s resignation has not been accepted.”
As Soylu himself explained when he resigned, the decision had been made in line with the President’s instructions. And just like that, conscience yielded to protocol. What had begun as a moral gesture was transformed into an act requiring political authorization — as if responsibility itself had been nationalized. The episode inevitably left many wondering whether Soylu’s resignation had ever been anything more than a carefully staged performance.
THE AUTHORITARIAN REFLEX: WHEN RESIGNATION IS FORBIDDEN
In democratic systems, resignation is one of the few remaining acts of personal agency — a leader’s way of saying, “I answer to the public, not just to power.” In heavily centralized systems, however, even this act is absorbed by hierarchy.
The acceptance or rejection of a resignation becomes a test of loyalty. When a resignation is refused, it sends a clear message: it is not your conscience that matters, but your obedience. In such regimes, errors are never admitted because errors imply fallibility, and fallibility threatens authority. The state cannot apologize because the state must always appear infallible.
Thus, the refusal of resignation — the denial of responsibility — becomes the most silent yet telling sign of authoritarianism. It is the moment when a state loses not its control, but its capacity for shame.
WHEN THE RAIL BREAKS
Criminal responsibility belongs to the courts; political and moral accountability belongs to the conscience of governance. In one country, the state apologizes; in the other, it explains. In one, a minister’s departure rebuilds trust; in the other, his staying corrodes it. Trains may derail everywhere, systems may falter anywhere — but what matters is what happens next. The tracks are repaired, and dignity is preserved. When authorities refuse responsibility — or when one does, and the resignation is rejected — in that quiet denial or refusal, a nation’s moral infrastructure collapses far more deeply than its rails ever could.
