The closure of a business is not limited to simply closing a door and temporarily preventing a business from continuing its activities; it is a decision that can, in an instant, affect the right to employment, investment, private contracts, and even the salaries of a company’s employees. For this reason, the legal question about the closure should not begin with the question of what violation the unit has committed; the question before that is which authority, based on which law and by observing what formalities, has the right to stop its activities?

In public law, the power of governance is not unlimited in nature. In order to ensure public order, health, consumer rights, security and other public interests, executive bodies have not only the right, but in some cases the duty to supervise economic and social activities; but this supervisory authority does not in itself mean having unlimited authority to close or seal. Article 22 of the Constitution protects the occupation of individuals from infringement, and Article 28 recognizes the right to choose an occupation. In addition to these principles, Article 40 also limits the exercise of individual rights where it causes harm to others or violates public interests. Therefore, the legal system recognizes the economic activity of individuals on the one hand, and on the other hand, it accepts the possibility of public intervention if there is a legal basis. The main issue is determining the boundary between the two.

The principle of legality and the limits of administrative authority

From this perspective, one of the most important principles governing administrative actions is the principle of legality. The executive branch must be able to attribute its authority to a specific legal basis in order to intervene in the rights of individuals. The fact that an agency supervises an activity does not necessarily mean that it also has the authority to close or seal that activity. In other words, a distinction must be made between the authority to supervise, the authority to determine a violation, and the authority to apply enforcement guarantees. The law may have assigned the detection of a violation to one authority, the determination of enforcement guarantees to another authority, and the implementation of the decision to be carried out by another agency.

In administrative law, the authority of a public authority, unlike the authority of private individuals, is not a given and cannot be expanded through broad interpretation. An administrative authority can only decide and act within the limits of the authority granted to it by law. Therefore, the mere existence of a supervisory duty cannot be considered as evidence of the creation of the power to close or seal; unless such power has been granted to that authority in a valid law or regulation.

This distinction is even more important for businesses that are subject to multiple regulatory regimes. A café may be subject to trade regulations, health requirements, premises regulations and site use regulations at the same time. A book café may also have a cultural aspect in addition to its trade activities, and tourism activities may also be subject to its own regulations and licensing regime. The multiplicity of these regulations and supervisory authorities should not be interpreted as creating a general and unlimited jurisdiction for sealing. In each case, it must be clear what the legal basis for intervention is, who is the competent authority, and what enforcement guarantees the law provides for the violation in question.

In the area of ​​guild units, the Guild System Law provides a clear example of this logic. After the amendment of the law in 1403, Article 27 stipulated that a natural or legal person who engages in activity without a business license will, in principle, face a warning and a twenty-day deadline to obtain a license, and if the license is not obtained within the prescribed deadline, the place of business will be sealed by the police command. The law also makes exceptions for some approval-based licenses, in which the aforementioned deadline does not exist. Therefore, even in a clear case such as operating without a license, sealing is not a direct and unconditional result of any type of violation, but is subject to specific legal conditions, deadlines, and mechanisms.

Article 28 of the Guild System Law also provides for the temporary closure of the guild unit as a guarantee of enforcement for certain violations. This distinction shows that in the guild system, the type of violation and its guarantee of enforcement must be determined based on a legal ruling, and not every violation can be considered worthy of sealing simply under the general title of guild supervision.

In the urban area, the municipal law has also provided a specific mechanism for cases where the activities of units cause disturbance or conflict with health principles. Paragraph 20 of Article 55 of the municipal law provides for the closure, destruction, or relocation of certain centers within the framework of the municipality’s duties, under prescribed circumstances, and its note also provides for arrangements for notifying and granting a deadline to the owners of these centers. Therefore, even where the law explicitly provides for the power to intervene and close, this power is subject to its own legal limits and procedures and cannot be transformed into an unlimited power for executive officers to seal any offending unit.

Another important point is that a violation does not necessarily equal a seal. The law may have foreseen a warning, an obligation to correct a defect, a fine, suspension or closure for a violation. Therefore, an administrative authority cannot choose the most severe possible response simply by establishing a violation, outside the framework of the legally prescribed enforcement guarantees; rather, its action must be both based on the law and within the limits of discretion that the legislator has determined for that authority.

The principle of proportionality also becomes important here. When an administrative decision directly destroys the possibility of continuing an economic activity of a person, it cannot be considered a mere technical and insignificant measure. The more severe the intervention, the more important the need for a clear legal basis, a careful assessment of the conditions and observance of formalities becomes. The principle of proportionality does not, of course, mean ignoring the guarantee of explicit legal implementation; rather, it ensures that the administrative authority, in choosing and implementing the measure, moves within the limits set for it by law.

Multiplicity of authorities and the manner of exercising public power

This is especially important for cafes, book cafes, and tourism activities, as these areas are often faced with a complex set of regulations and intervening institutions. One authority may have jurisdiction over licensing, another over trade union issues, and yet another over health, urban, or law enforcement matters. However, the multiplicity of supervisory authorities should not lead to an unlimited number of authorities making decisions about closures.

In the tourism sector in particular, a distinction must be made between monitoring activities, violations of license conditions, suspension or revocation of licenses, and physical closure of the place of activity. The fact that some tourism offices and units are actually sealed or closed is not sufficient to prove the legal authority of an authority; the legal basis for each action must be sought in the specific regulations of the activity. Reports on the suspension and revocation of licenses of travel agencies also show that this sector has specific supervisory and enforcement mechanisms.

Even in cases where the principle of state intervention is legitimate, the manner in which public power is exercised is also a matter of law. The fact that an entity is actually in violation does not mean that all actions taken against that entity are automatically considered legal. There may be a violation but the authority taking the action is not competent; or the authority is competent but the legal procedures have not been followed; or the principle of the decision is legal but the manner in which it is implemented does not comply with the regulations.

On the other hand, a distinction must be made between sealing or closing resulting from an administrative decision and cases where the action is taken in execution of a judicial order or in the capacity of a competent authority. In each case, it must be clear who made the decision and who was merely the executor of the decision. This distinction is important for determining the basis of jurisdiction, the manner of objection, and even the potential liability resulting from the action. Just because an executive or law enforcement officer was present at the scene and sealed the door of a unit does not mean that the legal authority to decide on the closure also rested with the same officer or agency.

In fact, one of the fundamental issues in controlling administrative power is the separation between the decision-making authority and the implementing authority. In cases where the law has assigned the decision to a specific authority and its implementation to another body, the implementing body cannot exceed the limits of the decision or its legal authority.

Judicial supervision and guaranteeing the rights of business owners

From a public law perspective, perhaps the most important guarantee to prevent the uncontrolled expansion of administrative powers is the possibility of judicial oversight of the administration. Article 173 of the Constitution provides for the Court of Administrative Justice to hear complaints, grievances, and objections from the public against government officials, units, and regulations, and the Administrative Court of Justice Act also specifies the jurisdiction of this authority over the decisions and actions of government units and their officials.

Therefore, closing a business is not necessarily the end of the story. In cases where an administrative decision or action falls within the jurisdiction of the Administrative Court of Justice, the business owner can use the legal mechanisms for objection and, if the prescribed conditions exist, also request the issuance of a temporary order. Article 34 of the Administrative Court of Justice Law provides for the possibility of requesting a temporary order if the implementation of the contested decision or action causes damage that is impossible or difficult to compensate.

The importance of an interim injunction in such cases is that judicial proceedings, even if ultimately in the business owner’s favor, may be time-consuming, and the temporary closure of an economic entity can cause serious and sometimes irreparable damage before a ruling is issued. Therefore, judicial supervision is not only a review of the legality of a decision after the damage has occurred; in the right circumstances, it can also be a means of preventing the continuation of the effects of a contested decision.

This oversight, of course, does not mean negating the legal powers of the administration. Public law does not prohibit the government from overseeing businesses. Economic activity may be directly related to public health, safety, consumer rights, public order, the environment, and the rights of others, and in such areas, government intervention can be completely justified and necessary. The point is not that the government should not intervene; the point is that government intervention must be carried out within the framework of legal authority, with due process, and within the limits of the guarantees of performance.

In fact, public law is more about regularizing public power than it is about negating it. An administrative authority cannot, by relying solely on its own discretion, create a competence that the law does not grant it; it cannot impose an executive guarantee beyond what the law provides; and it cannot deny the citizen’s right to protest by arguing that its decision was in the public interest.

The closure of a business may be perfectly legal, necessary, and even unavoidable in some cases to protect public rights; but its legality cannot be inferred solely from the existence of a violation or the claim of a public interest. A series of elements must be examined together: the legal basis, the authority’s jurisdiction, the occurrence of the violation, the guarantee of the prescribed execution, the observance of formalities, and the possibility of an effective objection.

Ultimately, the balance between business rights and public authority lies neither in eliminating government oversight nor in granting unlimited authority to executive agencies, but in the rule of law over the exercise of public power. The business owner must know that his economic activity in society is not unconditional; the government must also know that the power to supervise this activity is not the unlimited power to stop it. The distance between the two is where public law makes sense.