The Young Turk Regime and the Japanese Model after 1908: “Eastern” Essence, “Western” Science, Ottoman Notions of “Terakkî” and “Medeniyet” (Progress and Civilization)

Abstract

Whereas the Young Turks had been politically constrained during the Hamidian era, in the postrevolution period the domestic political atmosphere of the Ottoman Empire was charged initially with an air of optimism. Ironically, that sense of Ottoman unity and cooperation did not last for long in CUP circles or in society at large after the reinstatement of the Ottoman constitution. The Young Turks involved in the secret CUP association had, immediately after the revolution, increasingly claimed political power for themselves, to the exclusion of those whose views did not coincide with theirs.1 The CUP, declared a political party in 1909 but able to control government appointments and policies behind the scenes, alienated many in their midst by seemingly rejecting the Ottomanist conception of empire in favor of a more narrow, secular, elitist, nation-state program of political behavior. Their actions would elicit opposition that was both political and cultural in nature, whether as objections to their monopoly over government positions or to their secularizing orientation as un-Islamic.