Abstract
During the course of the nineteenth century, the harmonious relations between the Turks and some of the non-Muslims1 in the Ottoman Empire came to an end when the latter attempted to obtain their independence and, one by one, except for the Armenians, they succeeded in realizing this goal of theirs. Then, during the first two decades of the twentieth century, it was mostly non-Turkish Muslims such as the Arabs and the bulk of Albanians who also wanted to sever their relations from the empire and they, too, achieved their goals. Since ethnic nationalism had been alien to the Ottomans how did they react to the secessionist tendencies on the part of their non-Muslim and non-Turkish Muslim elements? Did they counter these developments by remembering their forgotten ethnic identity and, thus, play the ethnic card? Or did they try to grapple with these problems by resorting to what may be called non-ethnic management strategies. This Chapter addresses these critical questions.
This is a preview of subscription content, log in via an institution to check access.
Access this chapter
Tax calculation will be finalised at checkout
Purchases are for personal use only
Preview
Unable to display preview. Download preview PDF.
Search for a New Identity
Taner Timur, Osmanlı Kimliki (Istanbul: Hil Yayın, 1986), p. 116.
Bernard Lewis, The Multiple Identities of the Middle East (London: Weidenfield and Nicolson, 1998), p. 22.
Ümid Meriç, Cevdet Paba’nın Cemiyet ve Devlet Görübü (Istanbul: Ötüken Yayınevi, 1975), p. 76.
Roderic Davison, Essays in Ottoman History, 1774–1923: The Impact of the West (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1990), p. 119.
Stanford J. Shaw and Ezel Kural Shaw, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey. Volume II. Reform, Revolution, and Republic: The Rise of Modern Turkey, 1808–1975 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1977), p. 182.
Bernard Lewis, The Emergence of Modern Turkey (London: Oxford University Press, 1961), p. 158.
Kemal H. Karpat, The Politicization of Islam: Reconstructing Identity, State, Faith, and Community in the Late Ottoman Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 331, 332, 333.
Sarah G. Moment Atis, ‘Turkish Literature’, in The Oxford Encyclopedia of the Modern Islamic World, John L. Esposito, Editor-in-Chief, vol. 4. (New York and Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1995), p. 247.
The inspiration for this point comes from Carter Vaughn Findley, The Turks in World History (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2005), p. 160.
Cemil Koçak, ‘Namık Kemal’, in Modern Türkiye’de Siyasal Dübünce. Cilt I. Cumhuriyet’e Devreden Dübünce Mirası: Tanzimat ve Mebrutiyet Birikimi, Mehmet Ö. Alkan, ed. (Istanbul: Ileti§im Yayınları, 2001), pp. 247, 248.
Serif Mardin, The Genesis of Young Ottoman Thought: A Study in the Modernization of Turkish Political Thought (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1962), p. 328.
Ali Engin Oba, Türk Milliyetçilikinin Dokubu (Ankara: Imge Yayınevi, 1995), p. 186.
Selim Deringil, ‘The Ottoman Origins of Kemalist Nationalism: Namık Kemal to Mustafa Kemal’, European History Quarterly 23, no. 2 (April 1993), pp. 183–184.
David Kushner, The Rise of Turkish Nationalism, 1876–1908 (London: Frank Cass, 1977), pp. 21–22.
Serif Mardin, Jön Türklerin Siyasi Fikirleri, 1895–1908, fourth printing (Istanbul: Ileti§im Yayınları, 1992), p. 72.
Hugh Poulton, Turkish Nationalism and the Turkish Republic: Top Hat, Grey Wolf, and Crescent (London, Hurst, 1997), p. 62.
David Thomas, ‘Yusuf Akçura and the Intellectual Origins of “Üç Tarz-ı Siyaset”’, Journal of Turkish Studies 2 (1978), p. 130. More on this issue below.
Bernard Lewis, ‘Ali Pasha on Nationalism’, Middle Eastern Studies 10, no. 1 (January 1974), pp. 77–79.
Kemal H. Karpat, An Inquiry Into the Social Foundations of Nationalism in the Ottoman State: From Social Estates to Classes, From Millets to Nations, Research Monograph No. 39, Center for International Affairs, Princeton University, 1973, p. 92.
Karpat, An Inquiry Into the Social Foundations of Nationalism in the Ottoman State, p. 107; idem, The Politicization of Islam, pp. 325, 329–330.
William Ochsenwald, ‘Islam and the Ottoman Legacy in the Modern Middle East’, in Imperial Legacy: The Ottoman Imprint on the Balkans and the Middle East, L. Carl Brown, ed. (New York: Columbia Press, 1996), p. 270.
Eric J. Zürcher. Turkey: A Modern History, second edition (London: I. B. Tauris, 1997), p. 134.
Uriel Heyd, Foundations of Turkish Nationalism: The Life and Teachings of Ziya Gökalp (London: Harvill Press, 1950), p. 105.
Fuat Dündar, Ittihat ve Terakkinin Müslümanları Iskân Politikası, 1913–1918 (Istanbul: Iletibim, 2001), p. 37.
The last sentence is a reformulation of a point made in Hasan Kayalı, Arabs and Young Turks: Ottomanism, Arabism, and Islamism in the Ottoman Empire (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1997), p. 92.
François Georgeon, Türk Milliyetçilikinin Kökenleri: Yusuf Akçura: 1876–1935, trans. from French by Alev Er (Ankara: Yurt Yayınları, 1986), p. 7; Thomas, ‘Yusuf Akçura and the Intellectual Origins of “Üç Tarz-ı Siyaset”’, p. 136;
Roderic Davison, ‘Nationalism in the Ottoman Empire’, in Nationalism in a Non-National State: The Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, William W. Haddad and William Ochsenwald, eds. (Columbus: Ohio University Press, 1977), p. 26.
Tarık Zafer Tunaya, Hürriyetin Ilanı: Ikinci Mebrutiyetin Siyasi Hayatına Bakıblar (Istanbul: Baha Matbaası, 1959), p. 20. More on this issue below.
Masami Arai, Turkish Nationalism in the Young Turk Era (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1992), pp. 8, 23, 72.
Füsun Üstel, Imparatorluktan Ulus-Devlete Türk Milliyetçiliki: Türk Ocakları, 1919–1931 (Istanbul: Iletibim Yayınları, 1997), p. 25.
Ömer Seyfettin, Türklük Üzerine Yazılar (Ankara: Bilgi Yayınevi, 1993), passim.
Emin Alper, ‘Ömer Seyfettin’, in Modern Türkiye’de Siyasi Dübünce. Cilt I., Alkan, p. 191.
Yusuf Akçura, Türkçülükün Tarihi (Istanbul: Kaynak Yayınları, 1998), p. 18.
Rıdvan Akın, Osmanlı Imparatorlukunun Dakılma Devri ve Türkçülük Hareketi (Istanbul: Der Yayınları, 1992), p. 8.
Jacob M. Landau, Pan-Turkism in Turkey: A Study in Irredentism (London: C. Hurst, 1981), pp. 29–30.
T. Lothrop Stoddard, ‘Pan-Turanism’, American Political Science Review 11, no. 1 (1917), pp. 18–19.
René Pinon, ‘The Young Turk Policy in Asia’, Current History 11, no. 2 (November 1919), p. 335.
Sir Harry Luke, The Old Turkey and the New: From Byzantium to Ankara, new and revised edition (London: Geoffrey Bles, 1955), p. 151.
Feroz Ahmad, The Young Turks: The Committee of Union and Progress in Turkish Politics (Oxford: At the Clarendon Press, 1969), p. 154; Karpat, The Politicization of Islam, pp. 368–370.
Edwin Pears, ‘Turkey, Islam, and Turanianism’, The Contemporary Review 114 (July–October 1918), p. 379.
Caroline Finkle, Osman’s Dream: The Story of the Ottoman Empire, 1300–1923 (London: John Murray, 2005), p. 549.
Bükrü Hanioklu, Preparation for Revolution: The Young Turks, 1902–1908 (London: Oxford University Press, 2001), pp. 301–302; Akın, Osmanlı Imparatorlukunun Dakılma Devri ve Türkçülük Hareketi, pp. 48–49.
Arshak Safrastian, Kurds and Kurdistan (London: Harvill Press, 1948), p. 72.
Martı, Matin, compiler. Bahriye Nazırı ve 4. Ordu Komutanı Cemal Paba, fifth printing (Istanbul: Arma Yayınları, 1996), pp. 350–351.
Safrastian, Kurds and Kurdistan, p. 71; Sina Akbin, Essays in Ottoman-Turkish Political History (Istanbul: ISIS Press, 2000), p. 12, 19.
Kemal H. Karpat, ‘The Memoirs of N. Batzaria: The Young Turks and Nationalism’, International Journal of Middle East Studies 6 (1975), p. 290.
Donald Quataert, The Ottoman Empire, 1700–1922 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000), p. 188.
Benjamin C. Fortna, Imperial Classroom: Islam, the State, and Education in the Late Ottoman Empire (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2000), p. 66.
Author information
Authors and Affiliations
Copyright information
© 2007 Metin Heper
About this chapter
Cite this chapter
Heper, M. (2007). Search for a New Identity. In: The State and Kurds in Turkey. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230593602_4
Download citation
DOI: https://doi.org/10.1057/9780230593602_4
Publisher Name: Palgrave Macmillan, London
Print ISBN: 978-1-349-39596-5
Online ISBN: 978-0-230-59360-2
eBook Packages: Palgrave Political & Intern. Studies CollectionPolitical Science and International Studies (R0)