Introduction

Abstract

Abstract This book is about the Young Turk opposition movement against the regime of Abdülhamid II, with particular emphasis on the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP). It begins by examining the inception of the original CUP nucleus in 1889 and continues to expose in detail the internal workings of the movement until 1902. I chose to write about this phase of the CUP because it is seminal and because a clear demarcation can be made in 1902, at which time the network collapsed, leading to the formation of drastically different organizations. I believe that such an in depth study is long overdue, not least because the Young Turks had a formative and lasting impact on the modern Turkish state. The CUP, an outgrowth of the Young Turk movement, constituted the major ruling power in the Ottoman Empire between 1908 and 1918 except for a brief interlude; the founders of modern Turkey, including the first three presidents, serving from 1923 to 1960, were former CUP members.1 Further, although the period 1889-1908 has been viewed as remote by some political scientists, the official ideology of modern Turkey as shaped during this period by the early Young Turks has continued to exert its influence even today on Turkey’s intellectual and political life. Clarification of this period is thus both fundamental and essential to serious studies of events since 1889.