By the 1830s, the Ottoman sultans knew the empire was falling behind Europe militarily, economically and administratively. Their answer was a long programme of state-led reform known as the Tanzimat.
What was the Tanzimat?: The Tanzimat (1839–1876) was a series of decrees issued by the sultans Abdulmejid I and Abdulaziz, aiming to modernise the empire along European lines while keeping it Ottoman and Islamic at its core.
- Causes — military defeats (Greek War of Independence, Muhammad Ali's Egypt) exposed Ottoman weakness; European powers pressured the sultan to protect Christian minorities; reformist officials wanted to save the empire from collapse or partition
- Aims — equality before the law for all subjects regardless of religion; a modern conscript army; new law codes based on European models; centralised tax collection instead of tax-farming; new secular schools
- Key measures — the Hatt-i Sherif of Gulhane (1839) promised equal justice and security of life/property/honour for all subjects; the Hatt-i Humayun (1856), issued under pressure after the Crimean War, extended full civil equality to Christians and Jews
- Effects — some real modernisation (railways, telegraphs, new law courts, an Ottoman Public Debt Administration after bankruptcy in 1875); but reforms were resented by conservative Muslims who saw them as giving in to Europe, and by nationalists who wanted independence, not equality within the empire
Reform did not fix the underlying problem: The Tanzimat modernised the state machinery but could not solve the empire's core weaknesses: huge foreign debt, loss of territory in the Balkans, and rising nationalism among its non-Turkish peoples. It bought time rather than saved the empire.
In 1876 a short-lived constitution was granted, with an elected parliament — the First Constitutional Era. But it lasted barely a year before the new sultan, Abdul Hamid II, suspended it in 1878, using the excuse of war with Russia.
Reaction
Abdul Hamid II (r.1876–1909) suspended the constitution and parliament, ruled as an autocrat, and built a huge network of spies and censorship to crush dissent (the Hamidian regime).
Reform
Despite the repression, he continued practical modernisation: railways (including the Hejaz Railway), telegraph lines, new schools and universities, and a stronger central bureaucracy.
Contradiction
He used Pan-Islamism — presenting himself as Caliph and protector of all Muslims — to unite the empire's Muslim population against both internal nationalism and European interference.
Abdul Hamid: modernise the state, but crush the politics.
Balance both sides: Paper 3 examiners reward answers that show Abdul Hamid II was both a repressive autocrat and a genuine moderniser — don't flatten him into just "the tyrant who ended reform".
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Opposition to Abdul Hamid's autocracy grew among educated army officers and officials, especially those trained abroad or exposed to European liberal ideas. They organised into a secret reformist movement.
- Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) — a secret society (often called the Young Turks) formed mainly by junior army officers, many based in Ottoman Macedonia (Salonika)
- Why it grew — anger at Hamidian censorship and spying; humiliation at further territorial losses; the influence of European nationalist and constitutional ideas among army officers trained in modern military academies
- 1908 Young Turk Revolution — CUP officers threatened to march on Constantinople; Abdul Hamid II, facing mutiny, restored the 1876 constitution and parliament without a fight
- 1909 — after a failed conservative counter-revolution attempted to restore the sultan's absolute power, the CUP deposed Abdul Hamid II and replaced him with his brother, Mehmed V, who reigned as a figurehead
What the Young Turks actually did in power: The CUP kept parliament but increasingly ruled through a small clique — soon dominated by three men known as the Three Pashas: Enver Pasha, Talat Pasha and Cemal Pasha. They pushed Turkification — promoting Turkish national identity over Ottoman multi-ethnic identity — which alienated Arab and other non-Turkish subjects.
The CUP's promise of national renewal was tested almost immediately by disaster in the Balkans.
| War | Dates | What happened | Result for the Ottomans |
|---|---|---|---|
| First Balkan War | 1912 | Balkan League (Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro) attacked, exploiting Ottoman weakness after the 1911–12 war with Italy over Libya | Massive Ottoman defeat; loses almost all remaining European territory |
| Second Balkan War | 1913 | The victors fell out over dividing the spoils; Bulgaria attacked its former allies | Ottomans recovered Edirne (Adrianople), but overall territorial losses in Europe were confirmed |
Effects of the Balkan Wars: The empire lost almost all its remaining land in Europe, over 400 years of territory, and hundreds of thousands of Muslim refugees fled into Anatolia. The humiliation pushed the CUP — now led by the Three Pashas after a 1913 coup — towards a harder, more militaristic and nationalist form of government.
Don't confuse the timeline: 1908–09 = the Young Turk Revolution and Abdul Hamid's fall. 1912–13 = the Balkan Wars, fought under the new CUP government. The wars are a consequence of a weakened empire, not the cause of the revolution.
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By 1914 the empire was smaller, humiliated and dominated by the Three Pashas, especially Enver Pasha, the Minister of War. Their decision on alliance would decide the empire's fate.
- Reasons for entering WWI (1914) on the side of the Central Powers — Enver Pasha's personal admiration for Germany and belief a strong ally was needed to recover lost territory; a secret Ottoman-German alliance signed August 1914; hope of regaining the Balkans and Egypt; fear/distrust of Russia, the empire's historic enemy over the Straits and the Balkans
- Impact of the war on the empire — costly campaigns on multiple fronts (Gallipoli 1915–16, the Caucasus against Russia, Mesopotamia and Palestine against Britain); the Arab Revolt (1916), backed by Britain, turned many Arab subjects against Ottoman rule; the Armenian Genocide (1915), in which the CUP government deported and killed huge numbers of Armenian civilians, devastated the empire's Christian population and its reputation
- Gallipoli (1915–16) — a rare Ottoman victory, defending the Dardanelles against a British and ANZAC invasion; it made a national hero of a young officer, Mustafa Kemal (later Ataturk)
- Defeat (1918) — the Ottomans signed the Armistice of Mudros (October 1918); the empire, already exhausted by debt, famine and military losses, was forced to accept Allied occupation
Why Gallipoli mattered beyond the battle: Mustafa Kemal's leadership at Gallipoli built his reputation as a defender of the Turkish homeland — a reputation he later used to lead resistance against the post-war partition of Anatolia.
The Treaty of Sevres (1920) confirmed the empire's collapse: it stripped away Arab lands (now British and French mandates), gave territory to Greece, and left only a small Turkish rump state under Allied control.
Resistance begins
Mustafa Kemal rejected Sevres, organised a nationalist congress and army in Anatolia, and led the Turkish War of Independence (1919–1923) against Greek, Armenian and Allied forces.
Sultanate abolished
In 1922, the nationalist Grand National Assembly formally abolished the Ottoman sultanate; the last sultan, Mehmed VI, went into exile.
New treaty, new state
The Treaty of Lausanne (1923) replaced Sevres, recognising an independent Republic of Turkey with Ataturk as its first president, ending 600+ years of Ottoman rule.
Defeat, defiance, Republic: Sevres → Kemal's war → Lausanne.
Cause and effect chain: Balkan Wars weaken the empire → Three Pashas gamble on a German alliance → WWI defeat and Arab Revolt shatter it further → Sevres tries to dismantle it completely → Mustafa Kemal's nationalist resistance instead creates a new, purely Turkish state.