Young Ottomans

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

The Young Ottomans (Turkish: Yeni Osmanlilar) were a group of Ottoman nationalist intellectuals formed in 1865, influenced by such Western thinkers as Montesquieu and Rousseau and the French Revolution. They developed the concept of Ottomanism, aligned with these thinkers. They advocated a constitutional, parliamentary government.

The Young Ottomans were bureaucrats resulting from the Tanzimat reforms who were unsatisfied with its bureaucratic absolutism and sought a more democratic solution.

The failure of the "Young Ottoman" policies (Ottomanism) in reverting the path to Dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, the thinkers under Ottoman Empire searched other means. One of these groups was Young Turks, which pulled the empire to Second Constitutional Era (Ottoman Empire) and then to WWI, with the policies developed under Three Pashas.