İttihadism
Ittihadism was the ideology of the Committee of Union and Progress, which undertook the Young Turk Revolution in 1908 and ruled the Ottoman Empire from 1913 to 1918.
Turkish nationalism
Though the Central Committee of the CUP was made up of intense Turkish nationalists, until the defeat in the First Balkan War in 1912–13, the CUP did not stress its Turkish nationalism in public as it would offend the non-Turkish population of the empire. A further problem for Union and Progress was that the majority of the ethnic Turks of the empire did not see themselves as Turks at all, but rather simply as Sunni Muslims who happened to speak Turkish. The Turkish historian Taner Akçam wrote that at the time of the First World War that "It is even questionable whether the broad mass of Muslims in Anatolia at the time understood themselves as Turks, or Kurds, rather than as Muslims". Though the CUP was dedicated to a revolutionary transformation of Ottoman society by its "science-conscious cadres", the CUP were conservative revolutionaries who wished to retain the monarchy and Islam's status as the state religion as the Young Turks believed that the sultanate and Islam were an essential part of the glue holding the Ottoman Empire together.Emphasis on science
The Unionists believed that the secret behind the success of the west was science, and that the more scientifically advanced a nation was, the more powerful it was. According to the Turkish historian Handan Nezir Akmeşe, the essence of the Union and Progress was the "cult of science" and a strong sense of Turkish nationalism. Strongly influenced by French intellectuals such as Auguste Comte and Gustave Le Bon, the Unionists had embraced the idea of rule by a scientific elite. For the Young Turks, the basic problem of the Ottoman Empire was its backward, impoverished status and the fact that most of its Muslim population were illiterate; thus, most Ottoman Muslims could not learn about modern science even if they had wanted to. The CUP had an obsession with science, above all the natural sciences, and the Unionists often described themselves as "societal doctors" who would apply modern scientific ideas and methods to solve all social problems. The CUP saw themselves as a scientific elite, whose superior knowledge would save the empire; one Unionist later recalled the atmosphere as: "Being a Unionist was almost a type of God-given privilege".Social Darwinism
Alongside the unbounded faith in science, the CUP embraced Social Darwinism and the Völkisch movement, scientific racism that was so popular at German universities in the first half of the 20th century. In the words of the sociologist Ziya Gökalp, the CUP's chief thinker, the German racial approach to defining a nation was the "one that happened to more closely match the condition of 'Turkishness', which was struggling to constitute its own historical and national identity". The French racist Arthur de Gobineau whose theories had such a profound impact upon the German völkisch thinkers in the 19th century was also a major influence upon the CUP. The Turkish historian Taner Akçam wrote that the CUP were quite flexible about mixing pan-Islamic, pan-Turkic, and Ottomanist ideas as it suited their purposes, and the Unionists at various times would emphasise one at the expense of the others depending upon the exigencies of the situation. To the CUP, ideologies were secondary to the end goal of a powerful, predominantly Turkish Ottoman Empire.The Young Turks had embraced Social Darwinism and pseudo-scientific biological racism as the basis of their philosophy with history being seen as a merciless racial struggle with only the strongest "races" surviving. For the CUP, the Japanese government had ensured that the "Japanese race" were strongest in east Asia, and it was their duty to ensure that the "Turkish race" become the strongest in the near east. For the CUP, just as it was right and natural for the superior "Japanese race" to dominate "inferior races" like the Koreans and the Chinese, likewise it would be natural for the superior "Turkish race" to dominate "inferior races" like Greeks and Armenians. This Social Darwinist perspective explains how the Unionists were so ferocious in their criticism of Western imperialism while being so supportive of Japanese imperialism in Korea and China. When Japan annexed Korea in 1910, the Young Turks supported this move under the Social Darwinist grounds that the Koreans were a weak people who deserved to be taken over by the stronger Japanese both for their own good and the good of the Japanese empire. Along the same lines, the Social Darwinism of the Unionists led them to see the Armenian and Greek minorities, who tended to be much better educated, literate and wealthier than the Turks and who dominated the business life of the empire, as a threat to their plans for a glorious future for the "Turkish race".
The CUP's ideas of Turkish superiority were contrary to Islamic doctrine, which teaches that all humans are equal on the grounds of ethnicity and race. For purposes of gaining public support from a Turkish public that was for the most part devoutly Muslim, and out of the fear of alienating those Ottoman Muslims who were not Turks like the Arabs, the Albanians and the Kurds, the CUP's pseudo-scientific theories about the "Turkish race" were usually not publicly proclaimed.
Islamism
During the reign of Sultan Abdul Hamid II, Pan-Islamism had become an important part of the state ideology as Abdul Hamid had often stressed his claim to be the Caliph. The claim that Abdul Hamid was the Caliph, making him the political and spiritual leader of all Sunni Muslims not only caught on within the Ottoman Empire, but throughout the entire Dar-al-Islam, especially in British controlled India. The fact that Indian Muslims seemed to have far more enthusiasm for the Ottoman Sultan-Caliph than they did for the British King-Emperor was a matter of considerable concern for British decision-makers. The fear that the Sultan-Caliph might declare jihad against the British, and thereby plunge India into a revolt by its Muslims was a constant factor in British policy towards the Ottoman Empire. The CUP endorsed Abdul Hamid's legacy upon his death in February 1918, even though the CUP launched a revolution against Abdul Hamid in 1908 and ultimately deposed him in 1909. Şükrü Hanioğlu asserts that the CUP generally appealed to Islam simply whenever it was convenient. For the CUP, keeping the Sultanate-Caliphate in being had the effect of not only reinforcing the loyalty of Ottoman Muslims to the empire, but was also a useful foreign policy tool. As in 1909 Crete decided to leave the Ottoman Empire and join Greece instead, the CUP warned the European powers to support such an endeavor as it would lead to a strong opposition from the Muslim communities worldwide. Similarly, the CUP sent a delegation to the annual Hajj pilgrimage to Mecca in 1909 to raise support for their opposition to the European aggression. To forge further support to an eventual Pan-Islamic alliance, the CUP supported the creation of the Islamic association Ittihad ol Islam in Iran in 1910 and managed to establish Pan-Islamist ties in Iraq despite the Shiite-Sunni divide.Modernisation and secularism
While the CUP eventually relied on Pan-Islamism, there always existed a secular culture within the Sacred Committee. The CUP heavily cracked down on religious fanaticism following the 31 March Incident which strained its relationship with the ulema, but at the same time used Islamist fervor for their benefit during World War I. Nevertheless, the CUP saw itself as a modernizing force for bringing Ottoman, Turkish, and Muslim society to European standards, which mandated social reform. An example of pre-Kemalist style social reform was the controversial "Temporal Family Law" passed in 1917 was a significant advance in women's rights and secularism in Ottoman matrimonial law. Women's right to divorce was expanded, while polygamy was restricted.Influence of Goltz
The primary influences on the Unionists were the French scientist Gustave Le Bon and the German General Baron Colmar von der Goltz. Le Bon argued that democracy was only just mindless mob rule and the best form of the government was a rule by a scientific elite.Equally important given the large number of army officers as Unionists was the influence of Goltz, who trained an entire generation of Ottoman officers, the so-called "Goltz generation". Goltz was a militarist, Social Darwinist and an ultra-nationalist who saw war as something necessary, desirable and inevitable, writing: "It is an expression of the energy and self-respect which a nation possesses... Perpetual peace means perpetual death!". Goltz's most important idea, which was to greatly influence the Unionists was that of the "nation in arms", that henceforward in modern war, the side that could mobilise best the entire resources of its society would be the one that would win, and as such the best thing that could done was to militarise one's society in peacetime to ensure that it would be a "nation in arms" when the inevitable war came. Goltz, who spoke fluent Turkish and was very popular with the officers he had trained expressed a great deal of admiration for the Turks as a naturally warlike people, in contrast to his country where he believed that hedonism was rendering the next generation of young German men unfit for war.
Goltz was also an intense Anglophobe who believed that the great struggle of the coming 20th century would be a world war between Britain and Germany for the mastery of the world; for him it was self-evident that the world was just too small for the British and German empires to co-exist, and he urged his protégés in the Ottoman Army to ensure that the empire fought on the side of his country when the inevitable Anglo-German war broke out.