Said Halim Pasha : an Ottoman statesman and an Islamist thinker (1865-1921)

This dissertation is a study of the political career and thought of Said Halim Pasha (1865--1921), a prominent Islamist thinker and eminent Ottoman statesman, set against the historical and ideological background of his time.The period covered in this study extends from the twilight of the Hamidian era to the end of the Ottoman Empire (1900--1922). During these two crucial decades, the Ottoman Empire, prior to its demise, went through an immense transformation. The establishment of the Constitutional regime in July 1908 allowed several ideological currents to circulate freely on the political scene and to compete in filling the vacuum created by the fall of the ancien regime. Among these ideologies, three rose to prominency: Westernism, Turkism, and Islamism. Said Halim Pasha, one of the best representatives of the Islamist school, made important contributions to the ideological debates which were raging. In his writings that appeared between 1910 and 1921, Said Halim Pasha advocated a thorough and radical Islamization of the Muslim world in order to halt its decline and to ensure its progress. With regard to his political career as Grand Vizir of the Ottoman Empire, Said Halim Pasha proved himself to be a mastermind of diplomacy. Until his political isolation and deprivation of power by the Turkist wing of the CUP Government, he kept at bay the aggressive imperialist Powers and frustrated their plans to partition the Ottoman Empire