Shortest History of Turkey

Benjamin C. Fortna is professor of history and director of the School of Middle Eastern and North African Studies at the University of Arizona and formerly professor of the history of the Middle East, SOAS, at the University of London. He received his degrees from Yale, Columbia, and the University of Chicago, and has published numerous books on the Ottoman Empire, the early Turkish Republic, and modern Turkey. He has appeared on the BBC programs Who Do You Think You Are? and The Ottomans: Europe's Muslim Emperors. He lives in Tucson, AZ.

• Timeline Introduction: Competing Visions of Turkey PART 1: THE OTTOMAN EMPIREOttoman OriginsFrom Principality to EmpireImperial ConsolidationImperial HeightsDecentralizationPART 2: FROM EMPIRE TO REPUBLICInternal and External ChallengesReformsImperial ResistanceOpposition and Revolution: The “Young Turks”The Great WarThe “National” MovementPART 3: THE TURKISH REPUBLICThe Early Republic, or the “Single Party Period”The Democratic EraReturn of the Guardian StateTowards a Turkish–Islamic SynthesisThe Justice and Development Party EraConclusion: Republican Centennial and Imperial Ghosts Acknowledgments Image credits Index

"[An] astute combination of the entertaining and informed. . . . What comes across most significantly is what a multicultural melting pot Turkey has been and still is."