Pan-Turkism is a movement that emerged in 1880s among the Turkic intellectuals of the Russian Empire and Ottoman Empire, with the aim of cultural and political unification of all Turkic peoples. In the research literature, the term "Pan-Turkism" is used to describe the idea of political, cultural and ethnic unity of all Turkic-speaking people. Turanism is a closely related movement but a more general term than Turkism, since Turkism applies only to the Turkic peoples. However, researchers and politicians engaged in the field of Turkic ideology have used these terms interchangeably in a multitude of sources and literature. The term "Turkism" started to be used with a prefix "Pan" (from Greek πᾶν, pan = all), for a "Panturkism". While the various Turkic peoples often share historical, cultural and linguistic roots, the rising of a pan-Turkic political movement is a phenomenon only of the 19th and 20th centuries and can be seen in parallel with European developments like Pan-Slavism and Pan-Germanism or with Pan-Iranism. Proponents use the latter most often as a point of comparison as the concept of "Turkic" is not a true racial or ethnic description but more of a linguistic and cultural distinction. This is to differentiate it from the term "Turkish" which is more of an ethnic/racial term for the citizens and denizens primarily residing in Turkey. Pan-Turkic ideas and "re-unification" movements have been popular since the collapse of the Soviet Union in Central Asian and other Turkic countries. History In 1804, Tatar theologian Kursavi wrote a treatise calling for Islam’s modernization. Kursavi was a founder of the religious thought of Jadidism (from Arabic 'jadid', which means 'new'). The idea of Jadidism was encouragement of critical thinking, as opposed to insistence on unquestioning loyalty. It supported education for Muslims and promoted equality among the sexes; advocated tolerance for other faiths, Turkic cultural unity, and openness to Europe’s cultural legacy.[9] In 1843 in Kazan the Jadid movement was created. Its aim was a semi-secular modernization and educational reform, and within Jadid for the first time sprout the idea of a national, and not religious identity of the Turks. Before that they were solely Muslim subjects of Russia, and the Empire continued this attitude to its very collapse. Following the upsurge in Russian colonization of the Volga area in 1880s, the Islamic social movement Jaddidism added motives of national-liberation. However, as a result of the increase of imperial tendencies within the Russian Empire's internal politics after 1907, many partisans of Turkic unity immigrated to the Ottoman Empire. The newspaper Türk in Cairo was established by exiles from the Ottoman empire following the suspension of the 1876 constitution and the persecution of liberal intellectuals. It was the first publication to use the ethnic designation as a title.[11] Yusuf Akçura chose this paper to publish his infamous "Three types of policy" (Üç tarz-ı siyaset), anonymously in 1904, and was the earliest manifesto of a truly Pan-Turkic nationalism, not just Ottoman-Turkish nationalism.[11] In it he argues that the supra-ethnic union espoused by Ottomism was unrealistic, as was the "French liberal" model was already outdated by the "German national" model based on race. Lastly, the Pan-Islamic model had its advantages, but supporters would have to face the reality the majority of Muslim populations were currently under colonial rule, which would oppose unification. He concludes that the "Turkish political nation" based on ethnicity is unprecedented and would require active cultivation of cultural history and national identity. Given the territory of the Ottoman empire at the time, a Pan-Turkish empire would require withdrawal of the Balkans and Eastern Europe and the annexation of much of Central Asia. The first publication of "Three types of policy" was met with negative reactions, and it became much more influential towards its third publication in 1911 in Istanbul. The Ottoman empire had lost its African territory to Italy and would soon lose the Balkans, an Pan-Turkish nationalism became a more feasible and popular political strategy.

• published: 21 Nov 2014
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