Sociologist and politician (b. 1877, İstanbul – d. 1948, Neuchautel /
Switzerland). He was the son of Seniha Sultan, the daughter of Sultan
Abdulmecid who was the sister of Abdulmecid II and Damat Mahmut Celaleddin Paşa
and he grew up attending private lessons. When Mahmut Celaleddin Paşa
criticized Abdulmecid’s rule, he fell from favor and under pressure, fled to
Paris in 1899 taking his children Sabahattin and Lütfullah.
Sabahattin
had connections with politicians and sociologists in Paris. He brought together
Turkish intellectuals who campaigned abroad for the declaration of a
constitutional monarchy at the “Young Turk” congresses; the first in 1902 and
the second in 1907. He founded the Private Initiative Association and the
Decentralization Association. Publishing the review Terakki, he defended decentralization and private initiative in the
economy.
Using
the power that emerged from the congresses, which he had assembled, he founded
the Party of Ottoman Liberals. After the end of the administration of the
Committee of Union and Progress and the defeat in World War I, he returned to
Turkey and continued working. Afterwards, he lived in extremely difficult
conditions first in Paris then in Sweden where he died in 1948. His body was
brought back to Turkey and buried alongside his father’s grave in Eyüp cemetery.
WORKS:
İttihat ve Terakki Cemiyetine Açık Mektuplar – Mesleğimiz Hakkında Üçüncü ve Son Bir İzah (Open Letters to the Committee of Union and Progress – The Third and the Last Explanation on Our Work, 1327-11).
