Founding of the Turkish Republic and Atatürk's reforms

Date

29 October 1923 (reforms to 1934)

Category

Politics & governance

Region

Anatolia / Middle East (Turkey)

Era

Modern

Significance

Following Ottoman defeat in World War I and the Turkish War of Independence, recognition of the Ankara government at the Treaty of Lausanne (24 July 1923) cleared the way for the proclamation of the Republic of Turkey on 29 October 1923, with Mustafa Kemal (later Atatürk) elected its first president.

Over the next decade he led a sweeping programme of secularising, modernising reforms. The caliphate was abolished on 3 March 1924, severing the formal link between state and Islam; religious courts and schools were closed and replaced by secular institutions. The Hat Law (1925) and a Swiss-derived civil code (1926) reshaped dress and family law, granting women expanded rights including, by 1934, the vote. The Arabic script was replaced by a Latin alphabet on 1 November 1928. Codified as the 'Six Arrows' (republicanism, nationalism, populism, statism, secularism, reformism), Kemalism became an influential template for state-led modernisation across the developing world.

Empires active in 29 October 1923 (reforms to 1934)

• Empire of Japan
  1868 CE – 1947 CE
• French Colonial Empire (Second)
  1830 CE – 1962 CE
• Soviet Union
  1922 CE – 1991 CE
• British Empire
  1583 CE – 1997 CE
• Spanish Empire
  1492 CE – 1976 CE
• Portuguese Empire
  1415 CE – 1999 CE

Related politics & governance events

• Treaty of Versailles and the founding of the League of Nations
  28 June 1919 (in force 10 January 1920)
• Russian Revolutions of 1917
  March & November 1917 (February & October Revolutions, O.S.)
• Sykes-Picot Agreement partitions the Ottoman Middle East
  16 May 1916
• Hitler's appointment and Nazi consolidation of power
  30 January 1933 – August 1934
• The Xinhai Revolution and the fall of the Qing
  1911–1912 (Wuchang Uprising 10 October 1911; abdication 12 February 1912)
• Stalin's Great Purge (Great Terror)
  1936–1938

Also relevant

• March on Rome and Mussolini's rise to power
  28–30 October 1922

Further reading

Iran: A Modern History

The wider story

Iran: A Modern History

Abbas Amanat

Sweeping, readable history covering the Qajar century.

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