The Modernization of Egypt in the First Part of the 19th Century

Abstract

The process of modernization and the appropriation of European knowledge useful for Islamic society has not been completed and is still underway.
The reason is that the gap in scientific, educational and socio-economic development between the West and the Islamic world is still quite large. The problem was particularly acute in Egypt, the country with the largest population in the Arab world, which had always played an important role in the cultural life of the Islamic world, but by the beginning of the 19th century it found itself on the periphery of its development. At the end of the eighteenth century Egypt, like many other provinces of the Ottoman Empire, lagged far behind Western European countries in terms of the development of productive forces, the level of medicine, education and the standard of living of the people in general. The ideas and achievements of Western progressive social thought were hardly known in the country. Many Egyptian politicians and intellectuals realised the necessity of overcoming this backwardness and borrowing the best European achievements as soon as possible. In this regard, therefore appears relevant to consider how innovations were introduced in the Eastern Islamic Soci-ety, including in the field of education, by using the example of 19th century Egypt.
At that time Egypt was one of the first countries outside Europe to begin its socio-economic modernization under the leadership of Mohammad Ali Pasha, the viceroy of the Turkish sultan.