In today's Turkey there has been a comprehensive and radical transformation process. In this process where the Justice and Development Party (AKP) is the main actor, the norm and value system, which have become dominant in the state and the society, have been transformed through new conservative policies, while the principles (e.g. secularism), known to be the fundamental principles of the Turkish modernization, have lost their validities. In this paper, the dynamics of education and social change in the process extending from the Ottoman Empire to the Republic of Turkey, are discussed along with the claim that the roots of the ongoing social, political and educational transformation in Turkey can be found in the policies implemented in the late Ottoman Period and the early years of the Republic roughly until 1940s. In the first part of this paper, the social change experienced throughout the articulation process of the Ottomans as a semi-colonized peripheral unit to the Western system, is outlined with its different dimension. In the second part, the Republican Period until the 1940s is discussed with its economic, social, political and educational dimensions. Finally, in the third part the results of the paper are included.