POLITICAL THOUGHT AND PRACTICE IN THE OTTOMAN EMPIRE

Παρουσίαση

Contrary to the traditional image of a stagnating, conservative state, innovation and reform seem to have been constant features of Ottoman administration throughout the empire's long history. As the relevant treatises by Ottoman administrators and intellectuals reveal, reform and change became contested matters especially from the second half of the sixteenth century onwards: some authors felt the need for reform and advocated for it; others perceived changes as a challenge to the traditional order and suggested a return to what was considered the 'Golden Age' of the Empire. Eventually, in the grand narrative of Ottoman history, it is the Tanzimat which represents the climax of the process of transformation of the Empire. Even though it is often attributed to the influence (and pressure) of Western Europe, recent studies emphasise the internal dynamics of Ottoman society and administration rather than external factors, treating the developments of the seventeenth and the eighteenth century as a course towards modernity.
This volume aims to explore Ottoman political thought and seeks answers to questions such as those: Did Ottoman political thinkers precede policy-makers in proposing reform, or did political writers feel surpassed by developments with which they did not agree? What was the relation of religion-oriented ideological currents with like-minded reforms in the fiscal and landholding systems? What was the relation between European (and/ or Iranian) thought and Ottoman political developments? Was there innovative political thinking that led to the radical reforms of the Tanzimat era?
Moreover, the volume seeks to investigate the relation of political ideas to the political praxis of their time: i.e. to examine the nature of political power in the various stages of the Empire, the developments that led particular groups to advocate specific reforms, the power networks at the administrative and political levels, the reception of political reform in Istanbul and the provinces, the participation of various political actors in state policy-making; and its legitimisation, and so forth. (From the publisher)

Περιεχόμενα

Acknowledgements
Abbreviations - Note on Transliteration
Introduction: Political Thought and Practice in the Ottoman Empire
PART ONE: INTRODUCING POLITICAL THOUGHT
I. METIN KUNT, Ottoman Political Theory, Reality and Practice
LINDA T. DARLING, Ottoman Political Thought: Towards a Revised History
PART TWO: WORDS AND CONCEPTS
HEATHER L. FERGUSON, Ottomans, Ottomanists and the State: Re-defining an Ethos of Power in the Long Sixteenth Century
GUNES ISIKSEL, «Le sultan des Deux Terres et des Deux Mers»: representations diplomatiques de l'espace politique ottoman au XVle siecle
ELIAS KOLOVOS, Istimalet: What Do We Actually Know About It?
ANTONIS HADJIKYRIACOU, Beyond the Millet Debate: The Theory and Practice of Communal Representation in Pre-Tanzimat-Era Cyprus
MARC AYMES, What's In a Fake? Utterances of Late Ottoman Politicalness
PART THREE: AUTHORS AND IDEAS
LINDA T. DARLING, Ottoman Political Thought and the Critique of the Janissaries
KATHARINA IVANYI, And the Question of Lands is Very Confusing: Birgivi Mehmed Efendi (d. 981/1573) on Land Tenure and Taxation
DERIN TERZIOGLU, Power, Patronage, and Confessionalism: Ottoman Politics as Seen through the Eyes of a Crimean Sufi, 1580-1593
BAKI TEZCAN, The Portrait of the Preacher as a Young Man: Two Autobiographical Letters by Kadizade Mehmed
from the Early Seventeenth Century
MARINOS SARIYANNIS, Ottoman Ibn Khaldunism Revisited: the Pre-Tanzimat Reception of the Muqaddima, from Kinalizade to Sanizade
GOTTFRIED HAGEN, The Prophet Muhammad as Model Leader - Ottoman Readings of the Treaty of al-Hudaybiyya
PART FOUR: OBLIQUE VIEWS
KONSTANTINOS MOUSTAKAS, Ottoman Greek Views of Ottoman Rule (15th-16th Centuries). The Perspective of the Patriarchate Associates
DENISE KLEIN, Negotiating Power in the Crimean Khanate: Notes on Tatar Political Thought and Practice (16th-18th c.)
ARIEL SALZMANN, Between Saint-Domingue and the Sublime Porte: A Caribbean Revolution, Ottoman Realpolitik, and the Inter-Hemispheric Contingencies of Modern Political Thought
PART FIVE: IDEAS IN PRACTICE
NICOLAS VATIN, Le pouvoir des Barberousse a Alger d'apres les Gazavat-i Hayreddin Pasa
EUNJEONG YI, Atpazari Seyyid Osman Fazli as Portrayed in Temamu 'l-feyz: a Sufi Text's Relevance to Politics in Late Seventeenth-Century Istanbul
VIRGINIA AKSAN, The Ottomans' Military Manpower and Political Bargains, 1750-1850
YIANNIS SPYROPOULOS, Janissary Politics on the Ottoman Periphery (18th-early 19th c.)
H. SUKRU ILICAK, The Greek War of Independence and the Demise of the Janissary Complex: A New Interpretation of the 'Auspicious Incident'