Anscombe, Frederick F. State, Faith, and Nation in Ottoman and Post-Ottoman Lands (review)

Abstract

REVIEWS 563 the golden egg syndrome. It was not only the marine mammals which faced near extermination, but also large numbers of the species Homo sapiens, in particular the wretched Aleutians, whose hunting skills were forcibly exploited by their Russian conquerors. Elsewhere, the Canadian historical geographer James Gibson has calculated that ‘at least 80 per cent of the Aleut population perished during the first and second generations of Russian contact’, making them the most ruthlessly exploited aboriginal group anywhere in Siberia and the Russian Far East (quoted in Alan Wood, Russia’s Frozen Frontier, London and New York, 2011, p. 72). Aswithanyworkofexcellentscholarship(whichJones’sbookunquestionably is) there usually appear a few minor errors which do not, however, detract from the overall value of the publication. Nevertheless, a few quibbles are worth a brief mention. Handel’s Messiah is an oratorio, not a concerto (p. 22); the thousands of Russian settlers and state servitors who spread throughout Siberia in the sixteenth, seventeenth and eighteenth centuries surely constitute more than ‘a handful’ (p. 24); the Siberian taiga is obviously not ‘impenetrable’ (p. 25); Avvakum never got as far as the Pacific Coast (p. 26); and the correct title of Darwin’s seminal work is The Origin of Species (p. 112). Lancaster University Alan Wood Anscombe, Frederick F. State, Faith, and Nation in Ottoman and Post-Ottoman Lands. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge and New York, 2014. xix + 323 pp. Maps. Illustrations. Notes. Bibliography. Index. £19.99: $30.99 (paperback). The book under review is as ambitious as its title suggests. Anscombe narrates his perspective on the turbulent history of Ottoman and post-Ottoman lands over the past 250 years as a contribution to multiple frameworks of interpretation instead of single ‘truths’ that came to dominate the views of the Balkans and the Middle East. In a very personal, almost confessional style, Anscombe rejects the overemphasized force of nationalism and what he claims is the misrepresentation of the role of religion, especially Islam, in the copious literature on the Eastern question and the nationalist production of postOttoman states. According to Anscombe, a wider Europeanizing, modernizing and secularizing narrative has come to shape the historiography of the last two centuries, which helped include the two troubled regions in European and global historical trends, but problems arose with the recent ‘revival’ of nationalism, which was then hastily explained away by Balkan exceptionalism, Balkanism, Orientalism or some similar sort of historical determinism. His conclusions sit well with most recent perspectives on the late Ottoman period SEER, 93, 3, JULY 2015 564 and research into Orthodox Churches in the Balkans (for example, Lucian Leustan [ed.], Orthodox Christianity and Nationalism in Nineteenth Century Southeastern Europe, New York, 2014). The key to Anscombe’s reinterpretation is the analysis of social aspects of religion, most significantly the Islamic principles of the just society, which came under threat from the reign of Sultan Selim III (1789–1807) on. Furthermore, Anscombe argues that foreign pressure, not nationalism, tore the Ottoman Empire apart. In his analysis, nationalism is essentially a post-Ottoman construction too weak to solidify and legitimate new states as religion had successfully done for centuries before. Moving forward to contemporary issues, Anscombe charts the path of he denunciation of nationalism’s ‘sleeping beauty’ paradigm, insisting that nationalism was not reawakened but (re)deployed because of fears and unpredictability caused by the demise of the Cold War status quo. In the Balkans but especially in Arab states, whose frameworks were set by Western powers, nationalism resulted in state failure and political instability. This also explains the recent burgeoning of religion and its renewed primacy as a group identity-maker employed to legitimize national (i.e. state) politics. The book’s wealth of detail and the range of issues covered might hinder the lay reader, however, whereas a specialist might be put off by the numerous errors and lack of focus, despite its sound arguments and rich insights. While Anscombe is right to criticize the previous historiography for essentialism, his arguments stray dangerously, as historical continuities are projected, parallels exaggerated and all that does not conform deemed exceptional. For example, he claims all resistance to Ottoman central power to be foreign imported, as if...