Ottoman Legacy Research Articles

An Analysis of the Religious Solidarity Discourses Regarding the Syrian Refugees in Türkiye

Following the outbreak of the civil war in Syria, a massive migration of Syrian nationals to Türkiye has been a significant phenomenon. This situation has become a problematic issue, as the massive presence of Syrian refugees in Türkiye has become an important part of the domestic political agenda. The politicization of the refugee issue has long since presented a duality of conflicting opinions among the Turkish society, whereas it has led to political debates between pro-government and opposition groups. In light of these developments, Turkish government elites have produced discourses of religious solidarity with the aim of providing tolerance and social acceptance for Syrian refugees and thus legitimizing the open door policy of the government toward these refugees. The aim of this study is to analyze and categorize the themes that constitute the basis of the discourses of religious solidarity regarding Syrian refugees in Türkiye. In this context, a second aim is to demonstrate how these themes have been welcomed in a positive manner by their adoption and recognition by Turkish society. To these aims, governmental discourses of religious solidarity and a sample consisting of 980 posts on the digital platform X have been analyzed by using the critical discourse analysis technique and have been categorized under two discursive themes, namely the ensar–muhacir analogy and the emphases on the Ottoman legacy. The conformity between these discourses and the government’s ideological orientation and the degree to which these discourses have been welcomed and adopted by the Turkish society have been discussed in detail.

The Ottoman Legacy of the Connected Histories of Demographic Engineering: The Case of the Ottoman Greeks of Western Anatolia

ABSTRACT Is there any relationship between the seemingly separate histories of demographic engineering that affected millions of Ottoman peoples of Albanian, Arab, Bulgarian, Circassian, Georgian, Greek, Jewish or Kurdish origin and the Muslim refugees from the Balkans and Russian territories during the late-Ottoman period? Does this historical legacy play a role in the nation-state building processes of the Republic of Turkey and other post-Ottoman nation-states? What may sound like simple and rhetorical questions, taken at their face value, provide a scholarly framework for a more connected and holistic history of demographic engineering. Focusing on the personal micro-histories of the victims and perpetrators of demographic engineering clearly demonstrates how such histories are entangled with each other, and their role in the creation of the post-Ottoman world. The article argues that, unique as it may seem, a segment in the life of a Unionist-appointed and Muslim nationalist Ottoman civil servant; Ferid Bey, who was both a victim and a culprit of ethnic violence, points out to a pattern that connects histories of demographic engineering designed primarily by competing nationalists in the late Ottoman Empire. It underlines the impact of this legacy on the nation-state building processes of the post-Ottoman world.

Constructing Turkish Foreign Policy: From the “Grand Strategy” to the “Strategic Depth”

The Grand Strategy in the conventional Turkish foreign policy has been built on the defensive, secularism/security-based, pro-status quo and Western-oriented pillars while rejecting the Ottoman legacy since 1923. The Kemalist elite holding power in many institutions defined Turkey’s place strictly in the Western bloc in line with their identity, ideology, and quest to modernize and industrialise the country during the Cold War. However, from the 1980s onwards, several dynamics have opened new windows for change in both domestic and international politics including economic liberalisation, end of global bipolarity, new governmental initiatives abroad, de-securitization, democratization, and Europeanization. The JDP (Justice and Development Party) came to power in 2002, set a new orientation, goals, priorities, and tools for foreign policy within the guideline of the Strategic Depth Doctrine. An identity and ideology-driven, Middle Eastern-oriented, and pro-active foreign policy fuelling from the aspirations to utilize the Ottoman legacy to make Turkey a leading geopolitical actor in regional and global affairs was pursued until the collapse of the vision with the 2011 Arab Spring. In this article, firstly the characteristics of the conventional Turkish foreign policy and the factors that have constructed it, then the transition period, and finally the radical shift in JDP’s first decade will be critically assessed.

From Religious to Ethnic Minorities: The Cultural and Social Integration of Pomaks into Post-Ottoman Turkey

This article traces the cultural and social integration of Pomaks into post-Ottoman Turkey and the controversy over their ‘Turkishness’. Current scholarship on early republican nationalism is particularly interested in the importance of the imperial legacy in nation-building in the early republic period. Scholars discuss that the Ottoman legacy of the millet system was vital to the formation of Turkish identity because the republican elites continued to accept Muslim immigrants from the Balkans due to their Islamic background. A closer analysis of primary sources with a focus on Pomak-speaking immigrants, however, reveals not only the challenges that their cultural assimilation posed for the government but also competing versions of Turkishness within intellectual and political circles. This article argues for a complex understanding of relations between immigration and nationalism, which shows that the public acceptance of Pomaks as Turks depended on domestic factors, such as linguistic nationalism and security concerns.

Continuity and Change: the Missed Historical Background of the Turkish Legal Revolution

Abstract The Republic of Turkey, built on the ruins of the Ottoman Empire, has carried out, as in many other areas, a wide-ranging and radical revolution in the field of law; yet, it should be noted that this revolution was founded on the Ottoman Empire’s legacy of innovation and constituted its continuation. How this reality has been evaluated and perceived after the establishment of the Republic of Turkey, however, is a matter of debate. In this article, the legal changes in the period from 1839, when the reforms began, to the end of the 1930s, when they were completed, are considered as a continuum. In this context, the article evaluates how the interaction between Islamic and state law and the Ottoman legacy have been perceived during the period of the Republic of Turkey with a focus on reform in the field of civil law.

On Bülent Ecevit and the Ottoman-Republican Contention: a Kemalist Hardliner or a Mediator?

Abstract Turkey’s political structure was built on what remained of the Ottoman Empire, not on its ruins. For this reason, it was unlikely that political polarization would be immune to rival attitudes towards the Ottoman past. On the one hand, following the War of Independence the Kemalist revolutionaries carefully detached the new state from the Ottoman legacy. On the other hand, their more conservative allies, the opposition group in the First Grand National Assembly, and religious power centres within society seemed discontent with the new regime’s orientation. Therefore, a positive and sometimes nostalgic approach to Ottoman history has been an important reference point for the conservatives who are more distant from Kemalism and the counter-revolutionary dissidents. This article discusses Bülent Ecevit’s position on the antagonism between Kemalist and conservative readings of Ottoman history as the third chair of the chp and the pioneer of Turkey’s Social Democratic movement.

Adalet ve Kalkınma Partisi İktidarı Döneminde Ortadoğu'da Türk Dış Politikası: Çıkar Etkileşimi ve Gelecekteki Zorluklar

At the beginning of the twenty-first century, Turkish foreign policy witnessed an almost fundamental change from what it was in the last century, when new worlds emerged in front of Turkey, from the Balkans to the Caucasus and Central Asia through the Middle East. New political approaches have also emerged aimed at inspiring the Ottoman multi-ethnic group formula to reconcile with Turkey's Islamic and Ottoman legacy at home as well as abroad, and within the framework of this new political concept that restored balance to Turkey's regional relations, which it did not attach importance to in the past because of its excessive focus on building solid relations with the European Union and the United States of America. After the Justice and Development Party came to power in Turkey in late 2002, Turkey's new leaders worked to activate the Turkish role in the regional environment surrounding Turkey. The beginning was to establish good relations with neighboring countries in the Middle East. In order to be effective and influential, the new Turkish vision in foreign policy focused on the importance of the internal transformation, especially the consolidation of political and economic stability in the country, as internal reform in Turkey and its growing economic capabilities allowed it to emerge as a sponsor of peace in the Middle East. On this basis, Turkey's leaders have expressed their willingness to pursue active diplomacy in the Middle East in order to reduce or end problems with neighboring countries through a zero-problem policy.

How conflicts beteen Greece and Turkey in the 19th – early 20th centuries affected the formation of historical memory in both states

Present-day relations between Greece and Turkey cannot be defined as neighborship. One of the main reasons for this is a negative influence of the historical memory of relations (HMR) on the two peoples’ mutual vision. Addressing the HMR from this angle can help to identify the degree of hostilities and assess the prospects for improving relations. Therefore, the authors tried to trace, by means of historical narrative, the eventual determinants of both HMRs in 1821–1923, i.e. during the period when the events most actualized by the HMRs of modern Greeks and Turks took place. In this century, the HMRs were formed under the pressure of conflict situations. Those were the liberation war of the Greeks in 1821–1829, the “30-day war” in 1897, the Balkan wars of 1912–1913, and the Greek-Turkish war of 1919–1922. Because of them, the HMRs and the nationalisms in Greece and Turkey acquired mutually accusatory orientation. As such, they in a way guaranteed irreconcilability between the states on the issues dividing them. Also, the Greek-Turkish relations as well as the growth of nationalisms, fell into the context of the great powers struggle for the Ottoman legacy. The current Turkish-Greek disputes concerning Cyprus and over the Aegean shelf are also influenced by other countries’ interests. Nationalisms in Greece and Turkey block reconciliation of the parties, while the interdependent hostility of the two HMRs guarantees the continuity of confrontational motivations in their political consciousness. What results, is a cyclical nature of the Greek-Turkish clashes, long-term tensions between the two countries and recurring outbreaks of conflicts between them.

Caught Between the Notions of Ethnicity, Citizenship and Diaspora. The Case of the Bosniaks in Turkey

Along with many others, Bosniaks are an ethnic group within the contemporary Turkish nation with immigrant roots dating back to the last quarter of the 19th century. Constituting a significant ethno-demographic part of the Ottoman legacy within the modern Turkish nation, Bosniaks in Turkey have long refrained from identifying themselves with a separate ethnic or cultural identity when confronted with the assimilationist cultural policies of the new nation state. But, while adapting themselves to Turkish culture and identity, Bosniaks have also preserved a collective identity of Bosniakness, mostly owing to the fact that their population in Turkey has been fed by continuous migration waves in different periods. The aim of this study is to analyze the problematic development of a Bosniak identity in Turkey with regards to the cultural assimilation processes and continuous migration waves and other factors on both foreign and domestic scales. Based on the findings of the study, it can be concluded that Bosniaks in Turkey do not yet constitute a Bosniak diaspora, but rather they can be regarded as a diaspora in the making.

Neo-Ottomanism as the Basis of Turkey’s Middle East Policy

In the article the author emphasizes that Turkey’s current course of foreign policy is a reflection of its fear to remain a secondary, buffer state against the background of the past greatness of the Ottoman Empire. The author elucidates it as a reason that Turkey regards the traditional basis of its foreign policy (Ottomanism, Pan-Turkism) that is radically different to the pro-Western Kemalism. Direction of Turkish foreign policy towards neo-Ottomanism is explained by the peculiarities of geopolitics of the post-bipolar period, existence of the conflict identities, aspiration to take responsibility for the negative (from Turkey’s perspective) processes in the countries of the “Ottoman legacy” (European, Asian, African areas) and other. It is highlighted that Turkey aims to reach a new (supraregional) level through the revival of political Islam, Ottoman traditions and ideology, however, officially it distancing itself from neo-Ottomanism in order to avoid accusations of its commitment to expansionism.

Educating Palestine: Teaching and Learning History under the Mandate

Educating Palestine: Teaching and Learning History under the Mandate

Global far right and imaginative interconnectivities

While reading the papers in this collection on the far right, I have found myself in wondering how to locate the newly rising far right in the non-Western world and their global connectivities to each other and to the Western far right. The emotive and imaginative connectivities matter as they often feed each other. As such, Islamophobia in the European far right is used to strengthen the anti-Western sentiments in Islamist populisms in the Middle East, and vice versa. Turkey’s Erdoğan’s revivalist imperial dreams are not disconnected from the rest of the world either. Therefore, the rise of the far right could better be understood as a global phenomenon. The newly emerging literature on the far right, so far, seems to have failed to capture these interconnected imaginative forces in the formation of Islamist politics for three reasons: (i) the global interconnectivity in populist political aspirations is missed due to Western-oriented tendencies in calibrating the scholarly foci; (ii) the region does not fit into the foci employed by area studies; and (iii) rationality-oriented Eurocentric theories are limited in their ability to grasp and analyse the imaginative forces that are at stake. In a new project that takes place in 12 countries and in which I take lead, the members of the research team aim to develop theories that will allow for nuanced accounts of the way imaginative and affective elements impact people’s attitudes and opinions. For instance, although the last Islamic Empire ceased to exist almost 100 years ago, the dream of reviving Islamic Empires still haunts and even fuels political aspirations. It is therefore crucial to examine the rising far right in Europe vis-à-vis the currency of current imperial Islamist revivalist aspirations. It is equally crucial to see the interconnectivities within those revivalist movements. We therefore study the homes of three of the greatest Islamic Empires (Islamdom: Ottoman, Safavid and Mughal/Timurid). This geography, recently coined as the Balkan-to-Bengal complex (BtB) (Ahmed 2015), a historically, politically and socially interconnected zone, has been the heartland of Islamist resurgences. In the West of the BtB, Erdogan’s charisma and a series of philanthropic and media projects have gained him support within and beyond Turkey, particularly among Sunni Muslims (Akdoğan 2017; Carkoglu 2014; Martin 2015). The common theme in those investments is the revivalist dreams, presenting the Ottoman legacy as a protector against non-Muslims, from the (Albanian and Bosnian) Muslim minorities in the Balkans to Sunni Arabs in the Middle East and North Africa (Cagaptay 2009; Cetin 2014; Küçük and Türkmen 2018; Rüma 2010; Tabak 2016; Walton 2010; Yavuz 1998). In the East, the charismatic leaders of Islamists and Sufi groups (i.e. Pashtun Tahafuz movement, Jama’at-e-Islami in Pakistan and Hefazat-e-Islam in Bangladesh) (Ahmad 2009; Iqtidar 2011; Riaz 2012) enchant a large and ethnically diverse following beyond national borders, by intimately connecting them to each other through emotive elements against the colonial powers, and with dreams of just Islamic polities and futures. The historical interconnectedness imposed by the imperial Islamic past across the BtB informs and shapes the ways these political actors tap into the imaginative capacities of their audience, their audiences’ various social references, religious cosmologies, nationalist discourses, resentments, and other imaginative realms. Islamist actors appropriate those existing affective and emotive registers to further their often highly ambitious politics: including the dream of resurrecting the Islamic Empires, or of connecting them under a unified leadership for the Muslims in their region. Equally, they are able to use the elements of imperial nostalgia, post-imperial malaise and political rage not as autonomous entities, but highly calibrated to the far-right discourses taking place in the West. This publication is part of the ERC StG 2019 TAKHAYYUL Project (853230).

Late Ottoman Intrigue and Legacies Across the Mediterranean

A historian argues that the story of a former slave who became a leading statesman in Ottoman Tunisia, and then a political exile maneuvering to preserve his estates during French colonial rule, shows how North Africans found ways to pursue their own interests—and develop their own blend of nationalism and historical legacies—under overlapping systems of foreign rule.

The Ottoman Legacy and Neo-Ottomanism

The Ottoman Legacy and Neo-Ottomanism

Humanitarian, hospitable and generous

This article aims to analyze Turkish Public Diplomacy (PD) since the Justice and Development Party (AKP, in Turkish) came to power in 2002. In particular, it aims to make sense of the plurality of public diplomacy discourses and practices which attempt to enact a particular identity for Turkey and to tell a particular ‘story’ to foreign and domestic audiences. Based on a post-structuralist theoretical framework, we present the many institutions responsible for Public Diplomacy in Turkey and analyze the ‘stories’ told by them, arguing that PD is one of the many practices engaged by the AKP government in its attempt to enact a particularidentity and in its pursuit of legitimacy and influence. The particular identity the AKP has been trying — and keeps failing — to enact is that of a ‘benign’, benevolent, humanitarian, hospitable and generous emerging power, a model of a Muslim democracy with a growing economy, heir of a (positive) Ottoman legacy. The article also attempts to understand how AKP public diplomacy has been trying to modulate such a ‘story’ in a context marked by Turkish military interventions abroad and growing authoritarianism at home.

All that turban-folk: Orientalism and neo-folk music in Serbia

In this paper I look at the ?oriental controversy? of the neo-folk music in Serbia, focusing on the changes in the perception of the longstanding Serbian-Bosnian ensemble Juzni vetar (Southern Wind) in the academic circles, media and various segments of the music industry. The affirmative attitude towards the performers and music legacy of Juzni vetar, which has in recent years gradually entered the media from the alternative (non-commercial) music and art circles, may be observed in the context of the contemporary globalized music industry which constantly challenges orientalist assumptions and divisions between East and West. The key turning point in this process is the newly-embraced understanding of Juzni vetar (and ?turban-folk? in general) as part of Serbia?s cultural heritage. Using a representative sample of academic and media comments, in this paper I shed some light on the shifts in the reception of Juzni vetar primarily as an indication of the wider changes in the reception of the Ottoman legacy and contemporary influences of the ?Orient? in the contemporary Serbian culture, not excluding the wider context of Southeastern Europe.

The Emergence of Turkey as a Regional Power and the Neo-Ottomanism

Turkey was liberated and re-generated by Kemal Ataturk, a secular leader, on the ruins of six centuries old Ottoman Empire. The population was forced to accept the western way of life as strongly as possible. In fact, Ataturk never appreciated the deep cultural identity roots of the Turkish people with Islam and the Orient. Turkey's relationship with the US developed-based on the reasons that it (US) could protect Turkey from its traditional enemy-Russia. Since the 1990's, as Turkey was growing fast economically and in population, its ottoman legacy started re-surfacing. Islamism and Neo-Ottomanism were silently growing with the rise in Turkey's economic power and population. The failed military coup of 2016 has enabled President Erdogan to obtain control of an increasingly more Islamic army and administration. Today, Turkey has emerged as a regional power in the shifting international order. The concept of Neo-Ottomanism, launched by Erbakan and his associates in the early 1970's, has been silently promoting Turkey to be recognized as a regional power in this 21st century-by consolidating its political, military, economic and cultural strengths. This article has shown that Turkey is a sustainable regional power in the Balkans, Caucasus and in the Middle-East and the spirit of Neo-Ottomanism, has silently inspired and rejuvenated the Turkish national spirit to reach its goal.

Ottoman ghosts and legacies: A drift through the Dead Zone in Cyprus

This creative piece explores traces and erasures of a Cypriot Ottoman heritage by transposing autoethnographic and psychogeographical practice to Europe’s southernmost capital, Nicosia. It walks the border zone in Nicosia, once the site of the river Pedios, later a major Ottoman commercial street, a boundary from 1958 to 1974, and since then, a Dead Zone and the internationally contested border between the Republic of Cyprus and the unrecognized Turkish Republic of Northern Cyprus. Photography and writing are presented in conjunction with pages in Ottoman Turkish by my great-grandfather, the poet Imam Mustafa Nuri Effendi, who made a notebook from the English periodical The War Pictorial while incarcerated as an enemy alien in Kyrenia Castle by the British during World War I. I explore how these pages speak of my transcultural Ottoman, Turkish-Greek-Cypriot and English heritages and of changes in Cypriot culture in the century between his war and ours.

Ottomania: Televised Histories and Otherness Revisited

AbstractThis article discusses the ways in which the spread and the overwhelming popularity of Turkish television series in Southeastern Europe influence the change in perception of Turks and Turkey, as well as how the serials are transforming the image of the Balkans and the Ottoman legacy in Turkey. Television serials significantly contributed to the shifting popular image of the “other,” and initiated interactions unimaginable even a decade ago. These exchanges are both following and encouraging the breakdown of geohistorical boundaries that were set by the nationalist narratives in these regions at the turn of the 20th century, toward a more nuanced understanding of a shared past and a postnational future.

The Ottoman Empire, Southeastern European Literature, and Postcolonial Theory

Abstract The Ottoman Empire shaped much of the Mediterranean world and yet, postcolonial scholarship has developed very few tools that engage with it as a pre-modern and pre-capitalist empire. Given its influence, it is necessary to understand the Ottoman Empire as a colonial force, especially in literatures that represent its reign. Southeastern European literature is ripe for such analysis as it seeks to understand the Ottoman legacy in Southeastern Europe, and to account for the ways in which the Ottoman Empire’s imperial model created worlds within worlds, where regions not located in the imperial center were not peripheries but provincial centers. The works of Ivo Andrić, Ismail Kadare, and Meša Selimović fictionalize history in an attempt to show how history itself happens in these provincial centers. Audiences become aware of the Ottoman presence as a droning hum in the background with a lasting cultural, linguistic, and religious legacy.