This panel examines the ways in which the 1908 constitutional revolution and the subsequent inauguration of the Second Constitutional Era disrupted, intensified, or shaped social change in the Ottoman Empire. Deemed at times, a true "rupture" that marked the beginning of the end to the Empire, and in others, a triumphant restoration of an earlier, interrupted, revolution, 1908 is one of the most significant moments in late Ottoman history. It places a clear mark on its periodization, delineating a new Ottoman Empire or a new Turkey, severed from an "ancien regime." But what was it that was so new in the Second Constitutional Era, or so "ancien" in the period that preceded it? Taking this question as its starting point, and shifting the focus of inquiry towards the direction of practices within the revolution rather than solely discourses on it, this proposed collection of papers aims to offer an insight into what this watershed event may have meant to different groups, persons, and institutions.
The papers in this collection are brought together to address these concerns from different perspectives. The first paper examines the ways in which the revolution led to changes in the power dynamics with non-Muslim religious authorities and discusses how the revolution influenced ecclesiastic politics in Istanbul, Mount Lebanon, and Jerusalem. The second paper discusses the foundation of Ottoman Historical Society in the immediate aftermath of the revolution and explores the contextual shifts within history writing, due to political and ideological transformations. The third paper illustrates how the Committee of Union and Progress did not necessarily revolutionize the Ottoman Criminal Justice System after 1908, but built upon and intensified reforms begun during the Tanzimat and Hamidian periods, arguing that the CUP continued the process of creating a new Islamic legal system through the centralization of state authority and the standardization of legal practice and application. The fourth paper explores the proliferation of discussions surrounding the male body in the burgeoning sporting press in Istanbul after the revolution, tracing the commonality of different iterations of the beautiful, strong, and healthy male body across both time and communities. The fifth and final paper takes the practice of slavery as its point of departure and investigates how the Ottoman legal and administrative institutions, following a period of paralysis, were realigned after the revolution, to handle new notions of "freedom, justice, brotherhood, equality."
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Prof. Bedross Der Matossian
The paper deals in the ways in which the Young Turk Revolution of 1908 led to changes in the dynamics of power in the non-Muslim religious communities of the Empire. It will discuss the ways in which the revolution influenced ecclesiastic politics in Istanbul, Mount Lebanon, and Jerusalem. What was the impact of the revolution on the non-Muslim communities? How and why did these ethno- religious communities internalize the revolution? Why was the revolution more successful in creating new orders among certain ethno-religious groups? Why among other groups the attempt was unsuccessful? The cases of Istanbul (Armenians and Jews), Mount Lebanon (Maronite Church) and Jerusalem (Greeks, Armenians, and Jews) provide good examples of the ways in which the revolution shook the traditional foundations of these ecclesiastic powers. The paper contends that post-revolutionary ethnic politics in the Ottoman Empire should not be viewed from the prism of political parties only, but also through ecclesiastic politics, which was a key factor in defining inter and intra-ethnic politics. Interestingly, despite the fact that the revolution aimed at creating the modern secular Ottoman citizen whose loyalty was going to be to the state, it nevertheless strengthened the ethno-religious political centers of the ethnic groups. It did so by creating the space in which fierce competition began among the different actors within these communities for control over the power positions.
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Dr. Erdem Sönmez
The Young Turk Revolution was a transforming moment for history writing in the Ottoman Empire, during which it emerged as an academic discipline, attaining its professional standards and principles for the first time. That the beginning of this institutionalization process took place in a revolutionary era, where history itself was fast in the making is an oxymoron. Nevertheless, this process, soon to be deployed in carving out a new formal history of the Empire, had a crucial impact on the formation of a lasting historiographical tradition.
One of the most significant developments to this effect was the foundation of the Ottoman Historical Society (Tarih-i Osmani Encümeni) in 1909. The first history association proper in the Ottoman Empire, all of its benefactors were not only elected by the government and financed by the state but also the characteristics of their relations to the state circles determined the nature of history writing and its transformation during this time. Contrary to the history writing practices in the Hamidian era, which canonized loyalty to the sultanate and to Islam, the historiography after the revolution brought forth a notion of history that evoked a common Ottoman identity, with the aim of melting the ethnic, religious and regional differences together within the Empire. This particular understanding of history that emerged in the aftermath of 1908 soon underwent a significant transformation, as the Empire itself was transformed through consecutive wars and other social upheaval. Nevertheless. the nature of the ties that formed at this time, which bonded history writing to the state and the ideological climate it encourages, made its mark on the historical studies.
Consequently, in this paper, I seek to explore the institutionalization of historiography in Turkey, which has its origins in the onset of the Second Constitutional Era and had been jointly affected by nation-building and modern state formation processes. Perusing Ottoman Historical Society’s journal (Tarih-i Osmani Encümeni Mecmuas?) and other publications, as well as newspapers and archival material, I attempt to discuss the meanings of institutionalization and professionalization of historiography during a revolutionary era and analyze the contextual shifts in history writing due to the political and ideological transformations.
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Dr. Kent F. Schull
Part of the justification for the 1908 Constitutional Revolution by the Committee of Union and Progress (CUP) was destroying the corrupt, nepotistic, ancien regime of Sultan Abdulhamid II. With the exception of releasing numerous political prisoners, the new government did very little that was revolutionary in terms of the Ottoman Criminal Justice System. Instead, the new government built upon and intensified legal, penal, policing, and codification reforms begun during the Tanzimat and expanded during the Hamidian period. This paper investigates these reforms demonstrating the continuity and intensification, and argues against characterizing them as increased Westernization or secularization, but as examples of a unique Ottoman modernity. It also argues that the CUP continued the process of creating a new Islamic legal system through the centralization of state authority, the codification of Islamic criminal legal codes, and the standardization of legal practice and application, thus bringing Islamic legal institutions and practices in line with the strictures of the modern world. Sources for this paper include Ottoman criminal codes, court cases, penal reforms, and policing records all found in the Ottoman central archives.
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Dr. Murat C. Yildiz
This paper investigates the proliferation of discussions surrounding the male body in Istanbul after the 1908 constitutional revolution. One of the most important spaces in which these discussions took place was the burgeoning sporting press. The revolution created a context in which magazines and newspapers began to print much more frequently images of and articles about the beautiful and strong male body, as well as the importance of using sports to shape and mold this body. Like most political, social, and cultural transformations that (re)shaped life in Istanbul and other urban centers of the time, the increased proliferation of such discussions were not confined to a single ethnic community. Thus, this paper seeks to trace the ways in which members of the Armenian, Greek, Jewish, and Turkish communities of the late Ottoman Empire all participated in the production of, and were affected by, new conceptualizations of the body, masculinity, and beauty.
The argument advanced is based on multi-lingual archival research, and is part of a broader doctoral dissertation project, which examines how modern sports and physical education in Istanbul served as a space in which new understandings of the body, self, community, masculinity, morality, nationalism, and militarization intersected with one another during the late imperial and early republican periods. This paper seeks to accomplish two goals: first, to trace the commonality of different iterations of the beautiful, strong, and healthy male body across both time and communities; and second, to demonstrate that various people throughout the city and across communities treated and envisioned sports and physical education as a necessary means for the rehabilitation of the individual and the constitution of the larger community. The paper will draw from a diverse array of sources in Ottoman, Turkish, Armenian, French, German, and English from a number of private and public archives. These sources include journals, newspapers, memoirs, personal photographs, as well as oral histories.
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Dr. Ceyda Karamursel
Shortly after the Young Turk revolution, in September 1908, a slave girl of Circassian origin named Fatma Leman fled her mistress’ house, taking refuge to the Ministry of Justice in Istanbul. For her, if this revolution, heralded with the slogans of “freedom, justice, equality and brotherhood,” granted freedom to each and every Ottoman individual, then she too was free like the rest of her compatriots. She did have the right to demand her freedom, however, her intuition to seek for it at the recently established Ministry of Justice (in her view, more closely associated with the constitutional regime) instead of the religious sharia courts (where manumission deeds were normally issued) led only to an institutional paralysis in the ensuing months. Not knowing what to do with her, Ministry of Justice sent her to the Ministry of Police. In turn, the police, who knew that they could not return her back to her mistress but not let her go either, sent for her (ex-)mistress, for a possible negotiation between the two. The owner, whose trust to the old judicial order was intact, insisted that the slave girl be taken to the sharia court to “prove” her free status, whereas the slave girl herself decided to wait for the reinstatement of the parliament and make her appeal there. In all her vulnerability, the slave girl was kidnapped from where she was waiting in hiding and eventually made an odalisque to a high ranking provincial government officer.
Far from being an isolated case, Fatma Leman’s story well illustrates that the 1908 revolution is too readily referred to as the end of slavery in the Ottoman Empire. Focusing on the immediate aftermath of the revolution, at a time when “freedom” was publicly celebrated in carnival-like settings throughout the empire, this paper aims to look at what this “end” actually meant, particularly to the enslaved populations of this region, with the purpose of providing an insight to the ways in which Ottoman state, after a period of paralysis, realigned its administrative and legal institutions to handle slavery and its suppression.
