Turkey’s Violent Formation (new Social Contracts At The End Of The Ottoman Empire)

By (author) Kieser Hans-Lukas
Description:

The decade of war and violence culminating in the Conference of Lausanne was formative for the modern state of Turkey, as it was for interwar Europe’s diplomacy and appeasement. Yet the currents that gave rise to the defining events of the period – ultranationalism, imperial proto-fascism, and pan-Islamism – have yet to be definitively integrated into historiography.

The case studies in this book reappraise key events, concepts, and individuals in late Ottoman and early Republican Turkey. Divided into four parts, the book first examines squandered opportunities for democratic reform of the multi-ethnic empire, as well as the emergence of extreme politico-religious ideology in the late Ottoman period. It then examines the continuity of these currents in Kemalist Turkey in case studies including anti-Kurdish campaigns and biographical studies of key actors, insiders, and ideologues such as Ziya Gökalp, Cavid Bey, Riza Nur, and Mahmut Bozkurt. The final part of the book explores the legacy of Turkey’s violent formation vis-à-vis its relations with wartime ally Germany in the context particularly of the Armenian genocide.

Together, the chapters in this book emphasise the legacy of foundational violence which marked the formation of authoritarian modern Turkey, while highlighting the need for new, inclusive democratic social contracts.

Table of contents:

List of Figures
List of Maps
Acknowledgments

Introduction.
1. Democracy Versus Genocide?

Part I. Reform and Massacre in an Expiring Sultanate-Caliphate.
2. Fair Futures! Missionaries against “Indian Removal,” “Armenian Atrocities”
3. Islamic Empire and the Politics of Societal Massacre
4. Choosing War in the Crisis of Reform: The 1914 Agreement for Anatolia and Germany

Part II. Turkey’s Ultranationalist Refoundation.
5. Pact, Not Peace: The Lausanne Treaty’s “Near East Peace”
6. Riza Nur: Co-Founder of the Republic, Delegate in Lausanne, Pan-Turkist
7. The Destruction of Dersim

Part III. Revolution and Anti-Democracy: Biographical Approaches.
8. Ziya Gökalp: Mentor of Ultranationalism, Advocate of Education
9. Patriot Cavid Bey, Victim of Judicial Murder in Ankara
10. Mahmut Bozkurt: Revolution, Racism, and the Secular Republic
11. Parvus in Turkey, a Merchant of Revolution and War

Part IV. End of Empire, Time of Genocide: Turkey’s and Germany’s Affinitiy.
12. Johannes Lepsius, a German Patriot and Protestant Internationalist
13. Ambassador Wangenheim and the CUP: A Model of Moral Defeatism
14. Democrat Matthias Erzberger and Turkey
15. Germany and the Armenians: A Fatal Failure

Epilogue.
Index.

Review quote:
The Great War and its aftermath carried extreme violence into the fabric of Turkish politics and society. Hans-Lukas Kieser is a sure guide to this tragic story of lost possibilities and of the construction of an iron cage of public life. This book is history with a moral message.
Biographical note:
Hans-Lukas Kieser is a historian of the late Ottoman Empire and Turkey at the University of Newcastle, Australia, and the University of Zurich, Switzerland.
Promotional headline:
A reappraisal of the legacy of extreme violence and ideology at the end of the Ottoman Empire and the historical basis for peace in Turkey.
Feature:
Provides a thought-out and thought-provoking approach to importance of foundational violence in Ottoman and Turkish history
Feature:
Its broad historical reflection compellingly integrates the genocidal last decade of the Ottoman Empire into modern Turkish, Middle East