Constitutionalism Unbound

Constitutional Dynamics and Political Transformation in the Ottoman and Qajar Lands in the Long Nineteenth Century

Denis Hermann, Erdal Kaynar (Herausgeber)

Buch | Hardcover

390 Seiten

2025
Brill (Verlag)
978-90-04-73465-4 (ISBN)

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This volume explores the development of constitutionalism in the long nineteenth century across the Ottoman Empire and Qajar Iran as a multifaceted and transformative force that durably reshaped conceptions of state and governance, society and community, and politics and sovereignty.

Is democracy a foreign concept to the political culture of the Near East? This perennially debated question often overlooks a crucial historical factor: the rise of Ottoman and Qajar constitutionalism during the long nineteenth century. This volume is the first study to emphasize constitutionalism as a transformative force across Ottoman and Iranian lands. It investigates how new political ideas and social dynamics across the century shaped constitutionalism into a multifaceted and potent movement, culminating in the revolutions of 1906 and 1908. It traces how constitutionalism durably altered conceptions of state and society, leaving a significant legacy in both Iranian and (post-)Ottoman contexts.

Contributors are Houri Berberian, Yaşar Tolga Cora, Anne-Laure Dupont, Fujinami Nobuyoshi, Zaur Gasimov, Peter Hill, Denis Hermann, Erdal Kaynar, Varak Ketsemanian, Mira Xenia Schwerda, Alisa Schablovskaia, Nader Sohrabi and Barış Zeren.

Denis Hermann, Ph.D. (2007), is a historian and researcher at the CNRS (National Center for Scientific Research). Specializing in the history of Modern Iran and Shi’ism, his publications include Le shaykhisme à la période qajare: Histoire doctrinale et sociale d’une École chiite (Brepols, 2017). Erdal Kaynar, Ph.D. (2012), is associate professor in modern history at the University of Strasbourg. He works on the intellectual and political history of the late Ottoman Empire. His publications include L’héroïsme de la vie moderne. Ahmed Rıza en son temps (Peeters, 2021).

Contents

Acknowledgements

List of Figures

Introduction: Constitutionalism in the Ottoman Empire and Qajar Iran: Histories and Perspectives

Denis Hermann and Erdal Kaynar

Part 1: Conceptualizing Constitutionalism: (Re-)Imagining Politics

1 Who Can Participate in the Shūrā? Non-Muslims in the First Parliaments of Tunisia, the Ottoman Empire and Iran, 1861–1911

Anne-Laure Dupont

2 Khayr al-Din al-Tunisi and Arabic Constitutionalism

Peter Hill

3 The Nation Against the Sultan: Constitutionalist Thought in the Writings of the Young Turk Leader Ahmed Rıza

Erdal Kaynar

4 Democracy by Petition: the Popular Committees and What Made the Iranian Constitutionalism Unique

Nader Sohrabi

Part 2: Constructing Constitutionalism: Ideas, Actors, and Networks

5 Armenian Constitutionalism in the Late Ottoman Empire: the View from a Province

Varak Ketsemanian

6 The Iranian Constitution in the Mirror of the Russian Azerbaijani Press

Zaur Gasimov

7 Progressive Conservatives? The Young Turk Lectures on Constitutional Law

Nobuyoshi Fujinami

8 Constitutionalism and the Political Ethos of the Last Qajars

Alisa Shablovskaia

9 Constitutional Authority and Shiʿi Political Culture: the Mobilisation of Messianic Logic by the Ulama during the Iranian Constitutional Revolution

Denis Hermann

Part 3: Enacting Constitutionalism: the Challenge of Constitutional Rule

10 From Trusting to Cunning: Shifting Relations between Armenian Political Figures and Ḥasan Taqīzādeh during the Iranian Constitutional Revolution (1905–1911)

Houri Berberian

11 Crafting the Image of Constitutionalism: the Phenomenon of Bast in Turn-of-the-Century Iran and the Visualization of Protest

Mira Xenia Schwerda

12 Coal Heavers’ Strike of 1910 in the Ottoman Capital: Labor Activism and Socialist Politics in the Second Constitutional Era

Yaşar Tolga Cora

13 A Shift in Law-Making: Ottoman Constitutionalism Facing the Local in Rumelia

Barış Zeren

Index

Erscheinungsdatum	12.08.2025
Reihe/Serie	Social, Economic and Political Studies of the Middle East and Asia ; 135
Verlagsort	Leiden
Sprache	englisch
Maße	155 x 235 mm
Gewicht	775 g
Themenwelt	Geschichte ► Teilgebiete der Geschichte ► Kulturgeschichte
	Sozialwissenschaften ► Ethnologie
	Sozialwissenschaften ► Soziologie ► Spezielle Soziologien
ISBN-10	90-04-73465-1 / 9004734651
ISBN-13	978-90-04-73465-4 / 9789004734654
Zustand	Neuware