March 7, 2008
Transitions between the late medieval and early modern forms of political organization, beginnings of the demise of feudal power structures, the first steps toward the consolidation of centralized territorial states.
15th century Europe: city states in Italy and Germany; the Holy Roman Empire; feudal monarchies in France and Spain.
Italy: medieval communes replaced by five principle city states by mid 15th century, Florence, Naples, Rome and the Vatican, Milan, Venice. Various combinations of representational and constitutional structures with monarchic notions of rule.
Rise of mercantile economy, new and prominent class of merchant bankers. Concentration of power in the hands of new elites.
Florence: rise of the Medici to power from 1430’s onwards.
Princely courts, and the princely network in Italy.
The prince and the courtier.
Repeated assertion and representation of authority through ceremonial, family and patronage networks, and the arts.
French and Spanish invasions of Italy from 1494 onwards.
Niccolo Macchiavelli, The Prince, 1513.
France: territorial consolidation between 1453 and 1530’s.
The three estates: clergy, nobility, townsmen
Standing army; new fiscal regime and system of taxation. Notion of the monarch as ultimate sovereign, with divine qualities.
Spain: trend toward unification, particularly through marriage of Ferdinand of Castile and Isabella of Aragon, 1469
Notions of divine sanction of monarchs.
Expulsion of Jews and Muslims: part of the trend toward homogenization and territorial consolidation.
Overall, through the later 15th century: growth of state bureaucracies, new taxation policies, formation of standing armies lay the foundations of absolutist polities. Territorial consolidation, notions of divine rule, centralizing tendencies, balancing out of various power holders.
OTTOMAN ABSOLUTISM AND ITS LIMITS / DERİN TERZİOĞLU
March 10, 2008
- The paradigm of Oriental Despotism and its critique
- The making of Ottoman absolutism: an historical overview
- The sultan and the sultanate
- The kul elites
- The timar institution
- The learned establishment
- Ottoman legal culture and limits to royal authority
- The transformation of the Ottoman state after the late sixteenth century
Terms and names
Machiavelli
Montesquieu
Sultan
Caliph
Mehmed II
Kul, janissary, devşirme
Timar, timarli
Tahrir (land survey)
Ulema
Kadi, mufti, müderris
Shariah
Kanun
Urban notables (ayan)
Taxfarming
ABSOLUTISM IN SOUTH ASIA: THE MUGHAL EMPIRE: 16th to 19th CENTURY/ MELTEM TOKSÖZ
March 12, 2008
A region of travel and transport connecting Central Asia and the Indian Ocean
• Warrior aristocracy in a multi-religious environment on a geography of co-existence in a chaotic era
• Centralization 1526 babür
• Turning into ruling dynasty with an army, land tenure and central government.
• 1556-1605 akbar
• 1658-1707 aurangzeb
THE REIGN OF AKBAR
• United north India, advanced to the south
• Ruling a more populous empire than the Ottomans and Safavids, 100-150 million
• Military might, prosperity and arts
• Adapting the Islamic state to a non-Muslim population: cultural synthesis via Din-al-ilahi
• Abolished jizya, established Din-al-ilahi
A modern state environment for agrarian history: 16th century
• An imperial state extended its authority over a vast terrain of a network of urban centers, inter-city routes, and state elites
• Standardising state operations and cultivating loyalty
The early modern state
• Central administration : a consistent supply of taxes and troops, and loyalty to the state
• Zamindari (timarli)
• Mansabdar (kul)
• Raiyat or ryot (peasantry)
• Allowing the continuity and development of trading communities
This system of control creates the power of absolute rulers
• The Mughal imperial system collected tax from many localities of many intermediaries, not just zamindars but also rajas (tributary kingdoms)
• Many layers of authority and entitlements
• An early modern state project: struggling to collect revenue and enforce state power over land rights.
• Warfare and rising value of land revenue financing Mughal imperial grandeur
What’s behind Mughal success?
• Integrating Muslims into imperial service (central asians, persians, afghans, indian muslims) without ethnic discrimination while respecting local custom and culture
• Placing Hindus at levels of bureaucracy
• Getting a considerable portion of Hindus (both rural and urban) ally with them
Decentralization
• 17th century onwards intermediary powers of QASBAH –Muslim- (ayan) and
ASHRAF –Hindu- (esraf)
THE MING BUREAUCRATIC EMPIRE IN
March 14, 2008
-Voltaire and the Enlightenment View of Chinese Bureaucratic Empire
-Ming Bureaucracy
-State Examinations
-Autocracy of the Ming Emperor
-Tokugawa Centralized Feudalism
-Shoguns and the Bakufu government
-Local autonomy of Domains
