The great game of improvements

Description

This dissertation examines European involvement in the efforts of the Ottoman government to restructure the Orthodox Church and community ( millet) during the mid-nineteenth century. This is accomplished by placing squarely within the context of international diplomacy the progression of state-inspired reforms between the Giilhane Rescript of 1839 and the General Regulations of 1862 which attempted to reduce the temporal powers of the Orthodox clergy and to give the Orthodox laity control over the administration of their communities. The dissertation thereby illustrates the important role of religion and religious institutions in the colonial encounter between Europe and the Ottoman Empire and clarifies the process by which the debate over the rights and privileges of the Orthodox Church led to the outbreak of the Crimean War in 1854. The study is based on data from the British, French, Austrian, and Turkish state archives, the archives of the Ecumenical Patriarchate, Ottoman newspapers, memoirs, and various published sources.This dissertation demonstrates that the Orthodox Church became a focal point of conflicting political ambitions in the mid-1800s between European diplomats, Ottoman statesmen, local elites, and ordinary Christians. Behind these debates lay not only the "game" of Great-Power rivalries for control of the Ottoman Empire, but also profound differences between Orthodox Christians concerning modernity, national identity, and the structure of their own society.After describing the general position of the Orthodox clergy in Ottoman society during the 1820s--1830s, the dissertation discusses the attitudes adopted by British, French, Russian, and Austrian diplomacy towards the millet system and towards the Orthodox Church. An account is given of the Ottoman government's attempts to reform the Church during the 1840s and of how European responses to these failed attempts provided the backdrop for much of the diplomacy surrounding the Crimean War, from the Menshikov mission (1853) to the Constantinople Conference (1856). Particular attention is given to the involvement of ambassadors Stratford Canning, Edouard Thouvenel, and Anton Prokesch von Osten in the drafting of the Reform Decree of 1856, through which the Ottoman government finally legislated comprehensive millet reforms. Finally, the implementation and long-term effects of these reforms are examined.

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