A Critique of the histories of European and Ottoman States: "from modernization revisionism" and "State tradition" towards an alternative reading

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2011
Hasdemir, A. Seven
In this thesis two “western modern state” and three Ottoman “state tradition” scholars (Gianfranco Poggi, Christopher Pierson, Şerif Mardin, Metin Heper and Çağlar Keyder) are elaborated in the way how they write the the history for their theorization attempts. The specially emphasized processes in these histories are asserted to be reconstructed as the sources of an “idealized”-type that is assumed to be fulfilled by “the West” and should also be followed by “the rest”. The description of this form of a state entails a covert expectation on the requirement of an effective, limited but primarily strong state. Since the mainstream historical knowledge builds the foundations of both our academic studies and daily political arguments, it should be subjected to a critique. And state theory should be rethought with comparative and alternative perspectives. This work does not only trace the histories of political development constituted on “modernization revisionist” and “state traditional” theses, it also aims to cast new perspectives for the theorization of state-formation momentums and mechanisms by making a potpourri from some alternative readings of historical theses. As a result some central debates are brought into the picture on the historical transformation of state-society relationships. Along with the attempts for more comprehensive thinking exersizes on the states, theorization does not deal with two separate states or separate narratives of the the history but rather with the experiences thought together and watched through the different forms they takes in each particular historical momentums.

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Citation Formats
A. S. Hasdemir, “ A Critique of the histories of European and Ottoman States: “from modernization revisionism” and “State tradition” towards an alternative reading,” M.S. - Master of Science, Middle East Technical University, 2011.