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Edinburgh Studies on the Ottoman Empire

Corruption in the Ottoman PolityEmpirical Insights, Conceptual Reflections

Edited by Boğaç A. Ergene and Cengiz Kırlı

Format

£24.99

About this book

Presents the first collective study to examine diverse approaches to corruption in the Ottoman polity

  • Engages with conceptual and empirical questions related to the topic
  • Features social, political, economic, legal and discursive approaches to the study of corruption
  • Draws on a wide variety of primary sources
  • Contains essays focused on both the early modern and modern eras
  • Engages with recent scholarship on corruption in non-Ottoman contexts

This book features essays that explore corruption and its manifestations in the Ottoman Empire through social, political, economic, legal and discursive approaches. Its main goal is to contextualise the notion and investigate its meanings, conceptual parallels and associated behaviour via a nuanced historical framework. Combining theoretical analysis with detailed case studies, the volume also examines various corruption-related crimes and how they were regulated in the Ottoman polity across the early modern and modern periods.

Bringing together established and emerging Ottoman scholars, the collection advances the field by considering contrasting perspectives on the topic. The book’s scope extends beyond the Ottoman Empire to include comparative perspectives from other historical settings, such as Mamluk Egypt and Qing China, offering readers a broader understanding of how different polities defined and confronted corruption.

Reviews

Corruption in the Ottoman Polity is a competent volume historicising and contextualising the concept of corruption in the early modern and modern Ottoman Empire. The chapters are well structured and follow a pattern that help the reader appreciate the intricacies of dealing with a modern notion in a historical context. While a number of essays provide theoretical approaches to studying corruption as a historical phenomenon, others present case studies from the Ottoman Empire as well as from the similar polities such as the Mamluk Empire and Qing China. This is indeed a welcome contribution to the field of Ottoman studies and hopefully will inspire new historians to study corruption in the Ottoman context.
Table of contents

List of Tables
List of Figures
Acknowledgements
A Note on Transliteration
Contributors

Introduction to the Volume
Boğaç Ergene & Cengiz Kırlı

Part I. Historiographical and Methodological Considerations

1. Corruption in Modern Ottoman Historiography
Boğaç Ergene
2. Writing History Backwards and Forwards: Thoughts on the Notion of ‘Ottoman Corruption’
Avi Rubin & Iris Agmon

Part II. Corruption in the Early Modern Era

3. On Bribery, Law and Confiscation: Revisiting the Case of Kira, the Jew
Yavuz Aykan
4. Between Law, Custom and Abuse: Ottoman Judges’ Collection of Fees During the Late Eighteenth and Early Nineteenth Centuries
Jun Akiba
5. ‘Corruption’ and the Misuse of Waqf Funds
Suraiya Faroqhi
6. Valued but not Marketed: Revisiting the ‘Sale of Public Offices’ in the Ottoman Empire
Yasin Arslantaş

Part III. Corruption in the Tanzimat Era and Afterward

7. Codification Movements and Problematisation of Corruption in Nineteenth-Century Ottoman Governance
Safa Saraçoğlu
8. Invention of Corruption: The 1840 Penal Code, Power, and Bureaucracy
Cengiz Kırlı
9. Corruption and Construction: The Stained History of the Building Council
Eda Güçlü
10. ‘The Work of Inspection Cannot be Freed of Confusions and Amalgamations’: Purity, Danger and the Practice of Late Ottoman Statecraft
Marc Aymes

Part IV. Comparative Reflections

11. Reconsidering Administrative Networks of Taxation, Legal Execution and Bribery from the Mamluk to the Ottoman Period: A Comparative Historical Perspective
Toru Miura
12. Ottoman Corruption: The View from Qing China
Elif Akcetin
13. Afterword: The Ottomans in European and Other Contexts
Joanna Innes

Combined Bibliography

About the contributors

Boğaç A. Ergene

Boğaç Ergene is Professor of History at the University of Vermont. He is the author of Defining Corruption in the Ottoman Empire (Oxford University Press, 2024) and Local Court, Provincial Society, and Justice in the Ottoman Empire (Brill, 2003), and co-author of Halal Food: A History (Oxford University Press, 2018; with Febe Armanios) and The Economics of Ottoman Justice (Cambridge University Press, 2016; with Metin Coşgel). Ergene also edited and co-edited two other volumes and published numerous articles in scholarly journals.

Cengiz Kırlı

Cengiz Kırlı is Professor of History at Boğaziçi University. He is the author of Yolsuzluğun İcadı: 1840 Ceza Kanunu, İktidar ve Bürokrasi (2014), and Sultan ve Kamuoyu: Osmanlı Modernleşme Sürecinde “Havadis Jurnalleri (1840-1844)” (2009). He also published articles on 19th century Ottoman history in scholarly journals.

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