From the Ottoman Experiment in Local Government to the First Constitutional Parliament of 1876-1877

Abstract

From the Ottoman Experiment in Local Government to the First Constitutional Parliament of 1876-1877

Abstract

It vvould be an exaggeration to speak of a rich tradition of local
government, reaching deep down into the past, in Turkish history. The
ability of urban or rural communities to undertake autonomous action and to
set up their own organs of government was a relatively recent phenomenon
in the Ottoman Empire, as indeed in many other countries (with the very
limited exception of certain parts of medieval Europe). Nevertheless, some
authors have made much of, for example, the say that craft guilds had in
urban administration, or the fact the city of Ankara was run by the Akhis
until the 15th century — to the point of arguing that religious orders like the
Akhis represented a certain tradition of local government. It is diffıcult to
regard such claims as resting on careful study of the available documentation,
which reveal no evidence of any institutionalization nor hence of any
continuity in local government. It is not on craft guilds or religious orders
but on economic and financial autonomy that local government should be
based, and it should be capable of sustaining itself by incorporating local
residents as citizens into that institutional framework. But such processes
were very late in setting in under Ottoman administration

Keywords

• Ottoman Experiment
• Local Government
• First Constitutional Parliament