Alex
09-23-2010, 08:29 AM
It seems to me that the chief difference between the development of Western Europe and Middle East/North Africa between 1500 and 1900 was that Western Europe developed a concept of nation-state, while Middle East/North Africa remained with older concepts of dynastic states and empires. Much of that can be put on the shoulders of the dominant power of the Muslim world of the time - the Ottoman Empire, which took over lands home to a multitude of ethnic and religious groups united only through the infrastructure enforced from above by the Osmanli dynasty.
I would argue that a single, massive empire is perhaps more prone to long-term stagnation, if only because much of strife within such an empire is internal. A traditional nation-state may define itself in opposition to other nation-states, creating a unique national identity that creates more stability, and, perhaps, more of an incentive for the government to actively develop the entire state, as opposed to only developing lands and territories of the core group. It is worth noting that Russia, another imperial power of the time, tended to put most of its efforts into developing Russian heartland while ignoring largely non-ethnic-Russian provinces or using them for resources.
Additionally, while a nation-state may have an empire of its own (i.e. Spanish, Dutch, British, etc colonial empires), a nation state tends to be more compact, and, when combined with greater population densities in Western Europe, competition between nation-states invites developments in commerce, economics, manufacturing, engineering, and military fields. An empire, on the other hand, may only have some territories that are competitive (usually the empire's heartland, most frequently dominated by the empire's dominant/privileged group - European Russia for Russians, Turkic Anatolia for Ottomans, European nation-state for Britain, France, Germany, Spain, etc). While European colonial empires were generally far-flung and not directly connected to the "heartland", a more traditional empire is different in that respect, because the rest of its territory is directly connected to its core lands, which means the empire's main forces are often forced to protect outlying borders, communication can be more difficult, and a degree of decentralization becomes almost necessary in order to run it. That can be a dangerous proposition when the empire is faced with sufficiently significant unrest or enemy incursions, leading the empire's leadership to keep the provinces underdeveloped (so that challengers to the Imperial leadership cannot arise, and so that no contender to the throne could use dissent to forment a power base).
This brings up the point I wanted to address. With the Ottoman overlordship of Muslim Middle East and North Africa, the Ottomans exhibited every symptom of the empire, resulting in relative underdevelopment of most provinces (and the developed provinces were generally developed with the purpose of becoming cash cows, like Egypt). Plundering the provinces made the heartland (Anatolia/Turkey in this case) wealthier, but it also retarded its development in terms of self-sufficiency - why develop for self-sufficiency when you get everything you need from the provinces? And upon the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, much of the Middle East and North Africa found themselves decades, if not centuries behind neighboring European states in development.
Now, let's presume the Ottoman dynasty is stillborn. It does not mean that there is no Turkic state in Anatolia and possibly the Balkans - only that this state is not as powerful as in OTL, and has only limited territory. Perhaps this state, in itself, is ethnic-based as opposed to dynasty-based, and as a result is much more compact.
Without the larger Ottoman Empire, how do you think political situation in Muslim world* looks? Do you think the Muslim states may have potential for greater social and industrial development without the Ottoman overlordship? Will there be more of a nation-state building as the main differentiation factor between different dynastic groups? What do you think the effects on Europe will be?
* Note that I am deliberately ignoring Muslim states outside of Europe/Middle East. I am specifically interested in potential development of territories that were part of the Ottoman Empire without the Ottoman behemoth in the picture.
EDIT: I'd be interested to hear Abdul's and Hash's opinions on this, and on the role of Ottomans in the overall technological, social, and economic development of the Middle East.
I would argue that a single, massive empire is perhaps more prone to long-term stagnation, if only because much of strife within such an empire is internal. A traditional nation-state may define itself in opposition to other nation-states, creating a unique national identity that creates more stability, and, perhaps, more of an incentive for the government to actively develop the entire state, as opposed to only developing lands and territories of the core group. It is worth noting that Russia, another imperial power of the time, tended to put most of its efforts into developing Russian heartland while ignoring largely non-ethnic-Russian provinces or using them for resources.
Additionally, while a nation-state may have an empire of its own (i.e. Spanish, Dutch, British, etc colonial empires), a nation state tends to be more compact, and, when combined with greater population densities in Western Europe, competition between nation-states invites developments in commerce, economics, manufacturing, engineering, and military fields. An empire, on the other hand, may only have some territories that are competitive (usually the empire's heartland, most frequently dominated by the empire's dominant/privileged group - European Russia for Russians, Turkic Anatolia for Ottomans, European nation-state for Britain, France, Germany, Spain, etc). While European colonial empires were generally far-flung and not directly connected to the "heartland", a more traditional empire is different in that respect, because the rest of its territory is directly connected to its core lands, which means the empire's main forces are often forced to protect outlying borders, communication can be more difficult, and a degree of decentralization becomes almost necessary in order to run it. That can be a dangerous proposition when the empire is faced with sufficiently significant unrest or enemy incursions, leading the empire's leadership to keep the provinces underdeveloped (so that challengers to the Imperial leadership cannot arise, and so that no contender to the throne could use dissent to forment a power base).
This brings up the point I wanted to address. With the Ottoman overlordship of Muslim Middle East and North Africa, the Ottomans exhibited every symptom of the empire, resulting in relative underdevelopment of most provinces (and the developed provinces were generally developed with the purpose of becoming cash cows, like Egypt). Plundering the provinces made the heartland (Anatolia/Turkey in this case) wealthier, but it also retarded its development in terms of self-sufficiency - why develop for self-sufficiency when you get everything you need from the provinces? And upon the dissolution of the Ottoman Empire, much of the Middle East and North Africa found themselves decades, if not centuries behind neighboring European states in development.
Now, let's presume the Ottoman dynasty is stillborn. It does not mean that there is no Turkic state in Anatolia and possibly the Balkans - only that this state is not as powerful as in OTL, and has only limited territory. Perhaps this state, in itself, is ethnic-based as opposed to dynasty-based, and as a result is much more compact.
Without the larger Ottoman Empire, how do you think political situation in Muslim world* looks? Do you think the Muslim states may have potential for greater social and industrial development without the Ottoman overlordship? Will there be more of a nation-state building as the main differentiation factor between different dynastic groups? What do you think the effects on Europe will be?
* Note that I am deliberately ignoring Muslim states outside of Europe/Middle East. I am specifically interested in potential development of territories that were part of the Ottoman Empire without the Ottoman behemoth in the picture.
EDIT: I'd be interested to hear Abdul's and Hash's opinions on this, and on the role of Ottomans in the overall technological, social, and economic development of the Middle East.