Görkem Akgöz, In the Shadow of War and Empire: Industrialisation, Nation-Building, and Working-Class Politics in Turkey. Leiden: Brill, 2023, 300 pages.
Year: 2024
Type: article
Abstract: The narrative of In the Shadow of War and Empire: Industrialisation, Nation-Building, and Working-Class Politics in Turkey by Görkem Akgöz begins with the emergence of an Ottoman imperial industrial complex, which came to be known as the "Turkish Manchester," in 1840s' İstanbul.Akgöz considers this ambitious imperial project and its downfall, not only as a crucial episode in the complex history of the Ottoman Empire's incorporation into the global capitalist system but also as a recurrent theme in the industrial discourse of the early Turkish Republican era.According to her, even though the Republican elite often dismissed or overlooked it as failure, the infrastructure, managerial experience, and labor practices inherited from this experiment significantly influenced the early Republic's industrial landscape and its trajectory in the following decades.Thus, she focuses her narrative on the Bakırköy Factory, a state-run textile factory originally established as part of this imperial industrial complex, while illustrating the broader story of industrialization in Turkey particularly during the 1930s and 1940s.Reflecting the author's multi-scale approach, the book is structured into two parts.In Part 1, Akgöz provides a macro-historical context, examining the discourses and strategies of state elites from the mid-nineteenth-century Empire through the Republican period.Chapter 1 traces the origins of Turkish state-led industrialization in the 1930s to the Empire's nineteenth-century economic peripheralization, exploring the Empire's efforts to modernize its manufacturing sector.This includes the establishment of the industrial complex, known as the "Turkish Manchester."The chapter also highlights the diverse ethnic composition of the Ottoman workforce, challenging the Republican-era reinterpretation of this history as of a monolithic entity composed solely of Turks.Chapter 2 analyzes the transition from an open economy in the 1920s to a mixed economy characterized by protectionism and etatism in the 1930s.It explores the international and domestic factors that influenced this policy shift, including elite conflicts, debates over industrialization frameworks, and attempts to establish a Turkish labor code.Chapter 3 addresses the spatial logic behind state-led industrialization, focusing on efforts to rectify uneven geographical development inherited from the Ottoman period.This chapter emphasizes the Turkish state's strategic expansion of the railway network and the selection of industrial sites, driven by post-imperial anxieties and a desire to create a unified nation-state.Akgöz challenges the notion of state industries as uniform, highlighting variations between old and new industrial centers, particularly in labor market dynamics, including gender aspects.
Source: New Perspectives on Turkey
DOI: 10.1017/npt.2024.18
Author: Müge Özbek
Institution: Kadir Has University
Language: English
Topic: Historical Turkish Studies
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: bronze
OpenAlex ID: W4403472589