A Study of the Ottoman Practice of Müsadere, 1700S-1839

The London School of Economics and Political Science Confiscation by the Ruler: A Study of the Ottoman Practice of Müsadere, 1700s-1839 Yasin Arslantaş A thesis submitted to the Department of Economic History of the London School of Economics and Political Science, London, September 2017 1 Declaration I certify that the thesis I have presented for examination for the MPhil/PhD degree of the London School of Economics and Political Science is solely my own work other than where I have clearly indicated that it is the work of others (in which case the extent of any work car- ried out jointly by me and any other person is clearly identified in it). The copyright of this thesis rests with the author. Quotation from it is permitted, provided that full acknowledgement is made. This thesis may not be reproduced without my prior written consent. I warrant that this authorisation does not, to the best of my belief, infringe the rights of any third party. I declare that my thesis consists of 74,452 words. Statement of use of third party for editorial help I can confirm that my thesis was copy edited for conventions of language, spelling and grammar by Maxine Montaigne and Jared Kent Newman. 2 To Hilal and Erdem with love 3 ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS Writing this thesis has been the most challenging task of my life. I want to thank all the below mentioned people who made it easier. My primary supervisor, Tirthankar Roy kindly agreed to take me as his student at the halfway mark and brought extra-Ottoman perspective to my attention ever since. My secondary supervisor, Ali Coşkun Tunçer has played a crucial role over the course of four years by giving me constant support whenever I needed his help. I thank all my friends in the department of economic history at the LSE, especially but not exclusively Thilo Albers, Mattia Bertazzini, Enrique Jorge-Sotelo, Kazuo Kobayashi, Leonard Kukic, Maxine Montaigne, Sumiyo Nishi- zaki, Andrea Papadia, Esther Sahle, Greta Seibel, Gerardo Serra and Franz Zobl. Joan Roses and Eric Schneider of the LSE gave me quite useful feedback. I made a good friend, Daniel Gallardo Albarran during his visit to the LSE. Long chats with Selçuk Aydın have always been eye-opening. Back in Turkey, Bilgin Bari and Sevilay Küçüksakarya Atlama were kind and helpful during the early stage of my doctoral studies. Without Uğur Aytun’s friendship, I would not even be able to come to the UK. My dear cousins Fırat and Serhat Oğuz opened their houses to me during my archival visit in Istanbul. I am grateful to many institutions too. First and foremost, the Turkish Council of Higher Education and Anadolu University funded my doctoral studies at the LSE. The staffs of the Prime Ministry Otto- man Archives in Istanbul and the archives of Directorate General of Foundations in Ankara have been very helpful during my archival vis- its. I have also received funding for conference attendance and archival research from the LSE and the Economic History Society. I have bene- fited much from working at the libraries of London among which are SOAS library, Institute of Historical Research Library and Senate House Library. Finally, we thank the founders and staff of Nansen Vil- lage who created such a lovely and affordable place to live, and our fellow Nanseners who shared the last four years of our lives. 4 I know that my education life was unusually long for my family. I would not have written these words without the importance my father attributed to our education. His tiny home library full of encyclopae- dias, absent from many houses in his extended family, was where I developed an interest in history and geography, which I consider my first step to social sciences. To express my gratitude to my mother, I cannot say anything more than what Azeri poet Vahapzade wrote: ‘Through this language I have created/My every poem/My every tune/No, I am nothing/I am a lie/It is my mother who is the writer/Of my words book by book.’ My sisters, Derya and Hülya always stood together with me through this difficult path. Finally, it is my wife, Hilal, who endured all the hardships of my studies and she was the one who made the biggest sacrifice by leaving her job back in Turkey. If we are seeing this day, it is a joint work of both of us. And, towards the end of our journey, our son Erdem was born. If you are reading this from sometime in future, I hope that you will find it good enough to forgive me for stealing from the time I should have spent with you. This thesis is dedicated to my wife and son with love. 5 ABSTRACT This thesis examines the practice of confiscation in the Ottoman Empire during the long-eighteenth century. It investigates what ena- bled, guided and motivated the sovereign to confiscate the property of elites, and how and to what extent this occurred. The contribution of this thesis is twofold. First, it provides the first systematic analysis of the practice of confiscation in the Ottoman Empire, highlighting the basis of selectivity in its application. Second, it contributes to a broader line of literature by analysing the drivers, informal constraints and per- sistence of historical state predation. One of the strengths of the thesis is its combination of theory and a rich variety of archival evidence, us- ing both qualitative and quantitative techniques. The thesis finds that müsadere was a selective institution targeting mainly office-holders and private tax contractors. However, some were less likely to face or more capable of avoiding confiscation than others mainly due to factors related to time and location of confiscation, the bargaining position of the wealth-holder and the attributes of their wealth. Although confiscation was costly and time-consuming to enforce, the sultans were continuously interested in it because of its political and redistributive functions such as monitoring the behaviour of their agents and pro- tecting their share in the fiscal revenue from fiscal intermediaries. They had power to do so primarily because of many disincentives of collec- tive action among the targets of confiscation. Through the study of this practice, this thesis shows how an early modern monarch, who was not formally constrained, could and did confiscate the elite property in a time of crisis. 6 TABLE OF CONTENTS LIST OF TABLES ............................................................................ 10 LIST OF FIGURES .......................................................................... 12 LIST OF MAPS ................................................................................ 14 NOTES TO THE READER ................................................................ 15 1 LITERATURE REVIEW AND INTRODUCTION TO THE STUDY ... 17 1.1 Historical Background ........................................................ 20 1.1.1 The Origins of the Practice of Müsadere ....................... 20 1.1.2 Fiscal and Political Transformation in the Eighteenth- Century Ottoman Empire ......................................................... 27 1.1.3 An Era of Crisis and Reform in the Ottoman Empire, 1750- 1839 33 1.2 Literature Review ............................................................... 39 1.2.1 The State and Confiscation in Economic History .......... 39 1.2.2 Historiography of Ottoman Political Economy and Müsadere ................................................................................. 53 1.3 Research Questions, Methods and Chapter Outline ............ 63 1.4 Sources .............................................................................. 67 1.5 Conclusion ......................................................................... 68 PART I: CHANCE OR DESIGN: A QUANTITATIVE ANALYSIS OF PATTERNS AND DRIVING FORCES OF MÜSADERE ....................... 69 2 SOURCES OF DATA AND PATTERNS OF MÜSADERE, 1750-1839 70 2.1 Muhallefat Records and Data Construction ........................ 72 2.1.1 Scope and General Limitations ..................................... 72 2.1.2 Data Construction: Study-specific Limitations and Representativeness ................................................................... 75 7 2.2 Time ................................................................................... 81 2.3 Space ................................................................................. 88 2.4 Justification and Identity ................................................... 93 2.5 Conclusion ....................................................................... 108 3 DRIVERS AND CONSTRAINTS OF MÜSADERE ....................... 110 3.1 Theoretical Considerations ............................................... 111 3.2 Empirical Strategy ............................................................ 119 3.3 Results ............................................................................. 128 3.3.1 First-Step Estimates .................................................. 129 3.3.2 Second-Step Estimates .............................................. 134 3.3.3 An Alternative Test of Expected Costs Hypothesis ....... 140 3.4 Conclusion and Broader Implications ............................... 142 PART II: ACTORS OF MÜSADERE AND THEIR INTERACTIONS ..... 145 4 ENFORCEMENT OF MÜSADERE ............................................ 146 4.1 The Process of Enforcement of Müsadere .......................... 148 4.1.1 A General Narrative .................................................... 148 4.1.2 The Case of Fethullah Ağa, the Notable of Antakya, and his Family .............................................................................

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