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The Politics of Punishment, Urbanization, and Izmir Prison in the Late Ottoman Empire

Adak, Ufuk
http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1439309163

Abstract Details

2015, PhD, University of Cincinnati, Arts and Sciences: History.
This dissertation examines the politics of punishment and application of Ottoman prison reform in the three major port cities, Izmir, which receives the greatest attention, Istanbul, and Salonica in the late Ottoman Empire. This work explores Ottoman prisons on a daily scale and in a larger imperial frame by re-thinking the idea of social control and surveillance in the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, including the ways in which the Ottoman government dealt with the prisons as `modern’ and `European’ legal institutions. By using primary sources drawn from Ottoman archives, and relying heavily on Ottoman and British newspapers and journals, this dissertation examines Ottoman prison reform from various angles such as sustenance of prisoners, health and hygiene; the usage of cannabis (esrar) in Ottoman prisons; prison work; prison architecture; and urbanization. Until the first half of the nineteenth century, the Ottoman Empire was using various buildings as prisons, including old fortresses, such as Baba Cafer Zindani and Yedikule in Istanbul; military barracks; shipyards, such as Tersane Zindani (Bagnio); khans, such as Cezayir Hani in Izmir; and local notables’ (ayan) palace dungeons. The bureaucratization and centralization attempts of the Tanzimat reformers and, more importantly, the promulgation of the criminal codes of 1851 and 1858 not only paved the way for the shift from corporal and capital punishment to imprisonment but also allowed for the establishment of a new set of definitions in terms of crime and punishment. However, the establishment a modern prison remained merely an ideal until 1871 when the first general prison (hapishane-i umumi) was built in Istanbul. The construction of purposefully built prisons continued in the major cities of the Empire, including Izmir and Salonica, in the second half of the nineteenth century. Izmir as one of the major port cities of the Empire saw immense and fluctuating flows of people due to wars, migration, and territorial losses of the Empire, and was faced with increased crime rates during this late Ottoman period. Nineteenth-century Izmir also saw the restructuring of its urban and governmental space with new military barracks, hospital, governor’s palace, prison, reformatory, and school that all symbolized the presence of the `centralized’ government. The uniformity of state architecture provided visual and physical representations of progress and modernity through which the Ottoman imperial government strove to `enlighten’, `modernize’, and homogenize cities and their provincial hinterlands. The public sphere of Izmir was foundationally shaped in the period from 1825-1901. Izmir Prison, constructed in 1873, remained until the disintegration of the public space in Izmir in 1959. From its construction to destruction, Izmir Prison as a central part of the new Ottoman public space presented to the people living in the city not only the dichotomic image of a threatening (punitive) and reassuring (order) space, but also symbolized an apparatus of power in terms of the legitimatization of social control, even at the increasingly well-known cost of inhumane treatment of prisoners.
Elizabeth Frierson, Ph.D. (Committee Chair)
Kent F. Schull, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Evangelos Kechriotis, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Raja Adal, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
Robert Haug, Ph.D. (Committee Member)
284 p.
Middle Eastern History
Ottoman Empire; Prison; Criminal Law; Smyrna; Izmir; Istanbul

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Citations

  • Adak, U. (2015). The Politics of Punishment, Urbanization, and Izmir Prison in the Late Ottoman Empire [Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati]. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1439309163

    APA Style (7th edition)

  • Adak, Ufuk. The Politics of Punishment, Urbanization, and Izmir Prison in the Late Ottoman Empire. 2015. University of Cincinnati, Doctoral dissertation. OhioLINK Electronic Theses and Dissertations Center, http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1439309163.

    MLA Style (8th edition)

  • Adak, Ufuk. "The Politics of Punishment, Urbanization, and Izmir Prison in the Late Ottoman Empire." Doctoral dissertation, University of Cincinnati, 2015. http://rave.ohiolink.edu/etdc/view?acc_num=ucin1439309163

    Chicago Manual of Style (17th edition)

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This open access ETD is published by University of Cincinnati and OhioLINK.