Hostname: page-component-78c5997874-lj6df Total loading time: 0 Render date: 2024-11-10T05:50:22.209Z Has data issue: false hasContentIssue false
  • English
  • Français

The Rise of Arab Nationalism Reconsidered

Published online by Cambridge University Press:  23 April 2009

Mahmoud Haddad
Mahmoud Haddad
Affiliation:
Department of History, Columbia University, 611 Fayerweather Hall, New York, N.Y. 10027, U.S.A.
Get access Rights & Permissions [Opens in a new window]

Extract

The debate over the origins of early Arab nationalism in geographical Syria before World War I revolves around a twofold thesis presented two decades ago. Its first and most influential part advances a social explanation, maintaining that it was a traditional intra-Arab elite conflict: “those members of the Arab elite who had a vested interest in the Ottoman state were Ottomanists. Those who were without such a stake were Arabists.”

Type
Articles
Information
International Journal of Middle East Studies , Volume 26 , Issue 2 , May 1994 , pp. 201 - 222
Copyright
Copyright © Cambridge University Press 1994

Access options

Get access to the full version of this content by using one of the access options below. (Log in options will check for institutional or personal access. Content may require purchase if you do not have access.)

References

NOTES

Author's note: I thank Columbia University Council for Research in the Social Sciences for its support in making this study possible. Equal appreciation goes to Richard Bulliet, Abdul-Karim Rafiq, Kemal Karpat, Engin Akarli, Philip Khoury, Rashid Khalidi, and Gregory Gause III for their criticisms and suggestions. Any shortcomings are the sole responsibility of the author. An early version of this study was presented at the Fifth Biennial Conference, “Nationalisms on the Periphery of the Ottoman Empire,” organized by the Southwest Asian and North African Studies and Fernand Braudel Center, State University of New York at Binghamton, on 6–7 November 1992.

1 See Dawn, C. Ernest, “The Origins of Arab Nationalism,” and Rashid Khalidi, “Ottomanism and Arabism in Syria Before 1914: A Reassessment,” in The Origins of Arab Nationalism, ed. Khalidi, Rashid et al. (New York, 1991), 3–30, 50–69.Google Scholar

2 Dawn, Ernest, “The Rise of Arabism in Syria” in his From Ottomanism to Arabism: Essays on the Origins of Arab Nationalism (Urbana, 111, 1973), 173.Google Scholar

3 Ibid., 6.

4 Ibid., 19.

5 Hourani, Albert, “The Arab Awakening: Forty Years After,” The Emergence of The Modern Middle East (Berkeley, Calif., 1981), 205.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

6 Khalidi, Rashid, “Social Factors in the Rise of the Arab Movement in Syria” in From Nationalism to Revolutionary Islam, ed. Arjomand, Said (Albany, 1986), 54.Google Scholar

7 Ibid.

8 ʿAli, Muhammad Kūrd, al-Mudhakkirāt, 4 vols. (Damascus, 1948–1951), 3:719.Google Scholar

9 In “Two Concepts of Nationalism: An Interview with Isaiah Berlin,” The New York Review of Books, 21 11 1991, 19.Google Scholar

10 al-Khatīb, ʿAdnān, al-Shaykh Ṭāhir al-Jazāʾirī: Rāʾid al-nahḍal-ʿ ilmī yya fl bilād al-Shām (Cairo, 1971), 42.Google Scholar

11 Most recently, for example, Commins, David, Islamic Reform: Politics and Social Change in Late Ottoman Syria (New York, 1990), 89–103.Google Scholar

12 For a longer list of members, see Ibid., 92–96; al-Shihābi, Mustafā, al-Qawmiyya al-ʿ Arabiyya (Cairo, 1961), 53.Google Scholar For al-Shahbandar's likely membership in one of those societies, see Seikkaly, Samir, “ʿ Abdul-Raḥmān Shahbandar: The Beginnings of a Nationalist Career,” al-Abḥāth 34 (1986): 54.Google Scholar

13 Cachia, Pierre, An Overview of Modern Arabic Literature (Edinburgh, 1990), 31–32;Google ScholarSalibi, Kamal, The Modern History of Lebanon (Delmar, N.Y., 1977), 126–30, 154–55.Google Scholar

14 Dawn, , “Origins of Arab Nationalism,” 4.Google Scholar

15 Cachia, , An Overview, 32.Google Scholar

16 Haddad, Robert, Syrian Christians in Muslim Society: An Interpretation (Princeton, N.J., 1970), 83;Google Scholaral-Husri, Satiʿ, Muḥaḍaratfi nushuD al-fikra al-carabiyya (Beirut, 1985), 124–27.Google Scholar

17 Swanson, Glen W., “Enver Pasha: The Formative Years,” Middle Eastern Studies 16 (09 1980): 194.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

18 See the informative and unsigned article, “Taʾrikh al-idāra al-ʿuthmānīyya fī al-bilād al-ʿArabiyya,” al-Ahrām (Cairo), 26 04 1913, 1.Google Scholar

19 Gross, Max, “Ottoman Rule in the Province of Damascus 1860–1909” (Ph.D. diss., Georgetown University, 1979), 337.Google Scholar

20 Commins, , Islamic Reform, 95.Google Scholar

21 Hourani, , “Arab Awakening,” 203.Google Scholar

22 An Ottoman medical school was established in Damascus in 1903. See al-Ḥakīm, Yūsuf, Dhikrayāt al-Ḥakīm. Vol. 1, Sūriyā wa-al-ʿahd alʿuthmānī (Beirut, 1966), 59.Google Scholar

23 Mushtāq, Tālib, Awrāq ayyāmi, 1900–1958 (Beirut, 1968), 36;Google Scholar cited also in Simon, Reeva, Iraq between the Two World Wars: The Creation and Implementation of a Nationalist Ideology (New York, 1986), 9.Google Scholar

24 Abdulhamid gave preference to the graduates of the mülkiye and specified their eligibility to a list of offices in the central and provincial administrations; see Findley, Carter V., Bureaucratic Reform in the Ottoman Empire: The Sublime Porte, 1789–1922 (Princeton, N.J., 1980), 276.Google ScholarFor a breakdown of the highest positions attained by the students who graduated from the mülkiye from 1860 to 1909Google Scholar, see Kazamias, Andreas M., Education and the Quest for Modernity in Turkey (London, 1966), 90.Google Scholar

25 Szyliowicz, Joseph S., “Changes in the Recruitment Patterns and Career-Lines of Ottoman Provincial Administrations during the Nineteenth Century” in Studies on Palestine during the Ottoman Period, ed. Maʿoz, Moshe (Jerusalem, 1975), 261.Google Scholar

26 Ibid.

27 Findley, , Bureaucratic Reform, 167–68.Google Scholar

28 Al-Ḥakīm, , Dhikrayāt al-Ḥakīm, 1:57–58;Google ScholarTibawi, A. L., A Modern History of Syria Including Lebanon and Palestine (London, 1969), 183.Google Scholar

29 Farhi, David, “The Ṣeriat as a Political Slogan—or the ‘Incident of 31st Mart,’” Middle Eastern Studies 7 (09 1971): 281.Google Scholar It should be mentioned that the Albanians were more prominent than the Arabs in Abdulhamid H's palace guard. However, there was an intense rivalry between this section of the Ottoman army led by alāili officers and other sections led by mektebli officers. According to a British contemporary observer: “Amongst these troops [Yildiz palace guards] in the later years of Abdul's reign the Albanians held so favoured a position as to render plausible the statement made to me by an officer of the Genie, a corps corresponding to our Royal Engineers, that the army would like the chance of attacking the regiments around Yildiz and killing every man in them.” See Pears, Sir Edwin, Forty Years in Constantinople (London, 1915), 222.Google Scholar

30 Akarli, Engin, “Abdulhamid II's Attempt to Integrate the Arabs into the Ottoman System” in Palestine in the Late Ottoman Period: Political, Social and Economic Transformation, ed. Kushner, David (Jerusalem and Leiden, 1986), 75–89.Google Scholar

31 The Times (London), 3 11 1908, 5;Google ScholarIbid., 9 March 1909, 5; Ibid., 1 April 1909, 5.

32 Numerical and minor files of the Department of State 1906–10, Turkey 10044/179. Leisham, John, the American ambassador (Constantinople) to [Philander Chase Knox] secretary of state (Washington, D.C.), 15 April 1909Google Scholar.

33 Khadduri, Majid, “ʿAziz ʿA1ī Misrī and the Arab Nationalist Movement,” in St. Antony's Papers, no. 17, Middle Eastern Affairs, no. 4, ed. Hourani, Albert (Oxford, 1965), 147.Google Scholar

34 Cited, in Egyptian Gazette, 15 09 1907, 5.Google Scholar

35 Findley, , Bureaucratic Reform, 64.Google Scholar

36 Egyptian Gazette, 8 10 1908, 2.Google Scholar

37 Findley, , Bureaucratic Reform, 296–97.Google Scholar

38 Ibid., 297.

39 Ibid.

40 [Daghir, Asʿad], Thawrat al-ʿarab (Cairo, 1916), 52.Google Scholar

41 Findley, , Bureaucratic Reform, 238;Google ScholarShaw, Stanford and Shaw, Ezel Kural, History of the Ottoman Empire and Modern Turkey, 2 vols. (Cambridge, 1977), 2:275.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

42 Darwaza, Muhammad ʿIzzat, Nashʾat al-ḥaraka al-ʿarabiyya al-ḥaditha, 2nd ed. (Sidon, 1971), 301;Google Scholar[Daghir, ], Thawrat al-ʿarab, 52.Google Scholar

43 Karpat, Kemal, “The Memoirs of N. Batzaria: The Young Turks and Nationalism,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 6 (06 1975): 293.Google Scholar

44 Godechot, Jacques, The Taking of the Bastille (London, 1970), 51.Google Scholar

45 Al-Muqtabas (Damascus), 6 April 1911, 1Google Scholar. For a slightly different version of al-ʿAsalī's speech, see The Near East and the Anglo-Egyptian Mail (hereafter, Near East), 14 06 1911, 124.Google Scholar For a concise and insightful account of al-ʿAsalī's career, see Seikaly, , “Shukri al-ʿAsali: A Case Study of a Political Activist” in Origins of Arab Nationalism, 73–96.Google Scholar

46 Al-Muqtabas, 17 05 1911, 3.Google Scholar

47 Blake, Corinne, “Training Arab-Ottoman Bureaucrats: Syrian Graduates of the Mulkiye Mektebi 1890–1920” (Ph.D. diss., Princeton University, 1991), 194–95.Google Scholar

48 Ibid., 193.

49 Ibid., 194.

50 Darwaza, , Nashʾ;at al-ḥaraka al-ʿarabiyya, 301.Google Scholar

51 ʿIzzat Pasha al-ʿĀbid, the Damascene second secretary to Abdulhamid, was instrumental in appointing many of his proteges in the provincial civil and judicial administrations in both the provinces of Damascus and Beirut; see Gross, , “Ottoman Rule in the Province of Damascus,” 471–72.Google Scholar

52 Darwaza, , Nashʾat al-ḥaraka al-ʿarabiyya, 301.Google Scholar

53 Al-Muqtabas, 6 04 1911, 1.Google Scholar

54 Ibid.

55 Szyliowicz, , “Changes in the Recruitment,” 261.Google Scholar

56 Al-Muqtabas, 15 04 1911, 2–3.Google Scholar

57 Ibid., 17 April 1911,3.

58 Ibid., 6 April 1911, 1.

59 Ibid.

60 Ibid., 9 September 1911, 1–2.

61 Al-Mufīd (Beirut), 14 05 1911, 1.Google Scholar

62 Dawn, , “Origins of Arab Nationalism,” 19.Google Scholar

63 Saliba, Najib, “The Achievements of Midhat Pasha as Governor of the Province of Syria, 1878–1880,” International Journal of Middle East Studies 9 (08 1978): 314;Google ScholarKushner, David, “The Place of the Ulema in the Ottoman Empire during the Age of Reform (1839–1918),” Turcica 19 (1987): 60.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

64 Al-Ḥakīm, , Dhikrayāt al-ḥakīm, 1:126.Google Scholar

65 Ibid., 112; FO 195/2342/175–76, “General Report for the March Quarter [1910]”; Consul George Devey (Damascus) to Sir G. Lowther (Constantinople), 4 04 1910Google Scholar.

66 Al-Ḥakīm, , Dhikrayāt al-ḥakīm, 1:184–85.Google Scholar

67 FO 195/2342/94, “Permanent Members in the Courts of Damascus”; Consul Devey, George (Damascus) to Ambassador Sir G. Lowther (Constantinople), 23 02 1910Google Scholar.

68 Al-Huda (New York), 19 11 1910, 4.Google Scholar

69 FO 195/2342/175–76, “General Report for March Quarter [1910].” Because Consul Devey had reported earlier on 23 February 1910 in his dispatch about the “Permanent members in the courts of Damascus” that the central government had appointed sixteen new permanent members for the courts of Damascus, it is probable that the unaccounted for four members were non-Damascene SyriansGoogle Scholar.

70 Dawn, , “Origins of Arab Nationalism,” 20.Google Scholar

71 Al-Ahrām, 19 11 1909, 1.Google Scholar

72 FO 195/2342/94, “Permanent Members in the Courts of Damascus,”

73 Al-lqbāl (Beirut), 1 03 1909, 6.Google Scholar

74 Al-Muqtabas, 2 04 1910, 1–2.Google Scholar

75 Al-Ḥaqīqa (Beirut), 3 04 1913, 2.Google Scholar

76 Ergin, Osman, Türkiye Maarif Tarihi, 5 vols. (Istanbul, 1977), 3:1273.Google Scholar

77 See article 10 of the amended CUP program of 1909 in Tunaya, Tank Zafer, Türkiyeʾde Siyasal Partiler, 2 vols. (Istanbul, 1984), 1:82;Google Scholar see also, al-Shaʿb (Aleppo), 20 10 1909, 1.Google Scholar

78 In his “al-ʿArabīyya wa-al-turkīyya,” al-Muqtabas (monthly) 4 (1909): 109–12;Google Scholar see also, al-Mufīd (Beirut), 8 02 1911, 3;Google Scholaral-Muʾayyad (Cairo), 13 09 1910, 2.Google Scholar

79 Landau, Jacob, Pan-Turkism in Turkey: A Study of Irredentism (London, 1981), 47.Google Scholar

80 Duri, A. A., The Formation of the Arab Nation: A Study in Identity and Consciousness (London, 1987), 229–31.Google Scholar

81 No Turkish was taught in the schools run by the Greek Orthodox millet, for example, until 1895 when Turkish became a required subject of study, although not the language of instruction; see Kazamias, . Education and the Quest for Modernity, 95.Google Scholar

82 Kushner, David, The Rise of Turkish Nationalism 1876–1908 (London, 1977), 91.Google Scholar

83 Article 17 of the Program in Tunaya, Türkiyeʾde Siyasal, 67Google Scholar.

84 The Ministry of Education decreed in 1910 that all foreign teachers employed in either state or millet school should be replaced by Ottoman nationals; see al-Shaʿb, 10 08 1910, 2.Google Scholar

85 Ergin, , Türkiye Maarif, 3:1292.Google Scholar

86 Dawn, , “Origins of Arab Nationalism,” 20.Google Scholar

87 Ergin, , Türkiye Maarif, 3:1293.Google Scholar

88 Al-Hudā, 23 09 1910, 4–5.Google Scholar

89 Cited, in al-Muʾayyad, 13 09 1910, 2.Google Scholar

90 Le Temps (Paris) 5 10 1909, 1.Google Scholar

91 Seikaly, , “ʿAbdul Raḥmān Shahbandar,” 61.Google Scholar

92 Al-Muqtabas, 16 01 1910, 3.Google Scholar

93 Later on, the central government permitted the Ottoman graduates of foreign universities to retain their posts if they passed an examination proving their proficiency in Turkish; see Ibid., 7 July 1910, 3.

94 FO 371/1002/28562. Consul Devey, George (Damascus) to Ambassador Sir G. Lowther (Constantinople), 4 04 1910Google Scholar; cited also in Khoury, Philip, Urban Notables and Arab Nationalism: The Politics of Damascus 1860–1920 (London, 1983), 122, n. 18.CrossRefGoogle Scholar

95 Lisān al-Ḥāl (Beirut), 1 09 1910, 3.Google Scholar

96 Ibid., 17 October 1910, 2.

97 FO 371/1491/4965, “Turkey: Annual Report, 1911”; Ambassador Lowther, Sir G. (Constantinople) to Grey, Sir Edward (London), received 5 02 1911.Google Scholar

98 Al-Ahrām, 19 01 1912, 1.Google Scholar

99 The Times (London), 24 03 1911, 5.Google Scholar On the point of a conflict between Arab and Turkish members of the CUP's Beirut branch, see also Khalidi, Rashid, British Policy towards Syria and Palestine 1906–1914 (London, 1980), 228–29.Google Scholar

100 Records of the United States Department of State relating to the Internal Affairs of Turkey 1910–1929, 867.00/349Google Scholar. W. Stanley Hollins, American consul-general (Beirut) to [P. C. Knox] secretary of state (Washington, D.C.); it should be mentioned, however, that Hollins's explanation for the central government's behavior stemmed from what he perceived as its concern for maintaining public law and order. I do not believe that the above explanation for Istanbul's motives is credible for a number of reasons, the most important of which is that the Syrians were being ousted at that point not only from the local administration but also from the central administration.

101 Al-Muqaṭṭam (Cairo), 14 12 1912, 1.Google Scholar

102 Ibid.

103 Al-Ahrām, 15 02 1913, 1.Google Scholar

104 Birru, Tawfīq, al-ʿArab wa al-turk ft al-ʿahd al-dustūrī al-ʿuthmānī 1908–1914 (Cairo, 1960), 534–35.Google Scholar

105 Records of the United States Department of State relating to the Internal Affaīrs of Turkey 1910–1929, 867.00/578Google Scholar. W. Stanley Hollins, consul-general (Beirut) to [William J. Bryan] secretary of state Washington, D.C.).

106 FO 195/2451/423; SirLowther, Gerard (Constantinople) to Grey, Sir Edward (London), 25 09 1913.Google Scholar

107 Mirʾāt al-Gharb (New York), 12 11 1913, 4.Google Scholar

108 Al-Mufīd, 6 04 1911, 3.Google Scholar In 1910 Sulayman al-Bustani mentioned that, according to his calculations, only 7 percent of the officials in the province of Beirut were Turks; see Lisān al-Ḥāl, 17 10 1910, 2.Google Scholar

109 Landau, , Pan-Turkism in Turkey, 30.Google Scholar

110 On one of these pre-1908 polemics, see Vambéry, Arminius, Western Culture in Eastern Lands: A Comparison of the Methods Adopted by England and Russia in the Middle East (New York, 1906), 275.Google Scholar

111 al-Khaṭīb, Muḥibb al-Dīn, “Introduction” in al-Duktūr Ṣalāḥ al-Dīn al-Qāsimi 1305–1334 [1886–1916]: Āthāruhu, ed. al-Khaṭīb, Muḥibb al-Dīn (Cairo, 1959), iv;Google ScholarDarwaza, , Nastʾat al-ḥaraka alʿarabiyya, 303.Google Scholar

112 Qadrī, Ahmad, Mudhakkirātī ʿan al-thawra al-ʿarabīyya al-kubrā (Damascus, 1956), 6–7.Google Scholar That many of the Arab societies formed in Istanbul during the Young Turk era was a reaction to the Young Turk society or the CUP is confirmed by al-Shihabī, , al-Qawmiyya al-ʿarabiyya, 67–68.Google Scholar

113 Blake, , “Training Arab-Ottoman Bureaucrats,” 265–67.Google Scholar

114 al-Suwaydī, Tawfīq, Mudhakkirātī: Niṣf qam min tārīkh al-ʿirāq wa al-qadīyya al-ʿarabiyya (Beirut, 1969), 24.Google Scholar

115 Qadrī, , Mudhakkirātī, 11.Google Scholar

116 Al-Duktūr Ṣalāḥ al-Din al-Qāsimī, 72–73.Google Scholar For the names of some Turkish professors who were members of the Turkish Association (Türk Derneği) in those educational institutions in Istanbul, see Arai, Masami, Turkish Nationalism in the Young Turk Era (Leiden, 1991), 9, Table 1.Google Scholar

117 Al-Qāsimī, published these ideas on 8 02 1909, in the Damascene newspaper al-Muqtabas; cited in al-Duktūr Ṣalāḥ, 72–75.Google Scholar

118 Ibid., 74–75.

119 Al-Khatīb, , ”Min mudhakkirāt Muḥibb al-Dīn al-Khaṭīb,” Majallat al-Awqāf al-Islāmiyya (Damascus) 1 (1945–1946): 19.Google Scholar

120 Ibid.

121 [Daghir, ], Thawrat al-ʿarab, 52.Google Scholar On the attitude of the CUP Turkish members toward the Arab members before 1908, see Hanioğlu, M. Şükrü, “The Young Turks and the Arabs before the Revolution of 1908” in Origins of Arab Nationalism, 31–49.Google Scholar

122 Al-Khaṭīb, , Introduction, al-Duktūr Ṣalāḥ, iv;Google ScholarDarwaza, , Nastʾat al-ḥaraka al-ʿarabiyya, 302.Google Scholar

123 Landau, , Pan-Turkism in Turkey, 45–47.Google Scholar

124 Dawn, , “The Rise and Progress of Middle Eastern Nationalism,” Social Education, 01 1961, 22.Google Scholar

125 Al-Khatīb, , Introduction, al-Duktūr Ṣalāḥ, iv;Google Scholaral-Qāsimī, , al-Duktūr, 92.Google Scholar

126 An association called Türk talebe yurdu (homeland of the Turkish students) was the name of a separate organization of Turkish students abroad, mainly in Switzerland, France, and Germany; see Landau, , Pan-Turkism in Turkey, 39.Google Scholar

127 Al-Suwaydī, , Mudhakkirātī, 21.Google Scholar

128 Al-Muqtabas, 17 05 1911, 3.Google Scholar

129 Dawn, , ”Origins of Arab Nationalism,” 13;Google ScholarKhalidi, , “Social Factors,” 56–57.Google Scholar

130 Saʿīd, Amīn, al-thawra al-ʿarabīyya, 1:13.Google Scholar

131 Al-Manār (Cairo), 17 (25 04 1914), 395.Google Scholar

132 Khadduri, Majid, ”ʿAziz ʿA1I al-Masrī,” 149;Google Scholaral-Saʿid, Nūrī, Mudhakkirāt Nūrī al-Saʿ īdʿan alharakat al-askariyya lil-jaysh alʿarabīā fi al-hijāz wa suriyā 1916–1918, 2nd ed. (Beirut, 1978), 20.Google Scholar

133 Shūkri, ʿAlī Aḥmad, trans., Mudhakkirāt Jamāl Pasha (Cairo, 1923), 90.Google Scholar

134 Qadri, , Mudhakkirāti, 14;Google Scholar for al-ʿAhd program and the debate about it, see Birru, , al-ʿArab wa al- Turk, 557–61.Google Scholar

135 Al-Ahrām, 16 12 1912, 1.Google Scholar

136 [Daghir, ], Thawrat al-ʿarab, 57;Google ScholarSaʿīd, , al-Thawra al-ʿarabīyya, 1:13.Google Scholar

137 Saʿid, , al-Thawra al-ʿarabīyya, 1:13–14.Google Scholar

136 Records of the United States Department of State relating to the Internal Affairs of Turkey 1910–1929, 867.00/438. Hollins, W. Stanley, consul-general (Beirut) to [P. C. Knox] secretary of state (Washington, D.C.)Google Scholar.

139 Ministère des Affaires Èitrangères (Quai d'Orsay, Paris), Turquie, N. S.. Syrie-Liban, No. 118 Decembre [1912], Direction Politique et Commerciale D44/1, 129.Google ScholarOttavi, M., French consul (Damas) to Raymond Poincaré, minister of foreign affairs (Paris), 24 12 1912Google Scholar.

140 Al-Muʾayyad, 24 12 1912, 4.Google Scholar

141 Al-Duktūr Ṣalāḥ, 57.Google Scholar

142 Al-Muʾayyad, 24 12 1912, 1.Google Scholar

143 Georgeon, François, “La montée du nationalisme turc dans L'Ètat ottoman (1908–1914),” Revue du monde musulman et de la Méditerranée 50 (1988): 39.Google Scholar

144 Al-Mufīd, 14 05 1911, 1.Google Scholar

145 I[lber] Ortayli, , “Ideological Structure of Syria and Lebanon in the 19th Century and Ottoman Counter-Measures,” Revue d'histoire maghrebine 12 (06 1985): 151.Google Scholar

146 Al-Muʾayyad, 3 05 1913, 4.Google Scholar