The visibility of Late-Ottoman rulers :|the ideological transition of urban representation in Southern Arab provinces

Abstract

This study questions how the power shift in the Late Ottoman Period effected the representation of rulership in the cityscape, via architectural, urban and infrastructural interventions in the Southern Arab Provinces, namely Palestine and Syria in the case of this study. The main focus will be the modernization processes of the Ottoman state observed in late nineteenth and early twentieth-century urban developments. These developments were aimed to improve the Ottoman State’s connection with the periphery. This focus will be expanded in this study via the examination of the differences between the approaches of the Hamidian era and that of the Committee of Union and Progress. The methodology of spatial interventions structured on the representation of hegemony and the revanchism between shifting powers will be also inspected. It is crucial to mention before and after conditions and status of the provinces, in order to reflect on the progressive urban politics during the turn of the century. Possible alterations will be questioned via significant structural examples such as clock towers, monuments which implied celebrations and major infrastructural projects of the time. A methodological examination will be applied on how those examples were treated by the former and challenged by the latter powers that occupied the Ottoman rulership and the Ottoman urban space. The questions through the study will be instrumentalized in order to enlighten how the power shift affected the centralization politics and how it shaped southern provinces of the Ottoman Empire in late nineteenth and early twentieth century.