In the Shadow of War and Empire offers a site-specific history of Ottoman and Turkish industrialisation through the lens of a mid-nineteenth-century cotton factory in the “Turkish Manchester,” the name chosen by the Ottomans for the industrial complex they built in the 1840s in Istanbul, which, in the contemporary words of one of the country’s most prominent contemporary Marxist theorists, became “the secret to and the basis of Turkish capitalism" in the 1930s.
Görkem Akgöz, Ph.D. (2012), University of Amsterdam, is a post-doc researcher at re:work (IGK Work and Human Life Cycle in Global History), Humboldt University. She has published extensively on the history of labour and political economy, and on women and gender history.
"Görkem Akgöz has written an important and original book. Not only is the subject new, so is the methodology used. She explores new paths and she does so convincingly. In the Shadow of War and Empire is undoubtedly a landmark in the social historiography of the Global South." – Professor Marcel van der Linden, Institute of Social History, Amsterdam
"Görkem Akgöz has produced a study that will be of interest far beyond the ranks of historians of Turkey – those interested in labour, gender, state formation, citizenship, and ideology will find much of value here. Deeply researched, beautifully written, and insightful at virtually every turn, this is a book destined to become a classic." – Professor Rick Halpern, University of Toronto
"Görkem Akgöz takes Turkish and global labour history an important step further by successfully connecting a macro perspective of the long-term history of state building and industrialization to an inclusive microhistory of all the workers involved. Truly a tour de force." – Aad Blok, Executive Editor of the International Review of Social History
"Akgöz’s work offers a comprehensive critique of studies on both the Ottoman Empire and the Republican period. In this respect, the author takes a different approach to the industrialisation adventure of the Ottoman period, revealing the efforts and consciousness of the Ottoman administration and bureaucratic staff. In terms of the Republican period, Akgöz approaches industrialisation efforts more deeply, contrary to general enthusiasm. (...) Readers will also gain a new methodological perspective on the use of different sources to understand organisational dynamics." – Enes Kurt, Independent Scholar; in: Business History
Undergraduate and post-graduate students and scholars in the fields of labor and social history, women and gender history, political history, political economy and Middle East studies.