This thesis analyses the position of the Ottoman Empire and the Italian penin- sula and their position in the international scenario during the 19th century. This work studies the developments in the Ottoman Empire and the Italian peninsula from the beginning of the Tanzimat (in the Ottoman Empire) and the Risorgimento (in the Italian peninsula), until the Crimean War, and eval- uates the consequences of these events for the European balance of power. These developments took place at a time when Europe was divided be- tween conservative and liberal states, the formers being represented by Russia and the Habsburg Empire, the latters by Great Britain and France. This the- sis, while focusing on the role played by these great Powers in influencing the Ottoman Empire and the Italian peninsula during the first half of the 19th century, also considers the international developments that followed the out- break of the Crimean War. The Crimean War in fact saw the Ottoman Empire and the Kingdom of Sardinia allying themselves with the liberal forces, a choice consistent with the political path these two states were following in their internal reforms, which they were undertaking to allow them to meet the challenges of evolving times.

This thesis aims to examine the development of inter-communal fighting in Cyprus between 1948 and 1974. It focuses on the domestic factors of inter-communal fighting by analyzing the gradual evolution of Greek and Turkish Cypriot stances. The thesis argues that the inter-communal fighting of Cyprus is rooted in the historical and domestic factors. This thesis analyzes the continuities and changes in Cyprus politics. This work accordingly will examine the articulation of various political and social factors in Cyprus. Contrary to the prevailing dominant perspective, this thesis mentions that the inter-communal fighting was not the product of only external forces but their articulation with domestic factors as they evolved historically. Therefore, the issue of &bdquo / &bdquo / ethnic polarization

This study has three main objectives. First, it provides a theoretical framework that challenges the mainstream approaches to allow for a new reading of the Cyprus Question. Second, it identifies continuities, transformations and tendencies within different historical periods by analyzing the positions of the various actors and the international conjecture in order to offer a correct reading of all previous settlement proposals and indicate the basis on which perceptions and policies were constructed and why the latter failed repeatedly to resolve the Cyprus issue. Continuities are those factors that created the continuum of the crisis and were concretely reflected in the successive failures of different peace talks, plans and initiatives / examining these means analyzing the hegemonic projects of the various actors involved. Examining transformations means looking specifically at how and why these hegemonic projects changed. Examining tendencies means pointing out the latest developments such as accumulated sovereignty, shared sovereignty as protectorate, Taiwan Model, return to 1960, integration through class strategy and independent TRNC and exploring the logical consequences of developments. Third, this study focuses on the European Union&rsquo / s hegemonic projects related to Cyprus &ndash / how they emerged, the relationship between these projects and the domestic and international political conjectures, their aspects of continuity and reasons for transformation and their successes and failures. This thesis argues that all the previous plans and initiatives by international and local actors, latest being the EU-initiated Annan Plan, led not only to failure, but transformed the Cyprus Question from one paradigm to another.

In this study the Ottoman built environmet in the last period of the nineteenth century Anatolian city is examined. The study aims to explain the construction of new buildings as well as the transformation of earlier types during the process of contemporary modernization and centralization in the Empire. The main frame of the study is formed of the public and the private spaces that formed the urban built environment, and the transformation of these spaces. The city of Tokat has been chosen as the area of study, which still conserves built structures of the Ottoman as well as the earlier periods that are typical of an Anatolian city of the nineteenth century. Examining the transformation of public buildings and residential architecture in this city, this study emphasizes differences in degress of changes in public and private spaces, and the relation of such transformation with the central authority.

In this thesis the press laws of 1909 and 1931 are analyzed and compared. Before the comparative examination of the press laws, the emergence and development of press in the Ottoman Empire in the nineteenth century, including the related legal arrangements, is given within an historical framework. This thesis aims to introduce the similarities and differences between the first and only press law of the Ottoman Empire and the first one of the Turkish Republic by examining them in detail. It is argued that the press laws of 1909 and 1931 were prepared to be able to remove the legal deficiencies in press area. However, it is also claimed that the Ottoman and Turkish governments, which prepared the related press laws, was trying to control and suppress the press sine they were anxious about the safety of their regimes. Although both laws included articles that limited the press freedom, this study argues that the press law of 1909 had more liberal aspects in comparison with the Abdulhamid period and, the press law of 1931 gave extensive rights to the government to be able to control the press as a result of restrictions it imposed on the freedom of press which existed at that time.

In this study, it is aimed to analyze the learned (ilmiye) group that was important part of the military class of the Ottoman Empire and the ilmiye group had three important members. They were judges (kadis), professors (m&uuml / derrises) and muftis (m&uuml / ft&uuml / s) and they were analyzed from the beginning to the end of the career line as a dynamic process. Due to the vast nature of the subject, one needed to delimit the research in terms of time and space. In that regard, it was chosen the 18th century and the districts belonging to the Anatolian kaz&acirc / skerlik (chief justice). Due also to the impossibility to cover the whole Ottoman eras of six hundred years, the eighteenth century was chosen, the period following the classical period and preceding the era of modernization. This was because the 18th century was the era when the classical institutions of the Ottoman Empire could no longer resist the forces of change. The extent of changes, which took place in this century, might constitute a topic for other researches. On the other hand, the need to delimit the area of research to the Anatolian chief justice (kaz&acirc / skerlik) was a result of technical and methodological necessity.