CALL FOR PAPERS:

EASTERN MEDITERRANEAN CITIES COMPARED

Session to be held at the 7th International Conference on Urban History Athens 2004

Eastern Mediterranean Cities compared : Technical networks, town planning and municipal institutions (Greece, the Balkans and the Ottoman Empire 1820-1925)

The object of this session is to draw a comparison between the various forms of urban government in the Eastern parts of the Mediterranean. The idea is to set up a typology of the ways in which cities are ruled. This typology will consider cities from independent Greece to cities of the Ottoman Empire, or from the Habsburg Balkans to colonial cities.

Papers are expected to deal with municipal history, with a focus on the transition between Old regime forms of urban rule to administrative municipal modernity and on subjects related to the technical modernization of the urban space. Papers givers are invited to examine the history of the various reforms that have affected this transition. An attention to the respective competences of local powers and States is expected too, with a focus on the various domains of urban government (public order, construction, town planning, markets, local taxes, guilds, civic representation of confessional communities). The aim is to create a space for a comparative discussion between researchers who have few occasions to debate, as they usually work on different geographical fields and often belong to diverse academic backgrounds. It would be interesting in this perspective to compare the chronology and the content of urban government reforms in national Greece and in the Ottoman Empire for example, or to discuss imperial and national reforms in the context of a wider geographical and political panorama. For the end of the period, a comparison between colonial rule and national rule is expected too, mainly in the domains of municipal powers and town planning.

This session will consist in ten papers, chosen among those submitted after an international call for papers. The idea is to work together with researchers from Greece, Turkey, the Balkans and the Middle-East.

Denis Bocquet is a specialist of urban history in the Mediterranean (municipalities, town planning, technical networks).

Nora Lafi is a specialist of urban history in North Africa and the Middle-East. She has a particular interest in the transition from Old regime in the urban government to administrative modernity in the Ottoman Empire.

Yasemin Avci is a specialist of municipal history in the Ottoman Empire

Papers can be submitted by sending a proposal (500-600 words) at the following email addresses (below).

Deadline for Submission: October 31, 2003

Please see conference website for more details.