Insight Turkey Volume 14 No 2 Book Reviews

Allies with the Infidels, The Ottoman and French Alliance in the Sixteenth Century

Christine Isom-Verhaaren’s book is not a history of the Franco-Ottoman alliance in the 16th century; rather its aim is to show how the Ottomans and French of the time saw this alliance, which has so often been presented by later historians as exceptional and shameful, and why its real meaning and historical context were misunderstood. Chapters one to five describe what she calls the “traditional historiography”.

The Muslim Empires of the Ottomans, Safavids, and Mughals

The comparative study of empires is undoubtedly one of the fastest growing fields since the end of the Cold War. Dominic Lieven was among those who paved the way with his Empire: The Russian Empire and its Rivals, which was followed with some later additions such as Karen Barkey’s Empire of Difference: The Ottomans in Comparative Perspective and Jane Burbank and Frederic Cooper’s Empires in World History: Power and the Politics of Difference.

The Influence of the European Union on Turkish Foreign Policy

Özlem Terzi’s book analyzes the impact of the European Union membership process on the “alleged transformation” of Turkish foreign policy, particularly during the last few decades. The author reviews the existing literature on Europeanization and shows how several political thinkers and theoreticians have elucidated the basic parameters of the foreign policy of the European Union, particularly with regards to the non-member states and candidate countries.

Kurds of Modern Turkey: Migration, Neoliberalism and Exclusion in Turkish Society

As the Kurdish question in Turkey has yet to be solved, the question itself does not remain constant but rather it is dynamic and revolves around the political, economic, and social transformations within Turkey. Metaphorically speaking, one of the ‘bright’ sides of the ongoing conflict between the Turkish state and the Kurdish rebels has been that the violent conflict between the two parties has been hitherto secluded from the social space and it has not spread into a societal conflict between the civilian Kurdish and Turkish communities.

Activists in Office: Kurdish Politics and Protest in Turkey

Most of the recently published books on the Kurdish problem in Turkey focus on the armed struggle and the Kurdistan Workers Party (PKK). Watts, however, offers a much-appreciated alternative approach. “Pro-Kurdish political parties” (p. xvii), or what she also calls “challenger parties” (p. 16), “have made themselves matter and… have impressed their ideas and agendas on reluctant and often repressive states” (p. x).

The European Union and Central Asia

In this timely volume, Alexander Warkotsch gathers a variety of authors from different backgrounds who work and research Central Asia to produce an empirically well-sustained analysis of the policies and practices in the European Union’s (EU) approach towards the area. Warkotsch, an associate researcher at Würzburg University in Germany, has a strong research record on Central Asia, which together with the regional and EU expertise of the authors makes this volume an important contribution to studies about EU relations with Central Asia.

Producing Islamic Knowledge, Transmission and Dissemination in Western Europe

This collection of essays bridges the gap between arguments that emphasize the role of Islamic communities and the individualization of religious authority in the literature on Muslims in Western Europe. The editors propose to focus on the process by which Islamic knowledge—“whatever Muslims consider to be correct or proper belief and practice”—is produced through the interaction of religious authorities, lay Muslims, and their European context. There are two common themes that connect all the articles: the religious market model and the localization of Islam in Europe.

Thinking Through Islamophobia: Global Perspectives

Thinking Through Islamophobia contains 27 essays examining the concept of Islamophobia through discussions that cut across continents and disciplines. The papers were originally developed for the 2008 workshop on this topic organized by the Center of Ethnicity and Racism Studies at the University of Leeds. Together the chapters provide a deep and comprehensive understanding of the history, impact and breadth of Islamophobia, even while their authors disagree on the utility and credibility of the term.

Global Security Watch: The Caucasus States

Global Security Watch: The Caucasus States by Professor Houman A. Sadri of the University of Central Florida is an important addition to the Praeger series that has produced insightful studies on countries such as Iran, Russia and Turkey. Professor Sadri, an active participant in the International Studies Association’s (ISA) Post Communist States in International Relations group, is a committed scholar of the region. In the past few years he has published papers and book chapters on energy politics and on the regional relations of the states of the Caucasus and Caspian Sea basin.

Years of Blood: A History of the Armenian-Muslim Clashes in the Caucasus, 1905-1906

The first decade of the 20th century represents a very significant though turbulent period in the history of the Caucasian peoples. Not only had the region been shaken by the impacts of the drastic political changes taking place in the three neighboring empires—Russia, Iran and the Ottoman Empire—it had also become a scene of inter-communal violence due to the escalating tension between Armenians and Muslims of the Russian Caucasus.

Islam and the Veil: Theoretical and Regional Contexts

No matter how many attempts there have been to clarify the significance of the Islamic veil it remains a hotly contested issue. In Western civilizational discourse it is taken to be a symbol of women’s oppression and, beyond that, of Islam’s inability to grant gender equality and so of its followers’ unsuitability for membership in the countries of secular/Christian Europe. In an ironic transformation of its literal meaning as a curtain or screen to preserve modesty by segregating the sexes, the hijab has become, for its critics, the flag of an Islamist insurgency.

Ethnicity, Migration and Enterprise

Under the impact of globalization, and despite increased calls for diversity to be recognized, universal citizenship rights that safeguard individual rights and freedoms fall short of grasping diversity. International migration and minority issues are contributory facets of this process. Citizenship has become susceptible to international migration and the minority issues, and the relationship established with the nation-state in the form of membership or belonging has gotten disrupted.

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