Deprivation of Qualified Statesmen During Famine: The Struggle of the Central Government and Mosul Provincial Administration with the Famine of 1879-1880
Fasih DinçFamine is a natural disaster caused by drought and unbalanced precipitation which eliminates the production possibilities of society. Although this disaster is a result of geographical conditions, elimination of the disaster is closely related to the healthy functioning of the state mechanism. The most important pillar of this mechanism is successful and experienced administrators. As far as we ascertain in places where famine occurs, administrators with sufficient experience avoid taking administrative responsibility, as they do not want to tarnish their official duty. For this reason, the places in question are administrated by inexperienced junior civil servants. The ability of these civil servants to exist in administrative units where extraordinary conditions arise from disasters is directly related to their ability and aid capacity of the central state. Unfortunately, if the administrators lacking the capability to coordinate the crisis in extraordinary conditions are unable to receive the necessary support from the central government, the people living in these administrative units face a tragedy. This study deals with the approach of the Ottoman central bureaucracy in appointing administrators and the issue of how the appointed administrators struggled against famine in the Mosul province during the severe famine between 1879 and 1880.
Kaht u Galâda Kaht-ı Rical: Merkezî Yönetim ve Musul Vilayet İdaresinin 1879-1880 Kıtlığıyla İmtihanı
Fasih DinçKıtlık; kuraklık ve dengesiz yağışların toplumun üretim olanaklarını ortadan kaldırmasıyla ortaya çıkan doğal bir afettir. Bu afet, her ne kadar coğrafi koşulların bir neticesi olsa da afetin giderilmesi, devlet mekanizmasının sağlıklı işleyişiyle yakından ilişkilidir. Bu mekanizmanın en önemli ayağını başarılı ve deneyimli yöneticiler oluşturmaktadır. Tespit ettiğimiz kadarıyla kıtlıkların baş gösterdiği merkezden uzak yerlerde yeterli deneyime sahip yöneticiler, memuriyet görevlerine herhangi bir leke gelmemesi için idarî sorumluluk almaktan kaçınmışlardır. Bu sebeple söz konusu yerler, daha alt düzeydeki deneyimsiz memurlar tarafından idare edilmiştir. Bu memurların afetlerden kaynaklı olağanüstü koşulların hüküm sürdüğü idarî birimlerde varlık gösterebilmeleri, sahip oldukları yetenek ile merkezî devletin yardım kapasitesiyle doğrudan ilişkilidir. Ne yazık ki olağanüstü koşullarda krizi koordine edebilme kabiliyetinden yoksun yöneticilerin merkezî hükümetten gerekli desteği de alamaması durumunda söz konusu idarî birimlerde yaşayan halk, bir trajediyle karşı karşıya kalır. Bu çalışmada; 1879-1880 zaman aralığında şiddetli açlığın meydana geldiği Musul vilayet alanında Osmanlı merkez bürokrasinin yönetici atama yaklaşımları ile atanan yöneticilerin kıtlıkla nasıl mücadele ettikleri hususu ele alınmıştır.
During the period from 1877 to the winter of 1879, the eastern provinces of the Ottoman Empire suffered from severe drought and famine. Although famine due to this drought increased in Van, Bitlis and Diyarbekir provinces, it was experienced in Mosul province in its most severe form, and agricultural production was completely interrupted in these regions. Successive dry season conditions from 1877 onwards led to a severe hunger in which mass deaths took place from December 1879 to May 1880.
In 1877, when the famine began, the Ottoman central government joined a fierce battle called the 93 War against the Russian State. The Ottoman Empire, which sustained a heavy defeat by Russia, suffered a great loss of land, and its economy which was in a weak state also entered into a deep crisis. One of the consequences of this war was the fact that Hakkâri Center Sheikh Ubeydullah initiated an uprising against the unsettled State authority, which also affected the area of the Mosul province. The local and international problems of the central government of the Ottoman Empire prevented measures from being taken against the famine in all eastern provinces turning into severe hunger.
In 1877, when the famine began, the Mosul, Shahrizor (Kirkuk) and Sulaymaniyah regions, which constituted the northern regions of Iraq, consisted of sanjaks under the control of Baghdad province. As the famine began to turn into severe hunger and accordingly the disturbance of the peace into a general insecurity, the central government separated these three regions from Baghdad province in 1879 and turned them into a province borough called Mosul. Kirkuk settlement was designated as the center of this province. The establishment of the Mosul province at a time when the central government was struggling with local and international crises did not allow the necessary investments to be made for the placement of a state power mechanism. As a matter of fact, almost all of the Iraqi military force which was required to prevent tribal outbursts resulting from the disturbance of the peace during the famine process had been propelled to the front. Very few of the soldiers were able to return. Most of the zaptieh forces, which provided security for settlements and government institutions, were disbanded because their salaries were not paid. This situation deprived provincial administrators of the necessary mechanisms to carry out an effective struggle against famine disaster.
Faced with the effects of famine, the central government tried to assign experienced administrators to the provincial administration. However, experienced administrators who were assigned to a province with natural disaster did not want to take responsibility for struggling with famine due to the concern of not being able to deliver the necessary performance. There upon the central government was forced to assign civilian administrators who wanted to gain the higher authority but lacked the necessary experience. The administrators who went to the provincial area tried to change their positions upon encountering the destruction caused by famine. Those who could not get any results resigned from their duties. Those who continued their duties and those who could not carry out the necessary struggle against famine were dismissed by the central government after complaints from the citizens.
When the central government failed to obtain the desired success from the assigned civilian administrators, it unwillingly had to leave the provincial administration to a military administrator. In fact, it was not a rare case for military officials to come to civilian positions in a region such as Iraq, geographically remote to central government. The fact that the region had a long border with Iran and accordingly threatened the peace was the source of reasons for the military officer’s to take the civilian powers in addition to their own powers. The frequent occurrence of this situation led to a constant effort by the military officers to take over civilian power. Within the scope of these efforts, they refrained from working devotedly in order to leave the civilian authorities in a difficult situation whenever the peace in the province was threatened. When the civil authorities of the Mosul province failed to conduct an effective struggle against famine, the military officers took this opportunity to make contacts with the central bureaucracy, have the military officers take control of the province administration and succeeded in assigning by proxy a subordinate military officer as the administrator of Mosul.
The military officer, who was assigned by proxy as the administrator of Mosul province suffering from the famine disaster, could not achieve the necessary success due to the deep social devastation caused by the disaster. However, the military officer made contacts with the central government through a petition consisting of joint signatures of the notables of the province in order to turn the assignment of proxy into principal, but the central government avoided appointting a military officer as a the civil servant. The appointment of military officers as civilian servants had been incompatible with the state’s understanding of modernization about administration since the Tanzimat reform era. As a result, the central government of the Ottoman Empire was unable to assign experienced administrators who could carry out an effective struggle against famine on the eastern borders. The inefficiency of state mechanisms and the lack of necessary administrative experience of the assigned administrators left the people of the province vulnerable to the destruction of the famine disaster.
