Osmanlı Devleti'nde Veliahtlık Kurumu (1908-1922)
Özet
The Ottomans stayed in the stage of history for over six hundred years and were rather skilful in gradually building a bureaucratic, centralized and a rational monarchy adaptable to actual political circumstances. One of the reasons underlying this skill was their capacity of institutional transformation and adaptation to current developments. In this sense, the history of institutions in the Ottoman Empire was also a history of competency in adaptation, accommodation and flexibility to global conditions. While the sultans sent their sons along with their mothers and tutors (lalas) to sandjaks or sub-provinces to learn state administration, in the reigns of Selim II and Murat III only the eldest son was sent to govern a sandjak. At the end of the 16th and in the first quarter of the 17th centuries, two parallel developments occurred in the training of the princes, namely the "cage rule" and the rule of senioratus (ekberiyet), which eventually validated the eldest imperial prince as the crown prince. As a result, the cage system simultaneously happened to be an heir apparency system. In Ottoman history, the historical and material foundations of the office of heir apparency were laid in the 19th century and it began to operate on 23 July 1908, immediately after the promulgation of the 2nd Constitutional period. Subsequently, significant material, legal and practical attempts and regulations were made in order to institutionalise this post. It is through these steps and regulations that it has become possible to argue for the institution of heir apparency in the Ottoman Empire. The aim of our study is to explain the Ottoman efforts and initiatives in order to build up an Ottoman heir apparency system in harmony with the global world in the early 20th century.
