Imperial Resilience: The Great War's End, Ottoman Longevity, and Incidental Nations.

• Author: Ilter, Mustafa

By Hasan Kayali

The University of California Press, 2021, 272 pages, $85.00, ISBN: 9780520343702

Could WWI and its aftermath be considered as the ultimate turning point that historically disentangled Arabs from Ottoman integrity? In other words, was WWI alone responsible for the entire separation of Arabs from their Turkish counterparts? Moreover, can the classical nation-state paradigm explain the overall aspects of the emerging Arab states? As one of the most influential experts regarding the Turco-Arab relations during the late Ottoman and early Republican periods, Hasan Kayali asks these fundamental questions pertaining to the disengagement between Arabs and Turks in his recent book titled Imperial Resilience: The Great Wars End, Ottoman Longevity, and Incidental Nations.

It must be born in mind before anything else that the author skillfully demonstrates the theoretical and conceptual background as to why he attempted to write on this subject. Throughout the book, he adeptly follows the theoretical ideas he already elaborated in the preface and introduction regarding the nation-state. Challenging the widely held notion within the literature, that the nation-state paradigm has been influential, he endeavors to "eschew nation-state centric designations, since the book's purpose is to bring to light the flux and contestation that surrounded the crystallization of the familiar political entities" (p. 16). Rather than falling into the classical trap of so-called paradigms that allows for the teleologic explanation regarding the historical flow, Kayali successfully overcomes the theoretical fallacy on which the literature has long been based. For him, "nation-state along the fault line of 1918 has privileged the utilization of such terminology as 'national struggle,' which affirms the teleology of nationness in the Middle East. It ignores the flux and anguish of a search for political identity at a crucial juncture in the region's history" (p. 7). Rather than grand narratives about certain paradigms like modernization or nation-state, he often stresses the significance of historical flux, conflicts, contestations, and agencies that history built upon politically. This not only shows the extent to which the book provides a strong theoretical background but also the scope of its contribution to a new direction within the literature.

Moreover, the author defined 1918-1923 as a liminal period between empires and nationstates. Another theoretical...