A Simple Approach to Overcoming Euro-Specific Feudalism

Abstract

In debates over the nature of the Ottoman social formation, most 20th century Turkish historians have tended to argue that it was “not feudal.” I argue that this is mostly because of the extent to which they have unconsciously imported and internalized Eurocentrism. In particular, it is because they have been using a Euro-specific notion or definition of feudalism as their yardstick. Also involved is a methodological, indeed philosophical failure to differentiate between genus and species, between the specific and the general. What is common to most agrarian states and societies in pre-modernity is the existence of a fief-system. But once a royal power-center resorts to fief-distribution, different power configurations can result. It is this revisionist approach to taxonomy that is proposed in this article, derived from my recently completed PhD thesis on civilizations’ common structures