The Eastern Question in 1870s Britain (eBook)

This book examines mid-Victorian discourse on the expansion of the British Empire's role in the Middle East. It investigates how British political leaders, journalists and the general public responded to events in the Ottoman Empire, which many, if not most, people in Britain came to see as trudging towards inevitable chaos and destruction. Although this 'Eastern Question' on a post-Ottoman future was ostensibly a matter of international politics and sometimes conflict, this study argues that the ideas underpinning it were conceived, shaped, and enforced according to domestic British attitudes. In this way, this book presents the Eastern Question as as much a British question as one related in any way to the Ottoman Empire. Particularly in the crucial decade of the 1870s, debates in Victorian society on the Eastern Question served as proxies for other pressing issues of the day, including electoral reform, changing religious attitudes, public education, and the costs of maintaining Britain's empire. This book offers new perspectives on the Eastern Question's relationship to these trends in Victorian society, culture, and politics, highlighting its significance in understanding Britain's imperial programme more widely in the second half of the nineteenth century.

Leslie Rogne Schumacher teaches history, leadership, and intelligence studies at Wells College in Aurora, NY, USA. He also serves in the Mario Einaudi Center for International Studies at Cornell University and as a Senior Fellow at the Foreign Policy Research Institute in Philadelphia, PA, USA. He is a historian of Europe and the Middle East, focusing on nationalism, imperialism, and migration in the Mediterranean Sea and its basin from the 1700s to the present day.