Confiscation and Destruction: The Young Turk Seizure of Armenian Property

Ugur Ungor · Mehmet Polatel

Jun 2011 · A&C Black

About this ebook

This is the first major study of the mass sequestration of Armenian property by the Young Turk regime during the 1915 Armenian genocide. It details the emergence of Turkish economic nationalism, offers insight into the economic ramifications of the genocidal process, and describes how the plunder was organized on the ground. The interrelated nature of property confiscation initiated by the Young Turk regime and its cooperating local elites offers new insights into the functions and beneficiaries of state-sanctioned robbery. Drawing on secret files and unexamined records, the authors demonstrate that while Armenians suffered systematic plunder and destruction, ordinary Turks were assigned a range of property for their progress.

About the author

Dr Ugur Ümit Üngör is assistant professor at Utrecht University and affiliated with the Centre for War Studies (Dublin) and the Center for Holocaust and Genocide Studies (Amsterdam). He specializes in the historical sociology of mass violence. His research has focussed on genocidal processes in general, and the Armenian genocide in particular.
Mr Mehmet Polatel is a historian focussing on late Ottoman history and early Turkish republic. He has conducted research on the fate of Armenian property in the Ottoman Empire and the Republic of Turkey. Currently he is a PhD student at Bogaziçi University and a research assistant at the History Department of Koç University in Istanbul.