Includes bibliographical references and index.

"Investigating how a number of modern empires transform over the lon g century (1789-1914) as a consequence of their struggle for ascendancy in the Eastern Mediterranean and Middle East, Foundations of Modernity : Human Agency and the Imperial State moves the study of the modern emp ire towards a comparative, trans-regional analysis of events along the Ottoman frontiers: Western Balkans, the Persian Gulf and Yemen. This in ter-disciplinary approach of studying events at different ends of the O ttoman Empire challenges previous emphasis on Europe as the only source of change and highlights the progression of modern imperial states.The book introduces an entirely new analytical approach to the study of mo dern state power and the social consequences to the interaction between long-ignored "historical agents" like pirates, smugglers, refugees, an d the rural poor. In this respect, the roots of the most fundamental in stitutions and bureaucratic practices associated with the modern state prove to be the by-products of certain kinds of productive exchange lon g categorized in negative terms in post-colonial and mainstream scholar ship. Such a challenge to conventional methods of historical and social scientific analysis is reinforced by the novel use of the work of Loui s Althusser, Talal Asad, William Connolly and Frederick Cooper, whose c hallenges to scholarly conventions will prove helpful in changing how w e understand the origins of our modern world and thus talk about Modern ity. This book offers a methodological and historiographic intervention meant to challenge conventional studies of the modern era"--Provided b y publisher.