The Government of
Algiers
In visiting Algiers, you must understand the governing system and laws so that you have a safe, pleasant visit--and return home!
Algiers was governed like most Ottoman provinces: through a "provincial government" (Hourani, 228). The court at Istanbul appointed a governor for the province, sometimes the son of a sultan "practicing" before he succeeded the throne (Spielvogel, 522). The governor served only a limited term in order to restrict his power (Hourani, 230). In Algiers, as in the other Ottoman provinces, the governor worked with an a board made up of local Ottomans ("North Africa" Britannica Online). He had a janissary army (the elite Turkish soldiers) made up of soldiers from Anatolia and a navy to protect the Ottoman territorial claims in the western Mediterranean as well as an economy which depended on a strong sea-borne fleet (Hourani, 228).
By the mid-1600s, however, the provincial government began to weaken. The governor lost most of his control over his navy and the janissaries, maintaining only the ability to tax and to pay for their needs (Hourani, 230). The powerful janissary officials soon gained power over even these duties in 1689 and appointed their own official, known as the dey, to deal with taxation and funding, and, by the early 1700s, the dey had earned the title of 'governor' from the central Ottoman court in Istanbul (Hourani, 230 and "North Africa" Britannica Online). The troops now had control ("North Africa" Britannica Online). Although at first the deys ruled for short periods of time to continue the tradition of spreading power, they later began to held power for longer periods of time (Hourani, 251). Basically, a military republic had been established ("North Africa" Britannica Online).
The deys proceeded to appoint their own governors to supervise the urban centers located inland in Algiers. These governors had military forces and were usually linked to the merchants because of their common interest in piracy. In the regions less urban than the towns, pastoral administrators collected taxes and governed, but in some districts, for example the nomads of the Sahara or the areas in Mzab, councils of religious and wise elders governed with little connection to the deys or to the court at Constantinople. (Hourani, 230)
The people supported the new rule of the dey because they were allowed to maintain their lives under their local rulers and were subject to very little taxation due to the booming piracy economy ("North Africa" Britannica Online).
The deys, merchants, and leaders of the armed forces had been bound to each other because of their common link to piracy as a central goal (Hourani, 251). By the late 1700s, piracy had diminished in importance, and the ties between the dominant political, economical, and defense figures loosened (Hourani, 251). The people were more heavily taxed as piracy declined, and their peaceful acceptance of the dey changed to tribal uprisings, creating internal unrest before the French conquest ("North Africa" Britannica Online).
Even though the provincial government of Algiers changed dramatically during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, the basic principle of the sultan's absolute authority changed only slightly (Hourani, 252 ; "North Africa" Britannica Online). As Albert Habib Hourani states in A History of the Arab Peoples, the new provincial governors were "'local Ottomans', not independent monarchs" (Hourani, 252). During the provincial governments, the absolute obedience had been weakened with the establishment of a military republic, but not lost (Hourani, 252). The Hanafite School of Law, the main school of Istanbul, was established as the main school in Algiers, a symbol of the connection between the province and the court ("North Africa" Britannica Online). Religiously, ties to Istanbul held as strong as ever, as the deys respected the sultan as the caliph, or the defender of the Islamic faith ("North Africa" Britannica Online).
The main government of the Ottoman empire was set in the Topkapi Palace in Constantinople. As the head of the government, the an all- powerful sultan controlled both political and military aspects of the Ottoman world. He was called the caliph and was supposedly responsible for upholding Islamic law and guiding his people spiritually. These spiritual responsibilities of the sultan were handled by the ulema who directed the legal systems and schools for Muslims. Different religions were subject to different laws. (See section on religion) (Spielvogel, 522-3).
Leadership was hereditary, passed on by the sultan to a son. Because the son did not have to be the eldest, many fights arose over inheritance. Before a son became sultan, he usually gained experience from governing one of the empire's provincial governments. When a son became sultan, his mother became the "queen mother" and her son's advisor and as a result had much influence over political affairs. Instead of marrying, the sultan named four concubines of his harem as his 'favorites' after they had produced a son (Spielvogel, 522-3).
As the Ottoman empire grew, so did the power of the sultan, who controlled an empire which was divided into provinces and ruled through provincial governments (Spielvogel, 522-3). The sultan, as the supreme authority of the centralized government, became increasingly separated from the people as the administrative bureaucracy grew larger. Affairs of state were conducted by the sultan with the imperial council, which met four times a week under the direction of the sultan's grand vizier. The sultan himself attended from behind a private screen, voicing his desires only to the vizier. The members of the council were educated by a palace school and were usually born Muslims.
In all Ottoman societies, laws fell into two major categories: the Shari'ah laws, which were Muslim laws and applied only to professed Muslims, and the Kanun laws, which were civil laws that applied to all Ottomans. As the official religion of the empire and the religion held by most Ottoman subjects, Islam held great influence and the Islamic Shari'ah laws were more important than the civil laws as they were based on the Qu`ran and Islamic customs. These laws held precedence over any secular Kanun laws, and if any member of the ulama, or the council which interpreted and enforced the Islamic laws, saw any secular law as violating an Islamic regulation, the secular law could be revoked. The sultan had the right to create secular laws (Kanun laws) if they didn't violate the Islamic laws. Because the sultan created these laws, members of the ulama hardly ever revoked secular laws for fear of dismissal. This fear of dismissal gave the sultan the unimpeded power to make the laws he thought appropriate to the well-being of the empire, one of the many reasons for the Empire's successful duration (For more information on the separate religious governing institutions, see the section on religion) ("Turkey and Ancient Anatolia" Britannica Online).
Main Intro History Money/Economy Government Religion Society Culture Map