On the margins of nationality : passports in late occupied Istanbul
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Date
2023
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Thesis (M.A.) - Bogazici University. Institute for Graduate Studies in Social Sciences, 2023.
Abstract
This study investigates passport policies and their relationship to legal nationality during the last year of the Allied occupation of Istanbul from September 1922 until October 1923. Particularly looking at the attitude of British occupation authorities and British foreign service administrators, we see that passports were a significant source of conflict between the Allies and the newly victorious Turkish National Movement, institutionalized in the Ankara government. This study argues that a nearly violent clash between British and Turkish authorities in December of 1922 marked a turning point after which the Allies retreated from trying to impose their will on the city of Istanbul, particularly in their mission to protect Ottoman Christians. After conceding sovereignty over legitimate movement to the Ankara government, the British would also change their attitude towards travel documents. They would now try to only issue full passports to those who were British subjects, minimize the number of travel passes they were issuing to others, and make sure they had found a state to take in refugees before evacuating them on British expense. This study will follow a number of groups of people under British protection who struggled with the newly implemented passport regime and unpack how this affected their nationality status. By looking at the implementation of the international passport regime in its early years of use, when borders were being negotiated and sovereignty was contested, this study seeks to illuminate some of the foundations for the philosophical and legal connections between passports and nationality.