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UID:508@1718.ucla.edu
DTSTART;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20260306T090000
DTEND;TZID=America/Los_Angeles:20260306T170000
DTSTAMP:20260227T205129Z
URL:https://1718.ucla.edu/events/synchronicities-2/
SUMMARY:Strange Synchronicities and Familiar Parallels in Asia\, 1600–180
 0: Joseph Fletcher’s Plane Ride Revisited: Conference 2: Empires in Prac
 tice
DESCRIPTION:\n\nRegistration Form: Core 2 Form\n\nOrganized by Choon Hwee K
 oh (History\, UCLA)\, Meng Zhang (History\, UCLA)\, and Abhishek Kaicker (
 History\, UC Berkeley)\n\n\nCo-sponsored by the UCLA Program on Central As
 ia\, Center for Near Eastern Studies\, and Center for Chinese Studies\n\nT
 he second conference looks at Imperial Operations. How did empires work? W
 hat did the mundane\, everyday operations of imperial rule look like? Earl
 y modern empires confronted the same “great enemy” of distance which s
 everely constrained all actions\, from government communications to tax co
 llection. The solutions that the Ottomans\, Mughals\, and the Qing develop
 ed to address these common problems shared some essential features despite
  their local variations. For imperial communications\, each empire had the
 ir version of a relay postal system that relied on horses\, human-runners\
 , or a combination of both. For the problem of tax collection\, each empir
 e distributed tax farming privileges across extensive networks of local in
 termediaries. Scholars have suggested that empires devised comparable syst
 ems of delegating authority and distributing tasks that had more organizat
 ional sophistication than previously recognized. Given that such systems o
 f communication and tax collection were apparently autonomously developed 
 in each empire\, it is remarkable that these institutional solutions came 
 to acquire significant resemblances with each other. Investigations into t
 hese and other areas of imperial operations will lay the foundation for a 
 conceptual framework that might account for both their commonalities and d
 ifferences and work equally well for these different regions without presu
 ming one type of institutional response as being a universal ideal.\n\nOur
  prompt to participants of the second conference: How did administrative\,
  tax\, or legal innovation overcome the problems of imperial consolidation
  in the empire of your study? How did they change in this time period comp
 ared to previous eras? Is there a particular imperial operation that you h
 ave examined in this time period? (This could be a process of resource ext
 raction\, of recruiting or managing personnel\, of integrating ethno-relig
 ious minorities\, of instituting new laws\, etc.) Is there a question you 
 have for experts of other empires on how this same imperial operation work
 ed there? How might that knowledge help you better understand the empire o
 f your focus?\n\n\n\nSpeakers\nNicholas J. Abbott\, Old Dominion Universit
 y\nAbdurrahman Atçıl\, Sabancı University\nAnil Askin\, Ahmanson-Getty 
 Postdoctoral Fellow\nLi Chen\, University of Toronto\nMunis D. Faruqui\, U
 niversity of California\, Berkeley\nEvgenia Kermeli\, Hacettepe University
  / Käte Hamburger Kolleg "Legal Unity and Pluralism” Münster\nJaymin K
 im\, Rice University\nSudev Sheth\, University of Pennsylvania\nChristophe
 r Whitehead\, The Ohio State University\nLawrence Lok Cheung Zhang\, Hong 
 Kong University of Science and Technology\n\n\n\nAbout the 2025–26 Core 
 Program: Strange Synchronicities and Familiar Parallels in Asia\, 1600–1
 800: Joseph Fletcher’s Plane Ride Revisited\nIn the 1970s\, polyglot Sin
 ologist and Inner Asian specialist Joseph Fletcher had a powerful insight:
  there were both “interconnections” and “parallels” across the ear
 ly modern world. Despite Fletcher’s untimely death in 1984\, his insight
  of “interconnections” captured the imagination of a generation of his
 torians who went on to craft histories that were “connected” or\, even
 \, “global.” These histories highlighted the myriad kinds of “interc
 onnections” that had forged early modernity.\n\nWith this overwhelming a
 ttention to “connections\,” Fletcher’s second notion of “parallels
 ” came to be relatively neglected. Comparative history\, with its profou
 nd methodological challenges regarding unit\, scale\, and criteria of comp
 arison\, came to be passed over in favor of the agenda and paradigm of “
 connected history.” This relative neglect of comparative history has res
 tricted our understanding of the early modern world\, in which strange syn
 chronicities and familiar parallels appear across disparate world-regions 
 that were yet to be violently incorporated into a modern global order cent
 ered on Europe.\n\nIn this cycle of three conferences\, historians of the 
 Ottoman\, Qing\, and Mughal empires return to the problem of comparison by
  considering synchronicities and structural parallels across Asia. We focu
 s on three broad areas: Imperial Ideology (Empires of Thought)\, Imperial 
 Operations (Empires in Practice)\, and Society\, Materiality\, and Knowled
 ge (Empires of Things).\n\nEarly modern empires confronted many similar pr
 oblems: the ideological and administrative problems of managing diversity\
 , the informational and fiscal problems caused by distance\, the centrifug
 al and centripetal tensions of power\, and the delineation and co-optation
  of status groups\, to name a few. The many different solutions that had d
 eveloped in different regions also shared some striking similarities in th
 eir underlying logic. In jointly exploring such differences and commonalit
 ies across early modern Eurasia\, we aim to devise fresh methodological ap
 proaches to tackle old comparative questions in new ways.\n\n\n\nProgram S
 chedule\n\n8:30 a.m.\nCoffee and Registration\n\n9:00 a.m.\nDirector’s W
 elcome\nBronwen Wilson\, University of California\, Los Angeles\n\nIntrodu
 ctory Remarks\nChoon Hwee Koh\, University of California\, Los Angeles\, M
 eng Zhang\, University of California\, Los Angeles\, and Abhishek Kaicker\
 , University of California\, Berkeley\n\n9:15–10:45 a.m.\nPanel 1: Imper
 ial Rule in the Locality\nDiscussant: R. Bin Wong\, University of Californ
 ia\, Los Angeles\n\nLi Chen\, University of Toronto\n“Humanizing the Con
 quest Regime: Benevolent Rule and Sentimental Politics in Qing Criminal Ju
 stice\, 1650–1900”\n\nAbdurrahman Atçıl\, Sabancı University\n“Ce
 ntralized Inclusive Lawmaking: Regulating Political Power through Provinci
 al Law Codes in the Ottoman Empire”       \n\nMunis D. Faruqui\, 
 University of California\, Berkeley\n“A Year in the Life of a Mughal Pro
 vince: Gujarat\, 1702-3”\n\n10:45 a.m.\nCoffee Break\n\n11 a.m.–12:30 
 p.m.\nPanel 2: Imperial Law and Politics\nDiscussant: Kevan Harris\, Unive
 rsity of California\, Los Angeles\n\nEvgenia Kermeli\, Hacettepe Universit
 y / Käte Hamburger Kolleg "Legal Unity and Pluralism” Münster\n“The 
 Pluri-Legal Ottoman Law in Action: Jurisprudence and Judicial Praxis of Ot
 toman Christian Courts”\n\nNicholas J. Abbott\, Old Dominion University\
 n“In Her Excellency’s Sublime Service: Female Elites and Imperial Recr
 uitment in Mughal India\, c. 1550–1750”\n\nJaymin Kim\, Rice Universit
 y\n“Imperial Jurisdiction over Tributary Subjects: Elastic Sovereignty i
 n Three Qing Borderlands”\n\n12:30 p.m.\nLunch\nExhibition of Clark Libr
 ary materials in the North Book Room\n\n1:30–2:45 p.m.\nPanel 3: Merchan
 t and Administration\nDiscussant: Cristóbal Amunátegui\, University of C
 alifornia\, Los Angeles\n\nSudev Sheth\, University of Pennsylvania\n“Na
 garsheth\, or Chief Merchant of the City: The Making of an Urban Instituti
 on in Eighteenth-Century Ahmedabad”\n\nAnıl Aşkın\, Ahmanson-Getty Po
 stdoctoral Fellow\, University of California\, Los Angeles\n“Economies o
 f War and Merchant Capital in the Early Modern Ottoman Empire (1600-1800)
 ”\n\n2:45 p.m.      \nCoffee Break\n\n3:00–4:15 p.m.\nPanel 4: F
 inance and Power \nDiscussant: Luke Yarbrough\, University of California\,
  Los Angeles\n\nLawrence Lok Cheung Zhang\, Hong Kong University of Scienc
 e and Technology\n“Outsourcing War: Kangxi Period office purchase and th
 e financing of conquest”\n\nChristopher Whitehead\, The Ohio State Unive
 rsity\n“Bribery and the Sale of Office in the Seventeenth-Century Ottoma
 n Empire”\n\n4:15 p.m.                  \nRoundtable D
 iscussion \n\n5:30 p.m.\nConclusion\n\n\n\nThe conference is free to atten
 d with advance registration\, and will be held in-person at the Clark Libr
 ary. Seating is limited at the Clark Library\; walk-in registrants are wel
 come as space permits.\n\n\n\nComposite image:  Montanus\, Arnoldus. 1671
 . Atlas Chinensis: Being a Second Part of a Relation of Remarkable Passage
 s in Two Embassies from the East-India Company of the United Provinces… 
 Translated by John Ogilby. London. | Rycaut\, Paul\, Richard Knolles\, Rob
 ert White\, Frederick Hendrick van Hove\, John Macock\, and John Starkey. 
 1680. The History of the Turkish Empire from the Year 1623 to the Year 167
 7… London. | Tavernier\, Jean-Baptiste\, and François Bernier. 1688. C
 ollections of Travels through Turky into Persia\, and the East-Indies. Giv
 ing an Account of the State of Those Countries… Translated by J. Philips
  and Edmund Everard. London. | Rembrandt\, Two Mughal noblemen (Shah Jahan
  and Dara Shikoh)\, 1656\, pen and wash on paper\, The British Museum\, co
 urtesy of Wikimedia Commons. All other images courtesy of the William Andr
 ews Clark Memorial Library\, with special thanks to Arie Nair\, Reading Ro
 om Assistant and Ph.D. Candidate\, University of California\, Los Angeles.
CATEGORIES:Conferences,Core Program
LOCATION:UCLA William Andrews Clark Memorial Library\, 2520 Cimarron Street
 \, Los Angeles\, California\, 90018\, United States
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