The Capitulations Syndrome: Why Revisionist Powers Leverage Post-Colonial Sensibilities toward Post-Imperial Projects

Abstract

AbstractThis article confronts a puzzle regarding revisionist powers: How to make sense of states whose behavior combines “post-colonial” critique of Western hegemony with “post-imperial” projects at home and in near abroads? Answers to this question are often informed by realist notions of great power competition that tend to read revisionist critique of the West as either epiphenomenal or due to intrinsic enmity.This piece proposes an alternative—the “capitulations syndrome”—which is developed via the Ottoman/Turkish experience and the literature on ontological insecurity. The syndrome combines “moral injury” at subordination to the West with attempts to elevate a state's status within Western-dominated international society. Anxieties produced by this paradox are managed via state narratives that celebrate select glories and traumas. This results in an exceptionalist sense of national “Self” that—when confronted—can lead to outrage at “Others” of the state story. The syndrome, I argue, both shapes broad imaginaries and is instrumentalized by policymakers. Thus, calls for global justice vis-à-vis Western hegemony can coexist with hegemonic projects nearer home.Identifying a series of family resemblances with China and Iran, I conclude by underscoring the article's main contributions: (1) its empirical study of the (post-)Ottoman experience as a case of revisionist former empires, (2) its analytical tool—the capitulations syndrome—with which to read comparative patterns, and (3) its epistemological corrective to international relations’ blindspot regarding actors with both “post-colonial” and “post-imperial” features. This hybrid condition enables revisionist former empires to invoke post-colonial solidarities in pursuit of post-imperial projects.