1In the 19^th century, the “dangerous child” began to occupy a significant place in international public opinion and entered the agenda of elites and states. There was public anxiety about poor children occupying newly expanding urban public spaces, when, according to middle class opinion, they should be in school, family home, farm, factory or workshop. In the Ottoman case, although urbanization and industrialization was not at a level comparable to that of European states, Ottoman reformers and experts developed similar concerns about children in following Western discourses on public order and disciplining of the period.

2This paper focuses on the introduction and spread of reform houses (ıslâhhanes) in the Ottoman Empire, and thus, on the era’s discursive and practical interventions regarding the realm of child welfare and disciplinary reform. After the establishment of the first such institutions in the early 1860’s, the late nineteenth century witnessed the expansion of the institution, with over thirty reform houses being opened within two decades. Following the wars with the Russian Empire in the second half of the nineteenth century, unregulated migration of the Muslim population from those areas to major Ottoman cities was thought to be creating social problems, such as begging, loitering, and vagrancy. Moreover, there were new discursive developments such as a new emphasis on aspirations for a planned urbanization, security and order in the cities as well as an increasing importance attached to industrial productivity.

3Children engaged in any street activity began to be seen by reformers as a source of crime and pauperism in the cities, and as potential delinquents. One of the most significant crimes they committed was wandering in the streets and performing “the ugly act of begging1”. Curiously, concern and criticism over beggars and vagrants in urban areas was a quite novel and imported discourse, mostly coming from Europe, introduced and disseminated via the expert opinion of new reform-minded administrators, most of whom had worked as the diplomatic representatives of the Empire in European capitals during the first half of the nineteenth century2. Apparently the discourses on child disciplining came mainly from France, Austria, and England, as these were the places where these statesmen had most often served; they actually formed part of a package of ideas regarding the modern, “progressive” city.

4The change of discourse was also partially related to the increasing circulation of commercial goods in and around cities and was linked to a new conception of modern governance in urban areas. With the interference and influence of local notables, the municipality and police assumed the protection of the local merchant community. As street children, who could potentially become productive artisans or labourers, were instead joining the ranks of “infamous vagabonds” of the cities, reform houses were deemed necessary to direct them towards a proper livelihood, before their age should turn out to be an impediment. Moreover, destitute children were perceived as a type of threat to the order and security of cities and their “working, tax-paying, and respectable” inhabitants. The urban space should be cleared of them. Claiming that “a modern state” should both protect children from danger and protect society from dangerous children, in the second half of nineteenth century, a compulsive and brutal activity of “child collection” and incarceration was launched in major cities of the Empire by the reformers, with the concerted efforts of city authorities and police forces.

5Primarily based on the Prime Ministry's Ottoman Archives, laws and regulations, provincial press, and Ottoman Educational and Provincial Yearbooks, this study aims to analyze this large network of Ottoman juvenile reform houses, which aimed at disciplining the destitute vagrant children of the Empire on a very large geographical scale. As one of the first studies on discourses and policies regarding juvenile delinquency in the Ottoman Empire, this paper focuses on the incarceration and education of errant youth in the cities. Situated at the intersection of the beautification and sanitization of urban centres – by removing the unattended children and youth from the streets – and the aim of progress in urban economic activity – by turning idle and wandering children into skilled and productive labourers, reform houses embodied the logic of Ottoman urban reform and expertise.

1. The Ottoman “Reform Era”, Expertise and Midhat Pasha

6A series of legal and administrative reforms implemented in the Ottoman Empire between 1839 and 1876, called the Tanzimat (reorganization), has been described by Roderic Davison as a modernization campaign whose momentum came “from the top down and from the outside in3”. Ottoman reform, conceived by a small and influential portion of the imperial bureaucratic elite, was obviously related to foreign diplomatic pressure on issues mostly relating to right to life, liberty, and property and the situation of the non-Muslim subjects of the Empire, and yet intended a more all-encompassing transformation in the long-term. However, this is not to suggest that the East encountered the West simply on a colonial collision course. The process of “reorganizations” included intense intellectual engagement. Ottoman reformers’ proposed solutions to the problematic issues of the Empire were quite complex and original and did not simply import foreign ideas4.

7The establishment of a new educational and disciplinary institution, the ıslâhhane, targeting vagrant, orphan, destitute and poor children in the cities, was closely related to the newly devised politics of urbanism in the second half of the nineteenth century and a new conceptualization of urban space, redefining the borders of participation, security, and visibility. In 1867, each province (vilâyet) was ordered by imperial decree to establish an ıslâhhane in order to collect, protect and educate vagrants, beggars and destitute street children. Within two years, fifteen of them were opened throughout the Empire5. Again in 1873-4, a new wave was initiated by the “Regulation on Public Administration of Provinces” of 1871, in compliance with an article again enforcing the opening of reform houses6. A sign of a remarkable success on the part of the Ottoman reformers, more than thirty such institutions were opened within a period of thirty years (1862 – 1899).

8The idea of “reform”, inherent in the term ıslâhhane7, was directed at the outer space of the institution – both its specific urban setting and the Ottoman public space at large – as much as at its inmates. In other words, they were not only important venues of state-led acculturation, of transmission of ideas to their subjects, but also aspired to disciplining the “outer space”8. Their raison d’être was linked to such considerations as beautifying the city streets, establishing order and security in urban spaces, and rejuvenating local industries. In that sense, they were conceived from within a novel discourse of modern urban governance, which aspired to guarantee law and order, together with progress in urban manufacturing and industrial activity9.

9An overview of the “Ottoman reform” in the “pilot” vilâyet (province) of Danube (Tuna) may better situate the reform houses in this larger picture. The Vilâyet of Danube was created in 1864 as a proving ground for empire-wide administrative, legal, and fiscal reorganization10. Particularly under its first governor, Midhat Paşa, the province experienced a period (1864–1868) of “modernization” in the fields of legal and institutional reform, infrastructure, communications, economic development, medical care, hygiene, and urban development11. The province, in fact, fulfilled its “role model” reasonably well. Not only was the Danube provincial charter used as a template by new vilâyets all over the Empire12, but it also became the basis for the comprehensive new provincial law (also known as the Law of the Vilâyets) in 1867. The long-term goal was to use the experience of the Danube province as the basis of future empire-wide policies. Some “trial” beginnings in the Danube province under Midhat led to broader implementations. Therefore, it is no coincidence that it was during his governorship in Niš (1861) that the first ıslâhhane was opened for orphans and “problem children”.

10Midhat Pasha's modernization programme claimed to make the vilâyet the showcase of urban development, thanks to the legal framework in place and the supporters around him13. In the improvement of infrastructure and communications, Pasha’s record was especially impressive: during his less than four years of governorship, more than 3,000 km of roads in the new chaussée style, macadamized pavements, and over 1,400 bridges were built14. Railroads were also a priority. Telegraph stations also spread in the province, as the linking of all towns by “the wire” was made an official policy goal15. The modernization programme also included the cleaning, “beautification” and general “de-Orientalization” of the vilâyet’s urban centres16. Thoroughfares were widened, straightened, and repaved; small workshops were demolished in order to make room for new “Broad Streets”; small squares with fountains were built, and government buildings were repaired and enlarged17. In larger cities, particularly in the provincial capital (Ruse) and main port (Varna), more ambitious projects were undertaken by new municipalities. In Ruse, trees were planted along the major streets; in Varna, a public garden was built.

11Gas lamps made their debut in the streets. Official street names and numbers for all buildings were first introduced in Ruse and later in other cities.

12The reorganization of the police force was also part of the new urban policies and went hand in hand with a critical discourse targeting the unattended children in public spaces18. The most intriguing aspect of the police reform project was the restructured duties of the police officers (zaptiye). A portion of the zaptiyes in the province was to be retrained as enforcers of the new reform policies and regulations, particularly in the larger cities. Renamed “inspection officials” (umur-i teftişiye memurları), these policemen were given broad powers to monitor citizens’ compliance with their numerous new duties in the fields of city sanitation and embellishment19. More importantly, suspected minors could now be fined on the spot by the police, whereas more serious deviations were referred to the city council or to the local criminal court if necessary. Inspectors were given the authority to arrest and “remove” undesirable children, namely vagrants and beggars, from city streets and place them in the new ıslâhhanes.

13Considering the reasons why and mechanisms by which the street came to be conceived as anti-child, requires awareness of the overall orientation of “urban reform”. Expert opinion on the modern urban environment, formulated by the reform-minded Ottoman administrative authorities, underlined the exclusion of unattended children from public spaces. Despite the absence of specific treatises on social work or juvenile delinquency, the partial import and inspiration of European discourses on urban security apparently brought a so-far-invisible “child problem” to the fore. The intensive translation effort undertaken during the nineteenth century was especially crucial20. These translations on various issues regarding children's health and mortality, education, socialization and morality not only served the cause of reform, but were also instrumental in a process of creating a culture as “translation”, or “translation-like culture”, actively seeking inspiration in foreign models, in developed modern societies of Europe21.

14This was also the period in which professional groups in the major urban centres (specifically port cities) were interested in “the social question”, in other words they were interested in issues concerning social justice like poverty, health and welfare. They aimed at reconciling private interest with the public good, and they supported public charity, donations, and modern education as major ways of helping the unprivileged, the poor, and the community as a whole22. Moreover, the middle class started to promote an urban agenda in the press, local clubs and municipalities. Along with social transformation and urban reorganization, professional groups demanded stricter control over the city space. In this discourse, seasonal migrants, newcomers, and vagabonds were interpreted as threats to urban security and economy. Thus, part of the middle-class solution was to remove and/or relocate single immigrant men and vagrant children in the name of modernity and progress23.

15As previously underlined, ıslâhhanes were opened in almost all the provincial centres. Rather than the emergence of an actual “child problem” in the cities, at least not in the 1860’s, the motive behind this empire-wide permeation seems to be closely related to a new mentality of urban governance and the adoption of Western discourses on security, child care, and economic development. In other words, the discourse and expertise on orderliness and surveillance was introduced in the absence of juvenile delinquency as a real threat to the peace and security of the cities. It is telling that despite the prevalence of the warning tone of the authorities regarding the “child question”, the Ottoman state did not enact any legislation concerning juvenile delinquents, nor did it establish specific juvenile courts24.

2. Anti-Child Public Spaces and Administrative Experts

16In the nineteenth century, the “dangerous child” began to occupy a significant place in international public opinion25. There was public anxiety about street urchins, abandoned children, underage beggars, youthful criminals, thieves, etc. occupying newly expanding urban public spaces, when, according to middle-class opinion, they should be in schools, farms, factories, or homes26. The moral abandonment or neglect of children is usually attributed to material scarcity and the strain on families of rapid and forced urbanization. In the Ottoman case, while levels of industrialization, economic development, literacy, urbanization, and other measures of modernization varied considerably from place to place, accompanying social values spread more rapidly and with greater chronological coincidence. Therefore, despite the economic and demographic differences between Europe and the Ottoman Empire, Ottoman reformers developed similar concerns towards children insofar as they embraced the broader Western modernizing discourse of the period. In this climate, a solution – reform houses – was precociously offered in the 1860’s for a problem not yet conceptualized as being that grave.

17As the modernizing Ottoman state started to offer centrally organized philanthropic activities and charity institutions, there emerged a more or less discernible process of professionalization, accompanied by a whole corps of state educated workers. The problematization of children's education and the conditions that would prevent child delinquency came to be more and more the monopoly of “experts”. Interestingly, in the absence of genuine experts on psychology, education or social work in the Ottoman context, the state relied on the expertise of police departments, administrative officials, and provincial governors – especially in the person of Midhat Pasha as the “genius” behind the establishment of reform houses. These apparatuses produced a definition of or defined juvenile delinquency and devised methods for eliminating it.

18Within this new climate of opinion, critical of unattended children on the streets, idle and vagrant poor boys could easily find themselves in ıslâhhanes; gangs of boys were especially targeted. In Aleppo, for instance, the governor general argued that unschooled orphan children were strolling the streets as vagrants (sokaklarda haylaz gezmekte) and begging. Moreover, those who reached puberty were joining the ranks of the already infamous city vagabonds (had-i bülûğu tecavüz edenler adeta Haleb’in meşhur haşeratı cümlesine dahil olmakta)27. In fact, children engaged in any activity on the streets were readily seen as potential delinquents and risked being treated as such. Most commonly they were apprehended by the newly-appointed police “inspectors” or sent directly to the ıslâhhane by the inhabitants of local communities28. After the emergence of reform houses, the young were prohibited from even playing rowdy games, shouting, whistling, throwing snowballs, or sliding on wet grass or ice. The governorship of Danube, for instance, prohibited children from playing games in the streets, sledding (kızak kaymak), or disturbing passersby on weekdays and during school hours. On the first occurrence of these acts, the child and his parents would be punished by an official reprimand (tekdir) by the city council; the second offense was punishable by “incarcerating” the child’s father (presumably for a short term); and with the third offense the child would be placed in an ıslâhhane29. As apparent from the harshness of the stance, belief that a modern state should both protect children from danger and protect society from dangerous children was becoming established in Ottoman administrative discourse and practice as well.

19With a similar critical stance towards lower class families and their ability to raise their children properly, poor families were invited to abandon children they could not support to the ıslâhhanes30. Many of the reform houses, though giving priority to orphans and destitute children, were not reserved for them alone and provided care for children whose parents were indigent. In the Regulations of the Aleppo reform house, the targeted student body was defined as children of the poor from all communities (teba-yı devlet-i aliyeden her sınıf fukarası evladından)31. In the ıslâhhane of Antalya, many were children of the poor, who were “in a miserable position and unable to provide for the education of their children32”. In fact, the institutional world of children was not one defined by rigid boundaries; the institutions created could not always accommodate their intended populations. There were legitimate or parented children in foundling homes and orphanages, foundlings kept in hospitals, unruly children committed by their parents to the authorities for “correction” in judiciary prisons; and orphans, for lack of orphanages, were classified as vagabonds and sent to reformatories. This was a world of poor, needy children in flux, some finding, or being forced into, institutional situations with others outside the doors of institutions.

20In addition to vagrant boys in the streets and the children of the poor, the third category of children who were seen as “in need of protection” or as “abetted into crime” were beggars, usually of refugee origin. In 1868, the Supreme Council of Administrative Affairs (Meclis-i Vâlâ-yı Ahkâm-ı Adliye) underlined that the reform houses in the Danube were opened primarily to collect the destitute refugee children and orphans who had formerly wandered the streets and performed the ugly act of begging (zell-i sual) along with other disgraceful acts (sû-i efali irtikab)33. As apparent from the choice of words in the formulation, zell (misdemeanour) and irtikab (perpetrating a crime), the council implied that these children were seen as “inclined towards crime”, although none was charged with any specific offense. Concern and criticism about beggars in urban areas was in fact a new or emergent discourse, given that begging had once been a recognized “occupation” in the Ottoman society, even with a guild of its own. More importantly, vagrancy and begging started drawing the authorities’ attention as “behaviour that requires policing” if public order is to be maintained, although they were not crimes in themselves until the 1890’s, namely with the passage of the Law on Vagabonds and Suspected Persons34. Despite the longstanding presence of child beggars, perception of the issue as a “problem” and the anxiety it inspired was related to a preoccupation with disciplining the urban space with modern governance techniques.

21The marginalization of begging also resulted from consecutive refugee crises. After the Russo-Ottoman War of 1877-78, the issue of destitute refugee children, especially in Istanbul, was on the state’s agenda. In February and March 1878, the security forces collected a number of destitute children from the streets of Istanbul and attempted to shelter them in such places as boarding schools, ıslâhhane, and the Imperial Arsenal or Docks (Tophane ve Tersane-i Amire Sanayi Alayları)35. In 1881, in his report to the sultan, grand vizier Saffet Pasha argued that hundreds of orphans of the Rumelian refugees, who had come to Istanbul as a result of the war, were forced into begging36. He claimed that before the Russian attack it was impossible to encounter a single beggar from Rumelia in the capital city37. If these children, he continued, “who lost their motherland and their relatives” (yurd ve akrabalarını kaybetmiş), get used to this sort of livelihood, it will be impossible in the future to lead them into any craft or skill (kâr ve zanaata süluk etmek). So it was deemed necessary to guide them into a proper livelihood as quickly as possible, before their age became an impediment38. Following his report, two orders were given on 8 and 12 December 1881 for the collection of refugee orphans begging in the streets of Istanbul39. As a result, 222 child beggars were collected and 34 of them were put into the reform house of Istanbul, while the rest (188) were handed over to the Imperial Arsenal40. This rather effective “collection” and placement effort and the government’s immediate response in collaboration with the city’s municipal units point to the crystallization of the anti-child-in-urban-spaces discourse. In 1882, as there were still significant numbers of street children and not enough vacancies in potential institutions, the government even took the harsh decision of locking the children up in the old prison of Istanbul called Zaptiye Kapısı41.

22The problematization of begging was voiced within a discourse focusing on undesired migration42 and neglectful or abusive parents43. The new discourse on “children in danger” defined unruliness or crime as a learned thing. In this picture, the child, who was not liable for his conduct, was to be saved and normalized by a form of state interventionism. The state claimed jurisdiction over children and assumed the right to intervene for purposes of providing protection and welfare. The state jurisdiction, therefore, extended not only to delinquents, but also to children who were “in need of protection” (those who were not raised with care and love, who were abused, or whose basic needs were not satisfied). It was argued that since refugee families were forced to stay in urban environments despite their peasant backgrounds, they were leading their orphans and/or children into begging due to financial distress. In the late 1880’s, the government was already alarmed by the fact that poor parents from the Anatolian and European provinces of the Empire were migrating to the capital and forcing their children into begging in the streets and market places. Therefore, the Ministry of the Interior sent orders to the provinces in order to prohibit the migration of the needy and poor inhabitants of these areas to other areas44. Here the emphasis was on the role of third parties (adults in charge of these minors) in corrupting the morals of children and leading them in anti-social directions. There are also examples of individuals sentenced for leading minors into begging, in compliance with the Law on Vagabonds and Suspected Persons45. In other words, with a preventive discourse to keep children away from crime, parental rights over children were under the surveillance of the state authorities and institutions (police forces, governorships, ıslâhhanes).

23As the problem persisted and the number of beggars increased daily, in the early 1890’s there was an attempt to open a specific institution for homeless people and beggars in Istanbul. Despite a series of official discussions, decisions, and orders to open such an institution for employing able-bodied adults, sheltering and providing for the crippled, as well as educating child beggars, the government did not manage to realize the project46. Therefore, throughout the decade and as late as the early 1900’s, the Istanbul municipality and security forces continued collecting beggars, vagrants, and destitute children (serseri ve sefil olarak dolaşan çocuklar) from the streets. Although the ideal solution would be to enroll them in reform houses, boarding schools or vocational institutes, for lack of sufficient places and the state's incapacity to open new ones, most of the children were transferred to artillery units (Tophane Sanayii Alayları) or to the Imperial docks (Tersane-i Âmire)47. The transfer of children to any place with vacancies implies that reformers did not have a clearly outlined scheme for children's rehabilitation or reform (ıslâh). Yet, their stance regarding the security, sanitation and beauty of urban space was quite clear: a modern city meant the exclusion and incarceration of unattended children.

24Despite their name “reform house”, ıslâhhanes were not necessarily opened for criminal minors or juvenile delinquents. Yet, the fourth element constituting the population of these institutions was underage criminals. In the Regulation of reform houses, it was underlined that those children (under 13) who were accused of committing a crime (irtikab-ı töhmet ve cinayetle) which legally necessitated a prison sentence of one year or longer (kanunen bir sene ve daha ziyade hapsi lazım gelen), would be put into ıslâhhanes instead of adult prisons – as there were no juvenile prisons in the Empire48. Concluding from the few times the Regulation refers to “criminal children” – only three articles out of 52 mentioned them – those who were placed in the institution with the goals of disciplining and punishment (ıslâhhaneye tedib ve ceza için konulmuş olan etfal ve sıbyan) were probably a minority49. The way they were treated in the institution was no different from that of the other inmates, except that they were not allowed to leave the institution (dışarı salıverilmeyecektir) during weekends or vacations (Art. 44). Yet, it was within the director’s jurisdiction to grant them special permissions.

25The rules and regulations regarding children's behaviour and dress code in public – on occasions when they were allowed to leave the reform house – are also emblematic in drawing the boundaries of the inmates' presence in public spaces50. Each boy was provided with a jacket, a pair of trousers, and a fez for outdoor usage, in addition to indoor working clothes (Art. 5). It was strictly forbidden to leave the premises wearing working clothes and, thus, their superintendents were responsible for scrutinizing the children’s dress, making sure they wore their jackets and trousers (Art. 28) and that there were no stains or holes on their clothes (Art. 30). Moreover, children were required to act with good manners outside of the institution (gayet adab üzere hareket etmek) and were not allowed to mingle with other children on the streets (mahalle çocuklarıyla karışmak) or play games with them (Art. 39). In a sense, reformers imposed adult dress codes and behaviour in urban areas and even the basics of childhood – like playing games – were denied these children.

26We should also underline the gendered character of the interpretation of juvenile delinquency: whereas most descriptions of quasi-criminal bands refer specifically to boys, the majority of girls were accused of immoral behaviour or seen as subject to “moral threat”. Though immorality covered a wide array of behaviour, such as running away from home or associating with bad company, it clearly referred to sexual precocity. Lower-class girls were seen as targets of sexual predators; and that danger garnered special attention when those girls occupied public spaces (spaces outside the home, school, or factory). It was noted in a 1883 report that if refugee girls on the streets were deprived of decent instruction and discipline, Istanbul would thence suffer from the emergence of certain unacceptable activities (bir takım ef’al-i gayr-ı marziyat)51. The reform house, as a result, had the duty of steering these girls away from bad behaviour and disciplining them (kızları bir takım hâlatdan muhafaza ile zabt u rabt). Interestingly, the necessity of opening reform houses for girls was tied to the morality, order, and safety of the urban space, rather than affection and pity for the girls. Girls were in danger because of their sexuality, while that same sexuality posed a corrupting threat to society in general.

3. Children Working for “Reform”

27The urban reform practice of the new generation of Ottoman administrators brought about significant change in the way the Ottoman state treated such social groups such as prisoners, orphans, “delinquents” and beggars, who were now conceived as marginal and who needed to be pulled back towards the “centre”. Among these practices, the use of prisoners’ and delinquents’ labour in reform projects was the most visible one. As the Empire-wide inspirational example, in the province of Danube the prison population was used extensively: prisoners broke stones or carried bricks for building construction around Ruse; work gangs consisting of the city’s prison inmates demolished slaughter-houses, tobacco shops and other structures that stood in the way of the administration’s city modernization plan52.

28By the same token, children in the reform houses acquired necessary skills and were employed in new factories and industrial complexes opened by entrepreneurs. Vagrant and idle children and ıslâhhanes were, therefore, instrumental in developing the urban economy and reforming local industries. In this way, the reformers hoped to combat the Empire’s foreign debt and its dependence on imported goods. The reform houses would raise new generations of talented and skilled workers and ensure the rejuvenation of certain traditional urban arts and crafts. In other words, they would play a corrective role for the rehabilitation of the domestic economy. The decline of artisanal production, especially in the traditionally strong industries, was a very real concern for the administrative and intellectual elite of the Empire. Namık Kemal, a well-known author and reformer, bemoaned the closure of workshops all over the Empire: “[...] previously, we were self-sufficient, not only in agriculture, but also in industry. We used to possess many workshops to respond our all sorts of needs. In twenty or thirty years, all of them have been ruined53”.

29As part of the efforts to prevent an ongoing weakening of the local producers of various goods, to help improve their trades (ıslâh-ı sanat) and to raise the value of their commerce, the government established the Commission for the Reformation of Industry (Islâh-ı Sanayi Komisyonu) in 186454. One of the Commission’s first ventures was to open ıslâhhane or Islâh-ı Sanayi Mektebi (the School for the Reformation of Industry) of Istanbul in 186955. The appearance of the same objective of “reformation of industry” (ıslâh-ı sanayi) in both the commission’s and the school’s name reflects the organic link between reform houses and economic aspirations. The school’s main objective was declared as training a new well-educated artisan class in order to compete with the dominance of European goods in the marketplace56. Also according to Midhat’s account, the government established the entire network of reform houses after realizing the benefits of the ıslâhhanes in the province of Danube, not only in protecting and educating destitute children and orphans (aceze ve bikes eytamın muhafaza ve terbiyesi), but also in “rejuvenating the domestic economy and encouraging skilled artisans” (dahili sanayiin ve ehl-i sanat ve hirfetin teksiri)57.

30The reorganization of local industries and the formation of a new skilled class of labourers were the two main aims that went hand in hand. Reform houses were to transform vagrant children into responsible and dependable workers. One of the central discourses behind the legitimization of the orphanages in the official correspondence was to combat the idleness of children in turning them into productive workers (hirfet ve sanayii devama alışdırılarak)58. The administrators in Niš criticized the ignorance of the local community for having left their children unemployed59. In fact, together with a manifest objective of “saving the children”, the reformers insistently underlined the need to make these children useful as skillful and talented artisans60. Therefore, the inmates of the reform houses were not simply disciplined and educated, but were also recruited as employees of the vilâyets.

31The reformers aspired to inculcate an ethic of hard-work and industriousness to these previously idle and wandering children. As proof of the ıslâhhane's desired disciplinary effect on its inmates, official local newspapers of governorships published stories of achievement. In July 1865, for instance, the official paper of the Danube, Tuna/Dunav, published a letter supposedly written by a fourteen-year-old boy in Niš. The narrative not only emphasized the student’s accomplishments, but also an industrious, competitive and “patriotic” spirit that had been sparked amongst the inmates.

Some time ago, my friends and I began to learn how to cut and stitch shoes. When Süleyman Paşa, the district governor (kaymakam) of Niš, heard of this he did not believe it. His Excellency came to the ıslâhhane one day, placed a policeman to watch over me as I worked, and ordered the policeman to give me one gold lira coin if I managed to make three pairs of shoes. I made the shoes and took the coin. While your newspaper reported on this matter in its thirteenth issue, your report in fact stated that I used a machine to do some of the stitching on those shoes. That is not true – no machines at all are used in making that kind of shoe. Thus, your report made me sorry, because my prestige among my friends was being trampled upon. [...] I beg you to publish my letter in your newspaper, so I can again look my friends in the face61.

32In parallel with this preoccupation with raising hard-working, responsible labourers, the curriculum of the institution emphasized trades rather than formal schooling. The formal education was limited to two hours a day of basic education in reading, writing, and arithmetic62. The school day would start in the morning with primary school education (sübyan dersi), followed by training in arts and crafts (at least six hours a day in the ateliers)63. These institutions had proper workshops for trades, with an apprenticeship structure of teaching, wherein more advanced students taught less advanced ones64.

33Despite minor adjustments based on the specifics of the vilâyets in terms of raw materials and production methods, the same set of trades (tailoring, shoe-making, rug-weaving, cabinet-making, and printing) were taught throughout the Empire65. As typical examples, the boys in Izmir were taught tailoring, shoe-making, rug weaving, cabinetmaking, and printing66. In Aleppo, boys were only trained in tailoring and shoe-making, in order to manufacture the uniforms and shoes of the municipal police67. It was also common to send boys and girls to ateliers or factories in the cities to be trained in specific trades. For instance, boys in the printing subdivision of the Niš orphanage learned it at the vilâyet press; in turn, leather-working students of Istanbul were sent to the mills of Kazlıçeşme and Beykoz68.

34Many ıslâhhanes actually became important local producers, meeting the vital needs of local governments and municipalities – mostly military uniforms, shoes, and woolen cloth. Only three months after its opening in 1869, the ıslâhhane of Diyarbekir was able to produce the shoes for the gendarmerie together with a part of its uniforms69. In its later years, the orphanage provided for the needs of several governmental institutions and the local community70. The industrial orphanage of Kosovo also produced shoes and uniforms for officers and civil servants of the province71. The ıslâhhane of Bursa, specialized in weaving, produced the fabric for the gendarmerie’s uniforms72. The sale of student handiwork provided the bulk of the daily operating expenses of the ıslâhhanes and through its inmates’ labour, most of the reform houses were largely self-supporting.

35These “reform houses” not only generated revenue on a daily basis, but were also conceived of as veritable factories for cadres for many of the new public or semi-public businesses. Some of the industrial orphanages were specifically founded to supply labourers for large industrial complexes and factories. Midhat Pasha’s industrial policies and their links with the ıslâhhanes in Niš, Ruse, Sofia, Baghdad, and Damascus – each sheltering 150-250 orphans – were remarkable. The boys in Ruse were trained to become blacksmiths and cartwrights for the provincial coach company, technicians for the new naval repair yard, sailors for the provincial steamship company, typesetters for the printing presses, and railroad employees on the Ruse-Varna line. The girls in Ruse, for their part, worked for the cloth factory, producing fabric for the army. The broadcloth factory adjacent to the Sofia Orphanage was a profitable enterprise too, manufacturing 30,000 meters of broadcloth a year73. The girls’ orphanage of Istanbul, opened adjacent to the Yedikule weaving factory in 1870, also resulted in the employment of girls as workers74.

36Children were also used as helpers in the institution. They took care of their own wards/dormitories: they swept the floors, carried water, rolled up the clothes and helped with other necessary chores. Those who were punished for misbehavior in the institution were also responsible for cleaning the toilets75. Moreover, the ones who successfully finished their five years of study were given the chance of being employed in the reform house either with a daily wage (yevmiye), or long-term contracts (müddet)76.

37The 1869 Ordinance of General Education (Maarif-i Umumiye Nizamnamesi), issued along with the contributions of Saffet Pasha, the Minister of Education, was an important attempt at establishing a modern educational infrastructure. In line with recent developments in educating and employing orphans and destitute children in arts and crafts, the ordinance stressed the necessity of vocational training for the development and modernization of the country77. In fact, the pioneering educational reforms of the Tanzimat era were in the areas of technical-vocational, professional and informal public education78. In this picture, ıslâhhanes and their inmates were expected to “reaffirm the eminence of the industry and reinforce the wealth of the nation and the country79”.

4. Conclusion

38Long before young offenders were perceived as a problem in Ottoman society and prior to the emergence of a body of literature and experts on criminology, psychology, education or social work, reform houses (ıslâhhanes) were conceived as a part of a larger vision of Ottoman urban reform, aimed at the reorganization of urban life in social and economic terms. The discourse around the institution was mostly centred on the modernization, beautification, and security of the cities and the progress, welfare, and self-sufficiency of the economy. In that sense, the institution was first and foremost interested in reforming (ıslâh) the urban space. For that reason, the expertise the state relied on was that of provincial governors, municipal heads, police chiefs, and reform-minded statesmen, who played a significant role in the adaptation and implementation of European discourses on urban governance, as well as in problematizing not yet manifest juvenile delinquency.

39The attitude of Ottoman reformers towards disciplining and rehabilitating vagrant children was two fold. As a first priority, the vagrant and idle youth were to be removed from the streets – so ıslâhhanes were opened as a means of political control and exclusion from society. Yet, as an indirect but crucial outcome, the reformers wanted to make these children productive and useful in artisanal positions, as a means of (re)inclusion in the society. The establishment of reform houses was considered not only as a means of solving a public order problem, but also represented a means of re-integration, of re-shaping the civil responsibility among those children who had either lost or never embraced it. Thus, the incarceration and education of vagrants and destitute children was conceived of from different angles: they were collected from the streets as unwanted, undesirable elements of urban life, for the reformers believed that they could recycle this excluded sector and generate beneficial results.