ABSTRACT
The O ttom an Empire and Persia can be placed, w ith China, in a distinct category o f regions that presented peculiar obstacles to European expansion in the under developed world. The failure o f societies in these three empires to produce modernising elites w hich were both powerful and cooperative limited their development as independent polities along W estern lines. At the same time, the presence o f large, antique, yet still death-defying political structures m eant that indigenous authorities could not be taken over w ithout prom oting internal disorder, incurring massive expense and risking international conflict. T he con undrum posed by the attempt to secure European interests w ithout disrupting the Middle East became know n in diplomatic circles as the Eastern Question. Policy-makers in Constantinople and Tehran grappled w ith a m ore desperate dilemma — the W estern Question — o f how to respond to intrusive European designs w ithout losing their autonom y.2
