The paper presents a comparison of the model of National-Cultural Autonomy developed by Austro-Marxists at the end of the XIX century to the Ottoman Millet System.
Though in his State and Nation Renner does not make any specific reference to the Ottoman Millet System, it is recalled in the literature as the closest precedent to his conceptualization of cultural autonomies for linguistic communities.
The Millet System was at the basis of the Ottoman multi-cultural and multi-religious social system. It was based on the separation of different religious groups from each other and on the recognition of each denomination as legal entity with specific communal –‘segmental’- rights and privileges. The Millet was ultimately inclusive as it gathered all the people of the same faith independently of their place of living. Constituted as one of the basic administrative units of the state, the Millet provided the non-Muslim peoples with the possibility to cultivate a sense of identity and belonging to their communities, to protect their own culture, traditions, language and religion while acting within the framework of the Empire and in the respect of the authority of the Sultan. As a matter of fact, all Millet members shared a common political identity as subjects of the Sultan who, however, had no power on religious issues.
Nonetheless, National-Cultural Autonomies were envisaged to be constituted on the free and individual consent to belong to the national community and had restricted functional capacities if compared to the Millets.
The analysis underlines similarities and differences of the two models, addressing their conceptual foundations and structural organization. The comparison is further discussed in relation to the use of alternative forms of Non-territorial arrangements as instruments of management of diversities in contemporary multinational polities
