Scaling The Balkans

Scaling the Balkans puts in conversation several fields that have been traditionally treated as discrete: Balkan studies, Ottoman studies, East European studies, and Habsburg and Russian studies. By looking at the complex interrelationship between countries and regions, demonstrating how different perspectives and different methodological approaches inflect interpretations and conclusions, it insists on the heuristic value of scales. The volume is a collection of published and unpublished essays, dealing with issues of modernism, backwardness, historical legacy, balkanism, post-colonialism and orientalism, nationalism, identity and alterity, society-and nation-building, historical demography and social structure, socialism and communism in memory, and historiography.

The history of the Balkans has been a distillation of the great and terrible themes of 20th century history-the rise of nationalism, communism, fascism, genocide, identity and war. Written by one of the leading historians of the region, this is a new interpretation of that history, focusing on the uses and legacies of nationalism in the Balkan region. In particular, Professor Veremis analyses the influence of the West-from the fall of the Ottoman Empire and the rise and collapse of Yugoslavia. Throughout the state-building process of Greece, Serbia, Rumania, Bulgaria and later, Albania, the West provided legal, administrative and political prototypes to areas bedevilled by competing irredentist claims. At a time when Slovenia, Rumania, Bulgaria and Croatia have become full members of the EU, yet some orphans of the Communist past are facing domestic difficulties, A Modern History of the Balkans seeks to provide an important historical context to the current problems of nationalism and identity in the Balkans.

A newly revised and updated edition of an award-winning BBC correspondent's magisterial history of the Balkan region This unique and lively history of Balkan geopolitics since the early nineteenth century gives readers the essential historical background to more than one hundred years of events in this war-torn area. No other book covers the entire region, or offers such profound insights into the roots of Balkan violence, or explains so vividly the origins of modern Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, and Albania. Now updated to include the fall of Slobodan Milosevic, the capture of all indicted war criminals from the Yugoslav wars, and each state's quest for legitimacy in the European Union, The Balkans explores the often catastrophic relationship between the Balkans and the Great Powers, raising some disturbing questions about Western intervention.

Examines the origins of political violence in the Balkans since the 19th century, while treating the region as an integral part of modern European history, reminding us that political violence and ethnic cleansing are hardly unique to this region.

A comprehensive analysis of the political and security implications for southeastern Europe - indeed for the whole of Europe - resulting from the collapse of communism. This second edition has been significantly revised to include an assessment of the consequences of the disintegration of Yugoslavia and the ensuing war in Bosnia.

Since the collapse of Eastern European communism, the Balkans have been more prominent in world affairs than at any time since before the First World War. Crises in the area have led NATO to fire its first ever shots in anger, whilst international forces have been deployed on a scale and in a manner unprecedented in Europe since World War Two.An understanding of why this happened is impossible without some knowledge of the history of the area before the fall of communism, of how the communists came to power and how they used their authority thereafter. Covering the communist states of Albania, Bulgaria, Romania and Yugoslavia, and including Greece, Richard Crampton provides a highly readable introduction to that history, one that will be read by journalists, diplomats and anyone interested in the region and its impact on world politics today.

This open access book collects ten essays that look at intra-regional migration in the Southern Balkans from the late Ottoman period to the present. It examines forced as well as voluntary migrations and places these movements within their historical context, including ethnic cleansing, population exchanges, and demographic engineering in the service of nation-building as well as more recent labor migration due to globalization. Inside, readers will find the work of international experts that cuts across national and disciplinary lines. This cross-cultural, comparative approach fully captures the complexity of this highly fractured, yet interconnected, region. Coverage explores the role of population exchanges in the process of nation-building and irredentist policies in interwar Bulgaria, the story of Thracian refugees and their organizations in Bulgaria, the changing waves of migration from the Balkans to Turkey, Albanian immigrants in Greece, and the diminished importance of ethnic migration after the 1990s. In addition, the collection looks at such under-researched aspects of migration as memory, gender, and religion. The field of migration studies in the Southern Balkans is still fragmented along national and disciplinary lines. Moreover, the study of forced and voluntary migrations is often separate with few interconnections. The essays collected in this book bring these different traditions together. This complete portrait will help readers gain deep insight and better understanding into the diverse migration flows and intercultural exchanges that have occurred in the Southern Balkans in the last two centuries.

Everyday Life in the Balkans gathers the work of leading scholars across disciplines to provide a broad overview of the countries of Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Bulgaria, Croatia, Greece, Kosovo, Macedonia, Romania, Serbia, and Turkey. This region has long been characterized as a place of instability and political turmoil, from World War I, through the Yugoslav Wars, and even today as debate continues over issues such as the influx of refugees or the expansion of the European Union. However, the work gathered here moves beyond the images of war and post-socialist stagnation which dominate Western media coverage of the region to instead focus on the lived experiences of the people in these countries. Contributors consider a wide range of issues including family dynamics, gay rights, war memory, religion, cinema, fashion, and politics. Using clear language and engaging examples, Everyday Life in the Balkans provides the background context necessary for an enlightened conversation about the policies, economics, and culture of the region.

The loss of the Balkans was not merely a physical but also a psychological disaster for the Ottoman Empire. This work charts the creation of the modern Turkish self-perception during the transition period from the late Ottoman Empire to the Turkish Republic.