Western Balkans: Books

This book identifies the key challenges in the areas of economic inclusion, focusing on the themes of labour markets, vocational education and skills, female entrepreneurship and the integration of migrants. It considers the opportunities for solutions to “build back better” once the recovery from the COVID-19 crisis begins, and offers proposals for more acceptable, equitable and effective economic inclusion policies.

This book argues that it is everyday and mundane events that provide the entry points to showcase a broader set of practices of Europeanization in countries outside the EU. It does this by tracing notions of Europeanization in the everyday statebuilding of Kosovo, Europe Day celebrations in Bosnia and Herzegovina, urban politics in Tirana, and space and place making in Skopje. In doing so, the book shows that everyday events tell us that as much as it is about changing structures, institutions, and economic models, Europeanization is also about changing behaviours and ideas in populations at large.

This volume is an important contribution to debates about Europeanization, showcasing how European memory politics are appropriated and incorporated into local and national memory discourses. It sheds light not just on the Western Balkans, but Europeanization more broadly.

This book sheds light on the contradictions underlying the European Union enlargement process, specifically to the Western Balkans, challenging the common assumption that the integration of an extended European space might be possible without mutual transformation of the institutions and agencies involved.

The objective of the book is to detect the level of effectiveness of the EU impact on domestic structural changes in the Western Balkans regarding the fight against corruption and regional relations. The contributors argue that this impact has so far been limited and point to its limitations.

The book presents, in depth, the dual relationship between the EU and the Western Balkans. On the one hand it displays the continuous EU role in the Western Balkans, in particular in issues such as: the EU accession criteria; the EU approach and enlargement strategy; the visa liberalization process; the Stabilization and Association Process; the Stabilization and Association Agreements; instruments of financial assistance. On the other, it presents the progress the Western Balkans have achieved and the challenges faced

This book examines civil society empowerment during the EU enlargement process. Building on extensive fieldwork, it compares mobilisation around rule of law issues in Croatia, Montenegro, and Serbia. Moving beyond the traditional focus on the top-down impact of EU support, it demonstrates NGOs' agency and analyses their shifting strategies throughout the membership negotiations. Its approach and findings will appeal to scholars and advanced students of EU integration, social movements, and the politics of South East Europe.

This volume casts a fresh look on how the political spaces of the Western Balkan states are shaped, governed and transformed during the EU accession process. The contributors argue that EU conditionality in the Western Balkans does not work 'effectively' in terms of social change because rule transfer remains a 'contested' business, due to veto-players on the ground and strong legacies of the past.

This book assesses the instruments and measures geared towards determining the EU's relations with it's neighbours. These are channelled on the one hand by the enlargement policy focusing on the Western Balkans and on the other hand by the neighbourhood policy which will enable the integration of Central and Eastern European neighbouring countries without offering membership.

Focuses on the tools and mechanisms that the EU employs in its enlargement policy and examines the new instruments of direct intervention (in Bosnia and Kosovo), political coercion (in the case of Croatia and Serbia in relation to the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia), and stricter conditionality in the Western Balkan countries. The book discusses the key aim of this special form of statebuilding, which is to establish functional liberal-democratic states in Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro, and Serbia in order for them to join the EU and to cope with the responsibilities and pressures of membership in the future.

Investigates and explains the European Union's approach to conflict resolution in three countries of the Western Balkans: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Macedonia and Kosovo. In doing so, it critically interrogates claims that the EU acts as an agent of conflict transformation in its engagement with conflict-affected states.

How European issues have played out in Serbian and Croatian party politics since 2000, in the context of significant challenges brought by European integration of the Western Balkans.

This volume explores the different ways in which members of the European Union have interacted with Kosovo since it declared independence in 2008. Taking into account the quality and scope of their engagement with Kosovo, there are four broad categories of member states that can be distinguished: the strong and weak recognisers and the soft and hard non-recognisers.

This book provides a detailed understanding of how different types of engagements impact upon the reform and EU integration of the Western Balkan region. It examines the influence of Russia, China, Turkey and the UAE in the region and analyses the range of existing links.

This book examines the way in which a number of European Union member states, including Germany and France, formulate their policies towards enlargement in the Western Balkans. The six countries of the Western Balkans are on course to become the next members of the European Union. While there has been a lot of work on the ways in which these countries are preparing for accession, and how the EU as a whole approaches the question of expansion, very little attention has been paid to how individual EU member states regard enlargement into a region that presents a number of serious challenges.

With the region’s most contentious issues apparently having been defused, the EU could move from stability through containment towards European integration.

This book provides a detailed understanding of how different types of engagements impact upon the reform and EU integration of the Western Balkan region. It examines the influence of Russia, China, Turkey and the UAE in the region and analyses the range of existing links.

Alors que l’actualité de l’Europe se déplace vers l’Est, les regards se tournent à nouveau vers les Balkans : la guerre en Ukraine peut-elle s’étendre à cette région fragile ? De nouvelles violences vont-elles éclater au Kosovo ou en Bosnie-Herzégovine ? Trente ans après la dislocation de la Yougoslavie socialiste de Tito, tous les pays des Balkans occidentaux ont théoriquement « vocation » à rejoindre l’Union européenne, mais le processus d’élargissement est bloqué. Ces pays sont dominés par des élites corrompues et autoritaires, leur économie stagne, l’État de droit dérape, poussant ainsi les citoyens à l’exode.

This book outlines the main security threats, actors, and processes in the Western Balkans following the dissolution of Yugoslavia. Exploring the state of peace and security in the region it asks if a stable peace is achievable. The comparative framework explores state perspectives – from Serbia, Montenegro, Northern Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, and Kosovo – alongside military, political-societal, economic, and environmental security concerns.

This book presents information on public governance in the Western Balkan region – covering Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia, and compares it to OECD and OECD-EU countries. It features 40 indicators on public finance, public employment, centre of government, budgeting practices and procedures, human resources management, public procurement, digital government, core government results and serving citizens.

This book explores the stagnation of democracy in the Western Balkans over the last decade. The author maps regional features of rising authoritarianism that mirror larger global trends. It outlines the core mechanisms of authoritarian rule in the Balkans, with a particular focus on Serbia, Montenegro and Macedonia, including the creation of constant crises, the use of external powers to balance outside influences, as well as state capture. The authoritarian patterns exist alongside formal democratic institutions, resulting in competitive authoritarian regimes that use social polarization to retain power.

This book is a unique and original examination of borders and bordering practices in the Western Balkans prior to, during, and after the migrant "crisis" of the 2010s. Based on extensive, mixed-method, exploratory research in Serbia, Croatia, FYR Macedonia, and Kosovo, the book charts technological and human interventions deployed in this region that simultaneously enable and hinder the mobility projects of border crossers. This volume also explores the role of the EU in, and the impact of these processes on nation-states of the Western Balkans, their European future, and mobility in the region.

The Western Balkans and the Visegrad Group are two macro-regions within the larger Eastern European area. Geographically and historically close, both regions share comparable characteristics on a macro-regional level as well as among the region's individual countries on a national level. However, when it comes to identities, the national level seems unavoidable: politically speaking, identity means national identity first and foremost. This book examines the ways in which the very sense of regional belonging might-or might not-override the shortcomings of and the obstacles erected by national identity.

This book examines the evolution of liberal peacebuilding in the Balkans from the optimism of the mid-1990s to the current state through the analysis of three main phases, moving from the initial 'rise' to a later condition of 'stalemate' and then 'fall' of peacebuilding.

This book examines the process of presidentialisation of political parties in the Western Balkans through a comparative analysis that takes into account their distinctive features in terms of processes of democratization, forms of government and institutional assets, the presence of social cleavages and the nature of political parties. These show both differences from other European cases, especially in terms of origins, organization and structure; and similarities with other West European cases where power is centralised and held by the parties' leadership.

This book provides a comprehensive and systematic analysis of the foreign policy of Bosnia and Herzegovina, a post-conflict country with an active agency in international affairs. It includes conflict and post-conflict periods, Euro-Atlantic integration, political affairs on both local and regional levels, integration with a variety of international organizations and actors, neighboring states, bilateral relations with relevant other states including the United States, Russia, selected EU countries, and Turkey, as well as BiH's diaspora.

This book explores the challenges of democratization and reconciliation in the context of European integration in the post-Yugoslav region. Adopting an interdisciplinary approach, the book provides readers with a comprehensive account of the various challenges inhibiting democratization and reconciliation. The chapters are written by authors from different disciplines, thus allowing readers to analyze the region from different perspectives.

The author argues, first, that transition-characterised by instability, movement, alterations and ruptures-becomes the rule of any society, not exclusively that of 'transitional societies'. And, secondly, transition points tentatively to a new era characterised by a drive, a movement that empowers a society creatively to self-constitute. In a ceaseless participatory process, each polity assembles, adjusts, fabricates and constructs itself as a society. Instead of disenchantment and collapse, 'democratic indetermination' and the 'politics of dwelling' are the factors which shape a truly effective and open democracy. Transition, therefore, is an uncharted journey in the land of democracy.

This unique and lively history of Balkan geopolitics since the early nineteenth century gives readers the essential historical background to recent events in this area. The book offers insights into the roots of Balkan violence, and explains the origins of modern Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia, Greece, Bulgaria, Romania, and Albania. Misha Glenny presents a lucid and fair-minded account of each national group in the Balkans and its struggle for statehood.