Psc 780-1, International Politics of Southeastern Europe, Fall 2006

Office 405b Maxwell Hall, office hours M 4-5:30 pm, Tu 12-2:00 pm & by appointment

Today's inhabitants of southeastern Europe have experienced very rapid change in almost every aspect of their lives. The ways in which they relate to the external world has changed rapidly as well. The seminar explores three dimensions of the contemporary international politics of southeastern Europe: What do EU enlargement, NATO expansion, and emigration to Europe signify about the current condition and future prospects of this region. Do the historical cleavages of ethnicity, religion and language perpetuate regional divisions? Do the pervasive pressures of "globalization" create a common future for most of the region's inhabitants? Do the Balkans remain the "powder keg of Europe" or are they, as Misha Glenny once asked, a success story -- "problems from hell which we have sorted out"? After some introductory historical readings in common, the seminar will divide into working groups, each seeking to answer one of the twelve questions below.

One working group will attack each of the questions below. Their first step is to sharpen the question! They will present a written and an oral report to the seminar on the week following the week in which the question appears below.

Each student will participate in four working groups during the course of the semester. Each group will include 2 to 4 persons. Each group will nominate, at the class meeting for which its topic is listed, two accessible journal articles for the rest of the class to read before the group's presentation.

The written report should not exceed 15 pages. The oral presentation should not exceed 15 minutes. It may be accompanied with a handout and visual aids. Seminar grades are computed as follows:

Participation during reports and other sessions of the course 25%. This includes performance as a formal discussant for one meeting.

During the course of the semester the instructor will add three short journal articles to the list below.

"Balkans" or "Southeastern Europe"? Historical meanings and their impact upon political thought.

Foundations of international political analysis, the Big Three: By September 19 everyone -- regardless of how strong you think your background is in IR -- should read carefully Chapters 7-10 and 13 in John Baylis and Steve Smith, eds., The Globalization of World Politics, 2nd ed. Oxford University Press, 2001. (R)

*John R. Lampe, Balkans into Southeastern Europe, Palgrave 2006, "Introduction" and Chapter 1. (R)

*Florian Bieber, "Nationalist Mobilization and Stories of Serb Suffering: The Kosovo myth from 600th anniversary to the present," Rethinking History 6, 1 (2002), 95 - 110.

*Edward P. Joseph, "Back to the Balkans," Foreign Affairs 84, 1 (January/February 2005), 111.

*Steven Woehrel, "Future of the Balkans and U.S. Policy Concerns," CRS Report for Congress, February 2005. Pdf

*Misha Glenny, The Balkans: Nationalism, War & the Great Powers, 1804-1999. Penguin 2001, Introduction, and look at maps.

How can we apply generic international relations theory to a region? Many states claim their history is an exception -- none more vehemently than the United States and China! Are the Balkans exceptions? (More on the Big 3 of Realism, Liberalism and Marxism) .

Alexandra Gheciu, Security Institutions as Agents of Socialization? NATO and the ‘New Europe’ International Organization 59, 04 (2005), 973-1012.

(1) Many accounts of the region emphasize the persistent influence of myths and partisan histories. What, if anything, is discernibly new in Southeastern Europe?

*Steven Levitsky and Lucan Way. "International Linkage and Democratization" Journal of Democracy 16, 3 (2005), 20-35.

#Iaonnis N. Grigoriades, "Turkey's accession to the European Union, Debating the most difficult enlargement ever," SAIS Review 26:1 (2006) 147-160.

Lampe emphasizes the wide range of pre-war institutions and practices which facilitated the installation of communism. How about institutions and practices of the communist period? Were they all harmful to the creation of market democaracy?

(2) Do exclusivist nationalist ideologies remain powerful in Southeastern Europe? What nationalist elements remain the foreign policies of the states of the region?

*Choose: Misha Glenny, The Fall of Yugoslavia : the third Balkan war. Penguin 1992. (R) OR Laura Silber and Allen Little, Yugoslavia: Death of a Nation. TV Books, 1996. (R) (You may also wish to view the BBD documentary of the same title.)

*Milada Anna Vachudova, Europe Undivided: Democracy, Leverage and Integration After Communsim. Oxford University Press, 2005. Chapters 3 and 5 (on "passive" and "active" leverage of the EU).

Sven Biscop, "The European Security Strategy, the Neighbourhood Policy and a Euro-Mediterranean Security Partnership" Second Pan-European Conference, Standing Group on EU Politics, Bologna, June 2004. loc

*Karen E. Smith, The Making of EU Foreign Policy: The Case of Eastern Europe, 2nd ed. Palgrave 2004, chapters 1,4,6,7,8, special attention to treatment of relations with Bulgaria and Romania. (R)

#Steven Van Evera. "Hypotheses on Nationalism and War" in Nationalism and Ethnic Conflict, Revised Edition, Ed. Michael E. Brown, Owen R. Cote Jr., Sean M.Lynn-Jones and Steven Miller, MIT Press, 26 - 60.

(3) Why is the EU enlarging in the direction of Southeastern Europe? What alternatives to enlargement remain viable?

James Wesley Scott, "The EU and 'Wider Europe': Toward an Alternative Geopolitics of Regional Cooperation?" Geopolitics 10, 3 (2005), 429 - 454.

*Robert Dover, "The EU and the Bosnian Civil War 1992: The Capabilities - Expectations Gap at the Heart of EU Foreign Policy," European Security 14, 3 (2005), 297 - 318.

Gerald Knaus and Marcus Cox, "The “Helsinki Moment” in Southeastern Europe," Journal of Democracy , 2005.

*Vladimir Gligorov, Mary Kaldor and Loukas Tsoukalis, "Balkan reconstruction and European integration," 2004. Pdf

*Dimitar Bechev, "Carrots, sticks and norms: the EU and regional cooperation in Southeast Europe," Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans 8, 1 (2006), 27-43.

(4) How do regional leaders think about "security"? What do they identify as their most pressing vulnerabilities?

(5) Do time-honored practices of inter-state politics, such as balance of power, collective security, and the like, retain any for relations among states of the region?

*Stelios Stavridis, "The Europeanisation of Greek Foreign Policy: A Literature Review," Discussion Paper No.10, The Hellenic Observatory, LSE, 2005.

Heinz Jürgen Axt, "[Greek] Relations with Turkey and Their Impact on the European Union," Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 5, 3 (2005), 365 - 378.

*Atila Eralp, "Turkey and the European Union," in Lenore G. Martin and Dimitris Keridis, eds., The Future of Turkish Foreign Policy, 63-83.
MIT Press, 2004

Dimitrios Triantaphyllou, "The Priorities of Greek Foreign Policy Today," Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 5, 3 (2005), 327 - 346.

*Panayotis J. Tsakonas and Thanos P. Dokos, "Greek-Turkish Relations in the Early Twenty-First Century: A View from Athens," in Lenore G. Martin and Dimitris Keridis, eds., The Future of Turkish Foreign Policy, 101-127. MIT Press, 2004.

Hans HÆkkerup, "Russia, the OSCE and Post-Cold-War European Security Introduction," Cambridge Review of International Affairs 18, 3 (2005), 371 - 373.

Milan Jazbec, "Defence Reform in the Western Balkans: The Way Ahead," Geneva Centre for the Democratic Control of Armed Forces, 2005.

(recommended) Ronald D. Asmus, Opening NATO’s Door: How the Alliance Remade Itself for a New Era. Columbia University Press, 2002.

*Anders Wivel, "The Security Challenge of Small EU Member States: Interests, Identity and the Development of the EU as a Security Actor," Journal of Common Market Studies 43 (2005), 393-412.

#Mustafa Aydin, "Europe's new region: the Black Sea in the wider Europe neighborhood," Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 5:2 (2005) 257-283.

(7) What is required to create a 'security community' or 'zone of peace' encompassing all of the region?

[Amb.] Fatos Tarifa, "The Adriatic Europe: Albania, Croatia, and Macedonia," Mediterranean Quarterly 16.4 (2005) 8-19. loc

*Dan Reiter, “Why NATO Enlargement Does Not Spread Democracy,” International Security 25, 4 (2001), 41-67.

(8) Do distinctively regional patterns of politics and political action remain in Southeastern Europe?

*Martin Brusis and Peter Thiery, "Comparing Political Governance: Southeastern Europe in a Global Perspective," Southeast European and Black Sea Studies 6, 1 (2006), 125 - 146.

#Richard G. Whitman, NATO, the EU and ESDP: An emerging division of labor?" Contemporary Security Policy 15:3 (2004), 430-451.

#Martin G. Smith and Graham Timmins, "The EU, NATO, and the extension of institutional order in Europe," World Affairs 163:2 (2000), 80-89.

*Alexandros Yannis, "The UN as Government in Kosovo," Global Governance,10 (2004),

*Arolda Elbasani, "Albania in transition: Manipulation or appropariation of international norms," Southeast European Politics 5, 1 (2004) 24-44.

(9.5) Does a suitable methodology exist for historical analysis of multisocietal regions? And how can one assess regional interdependencies with alternative comparative approaches?

Theda Skocpol and Margaret Somers, "The uses of comparative history in macrosocial inquiry," Comparative Studies in Society and History 22, 2 (1980), 174-197.

*Gülnur Aybet, "Turkey's long and winding road to the EU: implications for the Balkans," Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans 8, 1 (2006), 65-83.

#Dejan Guzina, "Socialist Serbia's narratives: From Yugoslavia to a Greater Serbia," International Journal of Politics, Culture and Society 17: 1 (2003), 91-111.

#Ivan Krastev, "The Balkans: Democracy without choices," Journal of Democracy 13:1 (2002), 39-53.

David Kernohan, "Reverse Balkanisation? Trade Integration in South-East Europe " CEPS Working Paper, August 2006. loc

Mirna Skrbic, "The Western Balkans: Trade for a Better Image," Transitions Online 02/21/06.

#Milica Uvalic, "Regional cooperation and the enlargement of the European Union, Lessons learned," International Political Science Review 23: 3 (2003), 319-333.

*E. A. Hammel, "Demography and the Origins of the Yugoslav Civil War," Anthropology Today 9, 1 (1993), 4-10.

*W. Bruggeman, "Illegal immigration and trafficking in human beings seen as a security problem for Europe", 2002 loc

(12) Is out-migration helpful or harmful? What international policies will retard out-migration from the region?

*William T. Bagatelas and Bruno S. Sergi, "The Balkans ‘brain drain’ – its meaning and implications," South-East Europe Review 4 (2003), 7-12.

*Lois Labrianidis, Antigone Lyberaki, Platon Tinios and Panos Hatziprokopiou, "Inflow of Migrants and Outflow of Investment: Aspects of Interdependence between Greece and the Balkans" Journal of Ethnic and Migration Studies 30, 6 (2004), 1183–1208.

#Vedran Horvat, "Brain drain: Threat to successful transition in southeastern Europe?" Southeast European Politics 5: 1 (2004), 76-93

#Institute for Public Policy Research, "EU enlargement: Bulgaria and Romania -- Implications for the UK," (IPPR Fact File) April 2006

12. December 5: Conclusions and projections: What international political developments do we expect to witness in the next five years?

Detailed chronology, focusing upon dissolution of Yugoslavia, beginning January 1996.

Available now (9/25), Elizabeth Pond, Endgame in the Balkans : Regime Change, European Style. Brookings. 2006. Good overview: would have nicely set the agenda for the seminar, except its geographic scope is a bit more limited.

Related, on media symbolism in SEE, Mitja Velikonja, EUrosis A Critique of the New Eurocentrism, Institute for Contemporary Social and Political Studies, Ljubljana, 2006. (http://mediawatch.mirovni-institut.si/eng/eurosis.pdf)

"Greece's Defense and Security Policy," Military Technology 28:10 (2004), 84-88.

Commission of the European Union, "Turkey 2006 Progress Report," SEC (2006) 1390.

Andrew Moravcsik and Milada Anna Vachudova, "National interests, state power, and EU enlargement," Center for European Studies #97, 2001.

Alexandra Gheciu, Security Institutions as Agents of Socialization? NATO and the ‘New Europe’ International Organization 59, 04 (2005), 973-1012.

[Amb.] Fatos Tarifa, "The Adriatic Europe: Albania, Croatia, and Macedonia," Mediterranean Quarterly 16.4 (2005) 8-19. loc