PERCEPTIONS JOURNAL OF INTERNATIONAL AFFAIRS

Abstract

Writing on NATO and the Balkans1 is by no means an easy task. Even more than in other parts of the Old Continent, the post-1989 contradictory developments in the area called, more or less accurately, ‘the Balkans’, defy the long-standing inclination of analysts to think in either/or terms. Front-page mass media reports about NATO’s involvement in stopping armed conflicts in the territory of former Yugoslavia do quite often obscure other essential dimensions of the multifaceted presence of the Alliance within the area. Analytical efforts focused on identifying the new opportunities for a gradual re-linking of the whole area to mainstream Europe have to cope with die-hard stereotypes.

References

1. 1 The author’s views on the inaccuracy of the term ‘the Balkans’ can be found in Elena Zamfirescu, Mapping Central Europe, The Hague: Clingendael Paper, May 1996.
2. 2 Lawrence S. Kaplan and Robert W. Clawson, ‘NATO and the Mediterranean Powers in Historical Perspective’, in Lawrence S. Kaplan, et al. (eds.), NATO and the Mediterranean, Wilmington, Delaware, Scholarly Resources Inc., 1985, p. 4.
3. 3 Out of sheer symmetry, the author would like to remark that literally speaking, the geographical spread of NATO–North Atlantic–is as inaccurate as that of ‘the Balkans’.
4. 4 S. Victor Papacosma, ‘Greece and NATO’, in Lawrence S. Kaplan, et al. (eds.) op. cit., p. 191 (emphasis added). 5 Ibid., p. 192.
5. 6 Maria Todorova, Imagining the Balkans, Oxford University Press, 1997, pp. 165-186.
6. 7 William Clinton, ‘Radio Address by the President to the Nation’, in European Wireless File, American Embassy, USIS, Bucharest, February 16, 1999, p.25.