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Volume 70 Issue 4 - Making Sense of Archives; Guest Editor: Iva Lučić

Issue of Comparative Southeast European Studies

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Contents
Journal Overview

Publicly Available January 4, 2023

Frontmatter

Page range: i-iv

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Making Sense of Archives

Open Access January 4, 2023

Making Sense of Archives: An Introduction

Iva Lučić

Page range: 567-584

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Abstract

This introduction to the thematic section “Making Sense of Archives” explores different archival terrains in Southeastern Europe. It discusses the politics of storage against the background of the processes of professionalization in the archival field, the provenance of funding for both storing and digitalizing archival collections, and the chronic lack of archival personnel. The author makes a plea for critical engagement with archival spaces by explicating the logics of the archiving processes of documents of different kinds and the dimensions of power immanent to them. Moreover, she argues that scholars need to reflect more critically on archivists’ mediating interventions, including appraisal, arrangement, processing, and description as a necessary complement to applied source criticism. Lastly, she locates the thematic section’s contributions within broader themes in the archival field, including knowledge management and blind spots in archives, the archival turn, the potentials and pitfalls of visual archives, and the study of documents as archival artefacts.

Open Access January 4, 2023

Archives of Mass Violence: Understanding and Using ICTY Trial Records

Iva Vukušić

Page range: 585-607

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Abstract

The most relevant collection for studying the wars accompanying the breakup of Yugoslavia, which resulted in over 130,000 dead or missing, is the archive of the International Criminal Tribunal for the Former Yugoslavia (ICTY) in The Hague. The Tribunal established by the UN Security Council in 1993 to prosecute genocide, crimes against humanity, and war crimes indicted 161 people and had accumulated millions of pages of testimony, military and police reports, and videos when it closed in late 2017. This invaluable record details the massacres and includes well-known incidents, such as the mass executions after the fall of Srebrenica, but also killings and torture elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia. This article investigates the history of this archive, analyzes its contents, and argues that the collection has two important features which present both a huge opportunity and a significant challenge for research—the immense volume of the archive, and a lack of access to important parts of it.

Open Access January 4, 2023

Photographic Archives and the Anthropology of Communism in Albania

Gilles de Rapper

Page range: 608-641

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Abstract

The communist period in Albania was a time of intense photographic production. Much more than in previous periods, photography was perceived by those in power as an indispensable tool while at the same time becoming accessible to almost the entire population. Many photographs from the time survived the end of the communist regime and can now be used to study the history and memory of that period. To be of historical value, however, the diversity of photographic genres and practices, as well as the history of the constitution of photographic archives demands consideration of the context of the production and circulation of photographs, and that is a primary objective of this article. The author shows how he conducted an ethnography of photography based on presentation of the current state of public and private collections, and how such investigation constitutes a contribution to the anthropology of communism in Albania.

Open Access January 4, 2023

The Franciscan Order of Things: Empire, Community, and Archival Practices in the Monasteries of Ottoman Bosnia

Ana Sekulić

Page range: 642-666

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Abstract

This article revisits the history of the Franciscan archives under Ottoman rule by focusing on archival documents, practices, and spaces in the Monastery of the Holy Spirit in Fojnica. Ottoman papers and archives preserved in the Franciscan spaces were often associated with Ottoman oppression. In this study, the author demonstrates that the documentary relationship between monasteries and Ottoman chanceries was not one-directional and cannot be characterized as oppressive. Franciscans actively engaged with the Ottoman documents and genres; they relied on the Ottoman vocabularies and legitimacy embedded in the documents, and subverted them at the same time, carving out their own physical and discursive spaces, which were tied to and yet different from the imaginaries of the Ottoman imperial order. The article emphasizes how examining archival narratives is located at the intersection of practices, texts, and spaces.

Open Access January 4, 2023

Understanding Colonial Archives: Reflections on Records from Habsburg Times in the Archives of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Amila Kasumović

Page range: 667-685

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Abstract

The most important records of the Austro-Hungarian administrative history of Bosnia and Herzegovina are kept in the fonds of the Provincial Government in Sarajevo and of the Joint Ministry of Finance, Department for Bosnia and Herzegovina, in Vienna, both forming part of the collection of the Archives of Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo and together amounting to approximately 2000 shelf metres. The author looks here through the lens of “colonial archives” to assess the missed potential of the two fonds for writing the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina, pointing out that historians have hitherto used them primarily to study political history and a few segments of socio-economic history, neglecting recent approaches to re-establishing archives’ value for research. Yet, as the author shows, the so-called “archival turn” would prove to be an asset in deepening the understanding not only of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s Austro-Hungarian imperial history, but its history more generally.

Article

Open Access January 4, 2023

Welfare States and Covid-19 Responses: Eastern versus Western Democracies

Kristina Nikolova, Raluca Bejan

Page range: 686-721

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Abstract

This study uses a welfare state lens to examine disparities in Covid-19 infections and mortality rates between countries in Eastern Europe compared to West European democracies. Expanding on Esping-Andersen’s typology of welfare regimes, the authors compare six country groups to conduct a multivariate statistical analysis that, when controlling for economic and health differences, shows the number of cases and deaths per 100,000 to be significantly higher for Eastern Europe. In comparing First, Second, and Third Wave data, the difference in Covid-19 infections and mortality rates can be explained through stricter lockdown measures implemented in the East at the start of the First Wave. Overall higher numbers in the East reflect comparatively looser state measures in response to the Second and Third Waves as well as the lack of trust in government and the weak implementation of public health measures.

Policy Analysis

Open Access January 4, 2023

Side Effects of “Phantom Pains”: How Bulgarian Historical Mythology Derails North Macedonia’s EU Accession

Ulf Brunnbauer

Page range: 722-739

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Abstract

What happens if historical daydreams derail the vector of European integration? The latest round in the dispute between Bulgaria and North Macedonia provides an insight. This analysis discusses Bulgaria’s veto on European Union (EU) accession talks with North Macedonia, first declared in 2019, and its manifold consequences. Bulgaria tied its consent to North Macedonia’s accession to the EU with the country first capitulating to Bulgarian demands concerning its history and identity. This revived arguments from the 1960s and 1970s. Bulgaria’s demands led to a nationalist counter-reaction in North Macedonia, while at the same time complicating the work of a joint expert commission on shared history established in 2017. The author highlights the unenviable nature of the position of the Macedonian members in the commission, caught as they are between their academic ethos and the diplomatic priorities of their country. The analysis concludes with remarks on the implications for the EU of Bulgaria’s “phantom pains” over Macedonia.

Book Reviews

Open Access January 4, 2023

Tibor Valuch: Everyday Life Under Communism and After: Lifestyle and Consumption in Hungary, 1945–2000

Zsuzsa Gille

Page range: 740-742

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Open Access January 4, 2023

Neven Andjelic: Covid-19, State-Power and Society in Europe: Focus on Western Balkans

Ion Marandici

Page range: 743-745

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Open Access January 4, 2023

Jelena Džankić: The Global Market for Investor Citizenship. Politics of Citizenship and Migration

Andrej Přívara

Page range: 746-747

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Open Access January 4, 2023

Tatjana Sekulić: The European Union and the Paradox of Enlargement: The Complex Accession of the Western Balkans

Kamil Glinka

Page range: 748-749

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About this journal

The quarterly Comparative Southeast European Studies (COMPSEES) evolved into its new format from that of its predecessor Südosteuropa. Journal of Politics and Society. From 2021 onwards, it is published both digitally, in Open Access, and in print, thereby becoming more easily accessible and even more visible internationally, not least in Southeastern Europe itself. Before long, a digital repository of Südosteuropa will be available to everyone.

Comparative Southeast European Studies will continue to be a forum for scholars in Political Science, Sociology, Contemporary History, Anthropology, Economics, International Relations, Law Studies, Gender Studies, Media Studies, Cultural Studies, and related disciplines. Taking a comparative and broad multidisciplinary perspective it will explore critical processes and societal issues related to　the area bounded by the eastern Adriatic, the eastern Mediterranean, and the Black Sea. We use two formats to showcase research. There are peer-reviewed research articles and a shorter format open to other text genres, which are presented under headings such as ‘Commentary’, ‘Interview’, ‘Background’, ‘Policy Analysis’, ‘Film in Focus’, ‘Debate’, ‘Spotlight’, ‘Book Symposium’, ‘The Making of...’, for example. This is a flexible section allowing us to address more immediately pertinent political, social, cultural, and academic matters. In addition, the Journal also features a book review section.

The new name Comparative Southeast European Studies is the logical next step in the Journal’s evolution. After it was founded in 1952, for more than half a century its predecessor Südosteuropa served as a well-established policy advice journal monitoring events in the region, before in 2007 taking a turn towards becoming a research-oriented multidisciplinary forum of the social sciences. Since 2014 the Journal has been published exclusively in English. We have continued to work towards improving its quality, including by addressing the citation indices relevant in the field, as they increase the pool of potential authors. A rigorous double-blind peer review regime has guided us while we have become more selective in what we publish. We prioritise work that is empirically and methodologically sound, well-written and jargon-free, thereby fostering interdisciplinary scholarly communication. We remain committed to broadening the range of the research we publish, while welcoming both emerging and established scholars to publish with us. Comparative Southeast European Studies strives to consolidate its reputation as one of the major area studies journals focusing on Southeastern Europe. We encourage transnational and entangled comparative perspectives, acknowledging that any ‘area’, any geographical construct, functions in its transareal, indeed global, relations.

We welcome both single manuscript submissions and proposals for guest-edited thematic sections. We look forward to working with you.

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Comparative Southeast European Studies is published by De Gruyter on behalf of © The Leibniz Institute for East and Southeast European Studies 2022