The European Union as a Mediator in Post-Conflict Western Balkans PDF Download

Author: Violeta Ferati Bakia
Publisher: Rowman & Littlefield
ISBN: 1666914541
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 233

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Book Description
This book is among the few publications that analyze the determining conditions, outcome effectiveness and impact of EU mediation utilized as an instrument of conflict resolution that aims to solve protracted conflicts in the post-conflict settings of Kosovo and Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Author: Laurence Cooley
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1351043463
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 230

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Book Description
This book 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. The book argues, contrary to the assumptions of much of the existing literature, that rather than seeking the transformation of conflicts, the EU pursues a more conservative strategy based on the regulation of conflict through the promotion of institutional mechanisms such as consociational power sharing and decentralisation. Drawing on discourse analysis of documents, speeches, and interviews conducted by the author with European Union officials and policy-makers in Brussels and the case-study countries, the book offers a theoretically grounded, methodologically rigorous and empirically detailed analysis of EU policy preferences, of the ideas that underpin them, and of how those preferences are legitimised. This book will be of key interest to scholars, students and practitioners interested in ethnic conflict and conflict resolution, the politics of the Balkans, and the external and foreign policies of the EU.

Author: Julian Bergmann
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3030255646
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 270

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Book Description
This book explores the EU’s effectiveness as an international mediator and provides a comparative analysis of EU mediation through three case studies: the conflict over Montenegro’s independence, the Belgrade-Pristina dialogue between Kosovo and Serbia, and the Geneva International Discussions on South Ossetia and Abkhazia. The book starts from the observation that the EU has emerged as an important international provider of mediation in various conflicts around the world. Against this background, the author develops an analytical framework to investigate EU mediation effectiveness that is then applied to the three cases. The main finding of the book is that EU mediation has a stabilising effect on conflict dynamics, making renewed escalation less likely and contributing to the settlement of conflict issues. At the same time, the EU’s effectiveness depends primarily on its ability to influence the conflict parties’ willingness to compromise through conditionality and diplomatic pressure.

Author: Nathalie Tocci
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1134123388
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 219

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Book Description
Through the study of five ethno-political conflicts lying on or just beyond Europe's borders, this book analyzes the impact and effectiveness of EU foreign policy on conflict resolution. Conflict resolution features strongly as an objective of the European Union's foreign policy. In promoting this aim, the EU's geographical focus has rested primarily in its beleaguered backyard to the south and to the east. Taking a strong comparative approach, Nathalie Tocci explores the principal determinants of conflict dynamics in Cyprus, Turkey, Serbia-Montenegro, Israel-Palestine and Georgia in order to assess the impact of EU contractual ties on them. The volume includes topical analyzis based on first-hand experience, in-depth interviews with all the relevant actors and photography in ongoing conflict areas in the Middle East, the Eastern Mediterranean, the Balkans and the Caucasus. This revealing study shows that the gap between EU potential and effectiveness often rests in the specific manner in which the EU collectively chooses to conduct its contractual relations. The EU and Conflict Resolution will be of interest to all readers who wish to acquire an excellent understanding of the EU's impact on conflict contexts and will appeal to scholars of European politics, security studies and conflict resolution.

Author: Reina Zenelaj Shehi
Publisher: Logos Verlag Berlin GmbH
ISBN: 3832551379
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 130

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Book Description
The Western Balkan countries are characterized by an entanglement of different national, ethnic and religious groups. Within all Balkan states, nationalist rivalries have been and are exploited by political leaders as a propaganda tool when faced with internal unrest or unpopularity. Yet, the proximity of ethnic communities to their countries of ethnic origin tie all the Balkan states into a common problem: the spillover effect of regional insecurity. Existing and future disputes require an exhaustive survey of national, ethnic, religious, territorial, economic and political problems, and this is precisely what this volume sets out to do.

Author: Steven Blockmans
Publisher: T.M.C. Asser Press
ISBN: 9789067044790
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 0

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Book Description
The European Union has come a long way in the Western Balkans in just a few years. Where, in the 1990s, the EU stood by and watched the Balkans burn, it was the US, within NATO, that acted decisively to stop the wars. In the aftermath of the Kosovo crisis, the Union finally found its voice to say no to new armed conflict in the heart of Europe. As part of the international presence in the region, the EU adopted sanctions, brokered political agreements, launched its first-ever police and military missions and directed economic, legal and administrative reforms to eradicate the roots of instability. Yet, despite the comprehensive nature of the Union’s actions, its strategies have been marked by confusion, its actions by concurrent or competing mandates of other international organisations. As the Western Balkans still contain the possibility of a genuine security threat, there is a real imperative to move the region as a whole from the stage of international protectorates and weak states to the stage of accession to the euro-Atlantic organisations to which they aspire. The author argues that, under the leadership of the European Union, only a ‘tough love’ strategy, based on a firm but fair application of the conditionality principle, can lead to the integration of the Western Balkans into the European mainstream. Dr. Steven Blockmans is senior research fellow in EU law and deputy head of research at the T.M.C. Asser Instituut, The Hague, The Netherlands.

Author: Richard G. Whitman
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 0415528720
Category : Law
Languages : en
Pages : 274

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Book Description
This book provides a comprehensive assessment of how the EU has performed in facilitating mediation, conflict resolution and peacebuilding across the globe.

Author: Florian Bieber
Publisher: Routledge
ISBN: 1135739951
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 247

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Book Description
This volume examines how European institutions, the European Union in particular through its policy of conditionality, have shaped the post-conflict reconstruction of the Western Balkans. From state-building to democratization and environmental policies, this book explores whether and in what ways the EU has been successful in consolidating states and democracy in the Balkans. In addition to requiring countries to be ready to join the European Union, the EU has also set new conditions in an effort to become the prime international organization involved in stabilizing the Western Balkans after the wars of the 1990s. Its record has been mixed: the conditions of the EU have often been haphazard and were frequently not followed through. In addition, enlargement towards the Western Balkans has been slow and marred by open questions over the stability of some countries in the region. This volume assesses the EU's struggle to transform the societies through conditionality and whether the offer of EU membership is enough to build stable democracies. This book was published as a special issue of Europe-Asia Studies.

Author: Jelena Džankić
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 331991412X
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 262

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Book Description
This volume casts a fresh look on how the political spaces of the Western Balkan states (Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Kosovo, Macedonia and Albania) 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. The volume examines specific policy areas, salient in the enlargement process and to a different degree incorporated in the accession criteria, as well as EU foreign policy in the spheres of post-conflict stabilisation, democratization and the rule of law promotion.

Author: Rok Zupančič
Publisher: Springer
ISBN: 3319778242
Category : Political Science
Languages : en
Pages : 124

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Book Description
By shedding light on EULEX - the EU mission to Kosovo – this open access book investigates the EU’s peacebuilding activities in that country, in the light of the normative power theory in the post-conflict setting and peacebuilding theory. Ten years after the massive engagement of the EU in the country torn by war, the authors critically assess the effects of the EU projecting its normative power – the enforcement of its standards, ‘good’ or ‘bad’ – through the EULEX mission, taking into consideration also the local aspects, so far neglected in this field of research. Inspecting thoroughly the EULEX activities in the police, customs and judiciary sector, the authors reveal that the mission can contribute to a positive change, but only in those cases which do not request a heavy political involvement and broad leverage by other international players (for example in improving standards of work in police and customs). When it comes to the most serious cases of organized crime, corruption and war crimes, EULEX, however, has not been able to address them effectively due to several internal mission’s deficiencies and external factors; the perceived ineffectiveness of EULEX among the local population led to the lowering of trust not only in this CSDP mission, but also in the EU in general. This open access book offers a comprehensive assessment of the EULEX mission, based on two Horizon2020 research projects: IECEU - Improving the Effectiveness of Capabilities in EU Conflict Prevention, and KOSNORTH – The European Union and its Normative Power in a Post-conflict Society: A Case Study of Northern Kosovo (Marie Sklodowska-Curie Individual Fellowship). As such it is an invaluable resource for scholars, students and policymakers interested in security questions in South Eastern Europe and EU external action.