Between Balkanization and Banalization: Dilemmas of Ethno-cultural Diversity

Roshwald, Aviel

doi:10.1080/17449050701487371

Cited by 15 publications

(7 citation statements)

References 26 publications

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“…At the same time, many of the minorities in question were mobilized in support of collective rights to selfgovernance, activating a "rights vs. security" dilemma that was especially acute following the conflicts in the former Yugoslavia (Kymlicka 2007;Malloy 2015). As described later in this article, it was precisely this dilemma that sparked interest in NCA as a potential "middle way" between "banalization and balkanization" (Roshwald 2007).…”

Section: National-cultural Autonomymentioning

confidence: 96%

“…In both cases, NCA is portrayed as a potentially promising mechanism for boosting political stability and social cohesion within states, by enabling national minorities to participate fully and effectively in public life. NCA is seen as having particular merit because it grants these possibilities to minority communities while avoiding any explicit institutional linkage between ethnicity and territory (Roshwald 2007;Coakley 2016). State governments, it is reasoned, are invariably reluctant to countenance minority claims for territorial autonomy, since they see this as undermining their sovereignty as well as potentially threatening the integrity of the state.…”

Section: National-cultural Autonomymentioning

confidence: 99%

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The “Quadratic Nexus” Revisited: Nation-Building in Estonia Through the Prism of National Cultural Autonomy

Smith

2019

Nationalities Papers

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This article explores how the concept of minority national-cultural autonomy (NCA) has been defined and practiced in contemporary Estonia, combining data from interviews and previously unanalyzed archival sources to trace debates and policymaking processes back to 1988 and ascertain: why (and for whom) NCA was adopted; the functions ascribed to NCA institutions; and the effectiveness and legitimacy of the model in the eyes of different "noncore" ethnic communities. In so doing, the article uses NCA as a fresh lens for analyzing the more general politics of post-Soviet state and nation-building in the country, situating this case within the "Quadratic Nexus" framework. Estonia's NCA law is generally viewed as irrelevant to ongoing issues of diversity governance in the country. However, Finnish and Swedish minority autonomies have been established and, in recent years, there have been three applications to establish a Russian NCA. None have been approved, and yet some authors see them as evidence that NCA could (and should) have a role to play in bringing about a more meaningful accommodation of ethnic diversity. Having reviewed the evidence, however, the article concludes that this claim is misplaced.

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Section: National-cultural Autonomymentioning

confidence: 96%

Section: National-cultural Autonomymentioning

confidence: 99%

The “Quadratic Nexus” Revisited: Nation-Building in Estonia Through the Prism of National Cultural Autonomy

Smith

2019

Nationalities Papers

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“…Claims limited to the protection of minority languages (especially smaller ones in danger of extinction) were, it seems, far more palatable to European institutions. This in turn suggests that the latter were still wedded to ‘representation of ethno‐cultural differences within a nation as relatively superficial variations’ rather than espousing the more substantial agenda of self‐determination advanced by FUEN (Roshwald : 367).…”

Section: The Federal Union Of European Nationalities: Against the Grainmentioning

confidence: 99%

‘Forgotten Europeans’: transnational minority activism in the age of European integration

Smith

Germane

Housden

2018

Nations and Nationalism

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This article examines transnational activism by coalitions of national minorities in Europe from the early 20th century to the present, setting this within the broader 'security versus democracy dilemma' that continues to surround international discussions on minority rights. Specifically, we analyse two organisationsthe European Nationalities Congress (1925)(1926)(1927)(1928)(1929)(1930)(1931)(1932)(1933)(1934)(1935)(1936)(1937)(1938) and the Federal Union of European Nationalities (1949-)which, while linked, have never been subject to a detailed comparison based on primary sources. In so far as comparisons do exist, they present these bodies in highly negative terms, as mere fronts for inherently particularistic nationalisms that threaten political stability, state integrity and peace. Our more in-depth analysis provides a fresh and more nuanced perspective: it shows that, in both cases, concepts of European integration and 'unity in diversity' have provided the motivating goals and frameworks for transnational movements advocating common rights for all minorities and seeking positive interaction with the interstate world.

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“…Since 2000 much of the application has been to the dangers of balkanization in the United States and Iraq and the need for stern action to counteract them in both cases. But scholars also make considerable use of the term: Political Professor-[www.politicalprofessor.com], a Web site portraying political treaties and concepts-for example, defines "balkanization" as a "theory of the fragmentation of states"; others try to use the analogy in an analytic way (Roshwald 2007). Some of this recent usage of "balkanization" probably reflects widespread speculative debate about globalization and its relationship to renewed instability of international political borders in the late twentieth century (Kahler and Walter 2006).…”

Section: Why Balkan Analogies?mentioning

confidence: 99%

Making the Strange Familiar: Geographical Analogy in Global Geopolitics*

Agnew¹

2009

Geographical Review

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ABSTRACT. In several publications in the 1950s, Donald Meinig raised two themes that are central to contemporary “critical geopolitics”: criticizing the idea of a determining global physical geography that directs global geopolitics, and suggesting that geographical labels and geopolitical concepts have political consequences. I take off from Meinig's insight about geopolitics as an active process of naming and acting by discussing the broad power of analogy in world politics and by examining recent use of two geographical analogies—the Macedonian syndrome and balkanization—as symptomatic of a wider process of making the strange familiar by recycling geographical analogies.

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Between Balkanization and Banalization: Dilemmas of Ethno-cultural Diversity

Cited by 15 publications

References 26 publications

The “Quadratic Nexus” Revisited: Nation-Building in Estonia Through the Prism of National Cultural Autonomy

The “Quadratic Nexus” Revisited: Nation-Building in Estonia Through the Prism of National Cultural Autonomy

‘Forgotten Europeans’: transnational minority activism in the age of European integration

Making the Strange Familiar: Geographical Analogy in Global Geopolitics*

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