Captive States, Divided Societies

Political Institutions of Southeastern Europe in Historical Comparative Perspective

Research Group on European Affairs in cooperation with the Romanian Academic Society (SAR), Bucharest and The Romanian Institute for Recent History, Bucharest. Joint Project in the framework of the Volkswagen Foundation's funding initiative "Unity amidst Variety? Intellectual Foundations and Requirements for an Enlarged Europe". Term of the project: January 2005 until December 2007 German Version

21.02.2005 · Research Group on European Affairs

The prime objective of the project is to produce a research textbook on the political institutions of Southeastern Europe. The scope of the book encompasses both the state and nation building of the 19th and 20th centuries and the current period of transition. Supplementary objectives of the project concern the presentation of the main research results in a brochure for relevant decision-makers and opinion-makers as well as the consolidation of a multidisciplinary network of experts and institutions in Southeastern Europe.

Intensive cooperation in a team of political scientists, historians and political scientists will guarantee a proportionality of subregions and epochs. The project is base on a broad concept of political institutions: "normative arrangements – both formal and informal – that provide order and orientation to society and politics." The institutionalist approach ought to preclude an over-estimation of both national/regional specificities and universalistic processes of modernization and transformation.

The implementation of this project requires an experienced and highly motivated interdisciplinary team of two project managers, twelve authors for the thematic chapters and five reviewers who will, together with the managers/editors provide for the coherence of the intellectual process and the final product. The team members are expected to have a broad, theoretically founded expertise in the region and proven qualities in teamwork. The project offers them the resources for research trips – with the support of network institutions and scholars in the region – and thus the opportunity to add new epochs, or countries to their field of expertise. A major conference at the beginning of the project will carefully scrutinize and enhance the concept. At a second, smaller team-conference in the middle of the project preliminary results will be discussed and coordinated. At the final conference the research results will be presented and the brochure launched. Thereafter, the research textbook will be published.

Find more information and downloads in the project outline.