Course Description

The course revolves around a series of thematic areas related to the post-Cold War, post-communist era of Southeast Europe. These thematic areas will --inter alia-- include: a critical assessment of the disintegration of Yugoslavia; the evolution of the strategies of particular external actors (i.e.  US, Russia, China and Turkey) vis-a-vis the Balkans and their role in peacemaking and peacekeeping in the region; the role of international institutions in managing and/or resolving inter-state and intra-state/inter-ethnic conflicts in Southeast Europe (i.e. the United Nations in Kosovo, NATO and the European Union vis-a-vis the Greek-Turkish conflict, the European Union and NATO in Bosnia, Serbia/Kosovo and the 2001 insurgency in FYROM); the evolution of Greece's post-Cold War foreign policy towards the Balkan region; traditional and critical conceptions of security and new threats and challenges in the region ( i.e. Islamist radicalization and Jihadism) and current challenges and future prospects for building cooperative security schemes in the region.

Course Aims

• To acquaint students with the main security issues and threats facing the region (both traditional and new/asymmetric ones) as well as their nature and causes.
• To enable participants to analyze and explain particular developments in the region by connecting theoretical approaches to contemporary developments on the ground.
• To analyze and assess the role of external actors (i.e. international institutions and/or states) in the past, present and future of the region politics.
• To assess domestic and external efforts to mitigate the threats and challenges facing the region.
• To consider and assess efforts to promote cooperative security schemes in the region.

Learning Outcomes

On completing the course, students will:

• comprehend the complex nature of the region’s security problems

• have a systematic knowledge of the origins, historical evolution, and current debates of the most important issues related to the region
• comprehend how major theoretical approaches organize and sharpen our view of the challenges facing the region
• be able to critically evaluate and make inferences about the methodological validity of an approach used to understand and explain empirical developments and/or phenomena taking place in the region
• understand the relationship between theory and practice in Southeast Europe politics and to assess the policy-relevance of the various theories and approached of international relations

Students will also have gained the following transferable skills:

Through power-point presentation and interaction in the classroom students are expected to:

• develop their communication, presentation and argumentation skills;
• improving their own learning and performance by responding to comments, including criticism; and self-direction and originality in tackling and solving problems.

Course Organisation

The course is taught in twelve (12) seminars. It begins with an introduction of the most influential strands of the main IR theoretical traditions with the aim of making participants familiar with the various theoretical approaches' strengths and weaknesses in analyzing and explaining international phenomena. The rest of the course --devoted to the analysis of particular empirical developments in the region-- is organized along a series of presentations by the instructor of the course, three guest lecturers as well as oral collaborative presentations by the students, with the use of the PowerPoint projector and handouts. Preparation of the students presentations will be based on the listed readings provided in time by the course instructor as well as on the students' independent library research and will be followed by discussion and group work. The last week of the course, called the "Ambassador's Forum", will be devoted to a high-ranking diplomat from a Southeast European state, who will share with the participants his/her experiences as a practitioner in Southeast Europe politics. 

WEEK BY WEEK READINGS

Week 2:  Theories of IR and Security Studies

• Allan Collins (ed) Contemporary Security Studies (3rd edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2013)
• Peter Hough, Understanding Global Security (2nd edition, New York: Routledge, 2008)

Week 3: Past, present and future of the Greek-Turkish confrontation

• Panayotis Tsakonas (2010), The Incomplete Breakthrough in Greek-Turkish Grasping Greece's Socialization Strategy (Palgrave Macmillan, New York, 2010)
• Ioannis Grigoriadis "Greek-Turkish Relations" in Kevin Featherstone and Dimitri Sotiropoulos (eds.), The Oxford Handbook of Modern Greek Politics (OUP, 2020)
• Öniş, Z. and Yılmaz, Ş. "Greek-Turkish Rapprochement: Rhetoric or Reality?", Political Science Quarterly, 123 (1), 2008: 123–49

Week 4: A critical assessment of the disintegration of Yugoslavia

• Dejan Jovic (2001), "The Disintegration of Yugoslavia : A Critical Review of Explanatory Approaches", European Journal of Social Theory, 4(1)
• Jasna Dragovic-Soso, "Why Did Yugoslavia Disintegrate? An Overview of Contending Explanations in Lenard J. Cohen and Jasna Dragovic-Soso (eds.) State        Collapse in South-Eastern Europe: New Perspectives on Yugoslavia's     Disintegration (Purdue University Press, 2007), pp. 1-39. 

Week 5: The role of international institutions in managing and/or resolving intra-state/inter-ethnic conflict in Southeast Europe: (a) The United Nations in Kosovo and (b) The European Union and NATO in Bosnia and Kosovo.

• Alexandros Yannis, “The UN as Government in Kosovo”, Global Governance (10, January-March 2004)
• Gerald Knaus and Felix Martin. “Travails of the European Raj: Lessons from Bosnia and Herzegovina”. Journal of Democracy (14, no. 3, July 2003)
• Judy Batt “Failing states and the EU’s security agenda” (EU Institute for Security     Studies, Paris, 2004)

Week 6: The role of international institutions in managing and/or resolving inter-state conflict in Southeast Europe: NATO and the European Union vis-a-vis the Greek-Turkish conflict

• Thomas Diez, Stephan Stetter and Mathias Albert, “The European Union and Border Conflicts: The Transformative Power of Integration”, International Organization (60, 2006)
• Panayotis Tsakonas, “From 'perverse' to 'promising' institutionalism? NATO, EU and the Greek-Turkish conflict” στο Bourantonis, K. Ifantis, P. Tsakonas (eds.), Multilateralism and Security Institutions in an Era of Globalization (Routledge, London and New York, 2005)
• Panayotis Tsakonas and Antonis Tournikiotis, ‘Greece’s Elusive Quest for ‘Security Providers’: The ‘Expectations-Reality Gap’’, Security Dialogue 34 (No. 3, September            2003)

Week 7: The evolution of the strategies of external actors, i.e. the US, Russia and China vis-a-vis the Southeast Europe

• Dimitrios Triantaphyllou, “The interplay between the EU and the United States in the Balkans”, pp.191- In Shift or Rift. Assessing on US-EU Relations after Iraq. Edited by Gustav Lindstrom. Paris: Transatlantic Book, 2003.
• Daniel Serwer, “The Balkans: from American to European leadership”, pp. 169-189. In Shift or Rift. Assessing on US-EU Relations after Iraq.
• Dimitar Bechev, Rival Power: Russia in Southeast Europe (Yale University Press, 2017)
• Dimitar Bechev, “Russia: Play a Weak Hand Well” in Florian Bieber and Nikolaos Tzifakis (eds.), The Western Balkans in the World. Linkages and Relations with Non-Western Countries (Routledge, 2020)
• Anastas Vangeli, “China: A New Geo-economic Approach” in Florian Bieber and Nikolaos Tzifakis (eds.), The Western Balkans in the World. Linkages and Relations with Non-Western Countries (Routledge, New York, 2020)
• Plamen Tonchev, China’s Road into the Western Balkans (European Union Institute for Security Studies, 2017)
• Political Trends and Dynamics: Chinese Soft Power in Southeast Europe (Friedrich Ebert Stiftung-FES, Vol. 3, 2019)

Week 8:  The role of Turkey vis-a-vis Southeast Europe

• Adam Balcer, “Turkey as a Stakeholder and Contributor to Regional Security in the Western Balkans” in Ebru Kanan-Sokullu (ed.) Debating Security in Turkey. Challenges and Changes in the Twenty-First Century (Lanham, Lexington, 2012), pp. 219-237.
• Ronald Linden, “Balkan Geometry: Turkish Accession and the International Relations of Southeast Europe”, Orbis (Vol. 51, N0. 2, December 2007)
• Ahmet Erdi Öztürk and Samim Akgönül, “Turkey: Forced Marriage or Marriage of Convenience with the Western Balkans?” in Florian Bieber and Nikolaos Tzifakis    (eds.), The Western Balkans in the World. Linkages and Relations with Non-Western     Countries (Routledge, 2020)
• Asli Aydıntaşbaş, From Myth to Reality: How to Understand Turkey's Role in the Western Balkans (European Council on Foreign Relations, March 2019)

Week 9: Traditional and critical conceptions of security and new threats and challenges in the region: Islamist radicalization/Jihadism, terrorism and illegal trafficking

• Frank J. Cilluffo, Sharon L. Cardash, and Andrew J. Whitehead, "Radicalization: Behind Bars and Beyond Borders", The Brown Journal of World Affairs (13, No. 2,      2007)
• The Jihadi Threat. ISIS. Al Qaeda and Beyond (United States Institute of Peace & Wilson Center, January 2017)
• Michael Emerson et al (eds.), Islamist Radicalization. The Challenge for Euro- Mediterranean Relations (Centre for European Policy Studies, Brussels, 2009)

Week 10: Energy security in Southeast Europe and the broader Mediterranean

• • Bajić, Bojana Ž.; Vučurović, Damjan G.; Dodić, Siniša N., "Energy Security in South East Europe: Present and Future Challenges", Current Politics and Economics of Russia, Eastern and Central Europe (Vol. 33, No. 1-2, January 2018)
  • Emin Akhundzada , "Energy Security in Southeast Europe: The Role of the Southern Gas

Corridor", (ISPI, Analysis No. 282, January 2015) 

Week 11: Greece's strategic priorities in Southeast Europe and the broader            Mediterranean - The evolution of Greece's foreign policy towards SEE

• Ioannis Armakolas, “Southeastern Europe at the crossroads”, Hellenic Studies (18, No. 2, 2010)
• Ritsa Panagiotou and Anastasios Valvis, How is the sovereign debt crisis affecting Greece’s relations with the Balkan countries and Greece’s standing in the region? An initial impact assessment (Southeast Europe Programme, ELIAMEP, May 2014)
• Pavlos Koktsidis, Ioannis Armakolas, Maja Maksimovic and Bledar Feta, The Western Balkan EU accession process and the Greek Presidency 2014 Report (Athens: South-East Europe Programme, ELIAMEP, 2014)

Week 12:  "The Ambassador's Forum"