Balkan Strongmen

Dictators and Authoritarian Rulers of Southeast Europe

edited by Bernd Fischer

Click here to order online! 

The Balkan question has been a perennial threat to European stability for the past two centuries and ultimately the overt or underlying cause for many modern wars. Hence, any analysis of its political vicissitudes is a welcome contribution to understanding this chaotic area. Fischer gathers valuable scholarly essays that explore the careers of the strongmen of Albania, Yugoslavia, Romania, Bulgaria, Turkey, Greece, and Croatia. It is worth emphasizing the inclusion of Kemalist Turkey in a volume of essays on the Balkans, especially given the success to date of Ataturk's revolutionary changes. Part 1 reviews the interwar period of the 1920s-30s, when the shadow of Mussolini, Hitler, and Stalin influenced the new authoritarian regimes. Part 2 brings the area up to date and examines the continuity of authoritarian rule for both the good and its converse. The collection ends with the career of and an epilogue on the recent trial and death of Slobodan Milosevic. This is a most useful and illuminating contribution to the literature on this southern cauldron of perennial ethnic strife, whose experiments in modern nationalist states have been less than successful.

Summing Up: Highly recommended. Most levels/libraries

Choice

6 x 9
504 pages
Cloth
ISBN: 978-1-55753-455-2

$64.95

Paperback

ISBN: 978-1-55753-456-9
$39.95
Available in the United States and Canada only