At the moment you’re a participating academic in the EUI Widening Europe Programme project G-Dem - The geo(politics) of democracy in the Western Balkans. Can you tell us about your work on that project?
Yes, I am part of the G-Dem project in the framework of the EUI Widening Europe Programme, which the Institute launched two years ago. It is a research group with experts from the Western Balkans, led by Jelena Džankić as Principal Investigator, at the Robert Schuman Centre.
The project has just published a series of six technical reports; my report on Albania is available in open access through the EUI’s research repository, as are those on Bosnia Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia.
My report identifies two especially relevant geopolitical actors for Albania: Turkey and Italy. My findings suggest a growing ‘personalisation’ of Albanian foreign policy in recent years that appears to be driven by individual relationships or the preservation of power rather than by European values or the common good.
How has engagement with this project benefited your research?
As a person from Albania, it has been a pleasure to work on my home country and to discuss my conclusions with other researchers from the Western Balkans who are experts in their own countries. For example, the roundtable we held last December was a really good opportunity to share results, give our opinions, and exchange ideas.
You have also done some independent research at the Historical Archives concerning the European Union’s role in the dissolution of the ex-Yugoslavia. Can you tell us about that?
In 2023 I was awarded an International Visegrad Fund grant to use primary sources at the HAEU for a project stemming from my doctoral thesis. That work was about the role of the European Union (EU) in the dissolution of the ex-Yugoslavia. At the time, I had not covered the case of Kosovo, only Bosnia Herzegovina and North Macedonia. I applied for this grant to examine the Kosovo case, and to see what the Archives might offer in terms of sources about the present. I wanted to use the sources in the HAEU to explain why the dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina was not delivering at that time. That was the essence of my main research question. The pace of this dialogue has once again slowed down due to domestic issues in these countries–mass protests in Serbia and the difficulties in building a new government in Kosovo–so I hope this research is going to be important in how the relationship between Kosovo and Serbia could be resumed soon.
In your proposal for the IVF grant, you mentioned seeing the Western Balkans as “hostage to its past”. What did you mean by that?
I was referring to nationalism, which is so present in the Western Balkans and what we see in recent developments in Bosnia and Herzegovina with the secessionist tendencies of the Republica SRPSKA, reinvigorated by the its nationalist leader Milorad Dodik. We have to understand that radical nationalism expressed by one state acts to reinforce it in neighbouring countries as if one side feeds off the other. In my opinion, the issues of the past have not been resolved, or not resolved completely, thoroughly. To paraphrase Antonio Cassese, the first President of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY), whose private archives I consulted at the HAEU, when justice is done, when issues from the past are resolved, the spirits can be reconciled. Cassese’s words have been very inspiring to me. They have led me to the conviction that, without the resolution of past wrongs, the Balkans will be stuck in the present reality, held hostage. We will not have real peace in the Western Balkans without true reconciliation.
What would reconciliation in the Western Balkans look like to you?
One of the problems of the Western Balkans as a region is the fact that history has been revisited from many different perspectives and recounted in many different versions. I wish that researchers could come and look at the fonds in the HAEU, to be reminded of what happened in the past. To me, the HAEU represents a true source of information, a chance to look back at history from a neutral point of view. So maybe if we as a region could reach a point where we could revisit the history all together, and have one version of what happened, and label, with the same name, those who have harmed people of the Western Balkans, I think that it could be a good step towards reconciliation and a way to move forward from the past. This is what I have had in mind, what I have been exploring these past few months, and what I hope to transmit in my research.
In what ways has the EU contributed to democracy in the Western Balkans?
The EU has acted to help states recover from the ethnic conflicts that have happened in the Western Balkans and with state-building in Kosovo and Bosnia Herzegovina. And even though five EU countries do not recognize Kosovo as an independent state, the EU as a whole has contributed to the peace-building process through its missions there. The European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo, known as EULEX, has been important in building Kosovo’s future state constitution and consolidation.
The EU has been very important in terms of democracy consolidation in the Balkan countries. You should know that Europe exerts a sort of magnetic pull on the region. It represents a model to follow. The conditionality principle, which, to tell the truth, has at times been extremely harsh on the Western Balkans, aims at building democracy and the consolidation of the democratic institutions and the rule of law. So, in the Western Balkans, when we speak for example about the rule of law, we suddenly are talking about the EU. It is automatically associated with the EU, like two faces of the same coin.
Then, I’m not sure if many people are aware of it, but the EU recently adopted a 6 billion euro recovery fund for the Western Balkans. Of course, this fund is linked to conditionality, but it is going to really help these countries reduce the gap between their economy and the level of democracy that the EU expects from them. This is very important, and I would consider it as the final countdown for the Western Balkans’ entry into the EU.
As an expert on the geopolitics of the region, how has the war in Ukraine impacted the EU's approach to the Western Balkans?
The war in Ukraine marks a rupture with the past, a ‘paradigm shift’, as we would say. But paradoxically, it has had a positive impact on the EU’s relationship with the Western Balkans. Since the start of the conflict, all of the actors have sought to reshape and redefine their spheres of influence. In this case, the Western Balkans have been cast as a sphere of influence towards the EU, and there has been increased attention from the EU towards the region. The recovery plan, for example, was adopted one year after the war broke out and implemented in 2024. So, paradoxically, the war has been an accelerator for the EU – Western Balkans relationship.
Nevertheless, I am very worried about how this conflict might end. As an academic, but also as a person from the Western Balkans. Because if some of the invaded territories get split between Russia and Ukraine, there will be global repercussions well beyond the Western Balkans, like a pandora’s box. I trust and believe in the EU’s approach to the war, I believe it is a very ‘right’ approach, so I hope the EU is going to resist and the Ukraine will be able to fend off disaggregation of its territories, which could set a precedent also in the Western Balkans or beyond since any country backed up by Russia could follow Russia’s example of violating the sovereignty of a bordering country.
Do you have any words for academics taking a look at programmes at the EUI and the HAEU?
The EUI is an excellent and stimulating environment, a place for effective brainstorming among colleagues and researchers. This is what I have liked the most since the beginning of my journey here.
There are many opportunities on the campus: the PhD programme, the executive training at the RSC and STG, and the summer schools. These are very useful and stimulating opportunities for young researchers to experience EUI campus life at least once. The Visegrad Fund Grant at the Archives, for example, is very good for those who want to add a historical dimension to their research.
Klodiana Beshku is a Visiting Fellow at the Robert Schuman Centre of Advanced Studies of the European University Institute, affiliated with the EUI Widening Europe Programme project G-Dem - The geo(politics) of democracy in the Western Balkans, led by Jelena Džankić at the Robert Schuman Centre. She is also an Associate Professor in the Department of Political Science, Faculty of Social Sciences, at the University of Tirana.