scholarly journals North Macedonia after the Ohrid Framework Agreement

2021 ◽  
Vol 21 (1) ◽  
pp. 49-70
Author(s):  
Marijana Opašinova Šundovska

Independence movements triggered by the end of the Cold War ended in state collapse and the creation of new states across the European continent. The decade coloured with violent wars in the Balkan region did not leave the Republic of Macedonia immune from ethnic conflict, which occurred in 2001. The outcome in the form of the so‑called Ohrid Framework Agreement (OFA) was the intended improvement of the rights of minorities and the sharing of power in decision making, both on local and central levels. The purpose of this paper is to determine whether theoretical approach patterns to state instability match the causes for the outburst of the Macedonian conflict of 2001. It will also try to detect if the conflict resulted from minority discrimination, state institutions’ inability to control the territory, poor economic situation, uneven regional development after independence, or it was a combination of factors that – fully or partially – contributed to its emergence. The paper will also seek to confirm if addressing these factors two decades later decreased the divisions across ethnic lines in the state.

Istoriya ◽  
2021 ◽  
Vol 12 (8 (106)) ◽  
pp. 0
Author(s):  
Zilya Khabibullina

The Spiritual Administrations of Muslims of the USSR were official organizations accountable to the Council for Religious Affairs, which concerned with regulation the life of religious communities in the allocated territory. Their competence included functions of a theological nature, statistical treatment, observation of cult objects and believers. Under the pressure of post-war circumstances, the beginning of the Cold War, religious organizations were engaged in the propaganda foreign policy tasks of the USSR. In permitted international contacts, they created a positive image of the country and demonstrated freedom of religion. The article examines the participation of the Spiritual Administration of Muslims of the European part of the USSR and Siberia in the spread of the Soviet ideological project abroad. Territorially, the spiritual administration was located in Ufa, the materials of the National Archives of the Republic of Bashkortostan offer an insight into such forms of interaction with the foreign world as: staff meetings of the spiritual administration with representatives of foreign states, visits of Islamic spiritual leaders to Muslim countries, their publication in foreign editions, participation in international conferences, the presence of believers of the USSR in Saudi Arabia during the Hajj. In the 1950s DUMES has been converted regularly subjected to demonstrations to foreign guests of Bashkiria and all kinds of delegations as a symbol of freedom of conscience in the USSR. The Muslim clergy had promoted of the Soviet lifestyle and the country’s achievements in a deep crisis of religious life in the USSR.


Author(s):  
A.A. Mushta ◽  
◽  
T.V. Rastimehina ◽  

The interrelated concepts of memory policy, historical policy and security policy are considered. It is shown that in Russia and in the Republic of Belarus there is a steady trend of securitization of historical policy and memory policy. The tendencies of indoctrination of the securitist model of historical policy into official documents of both states are considered. It is shown that both in Belarus and in Russia, the internal political confrontation is considered in the historicist construct of the Cold War. It is argued that in the context of the need to deepen integration within the framework of the Union State, it is necessary to search for a relatively unified holistic concept of history for all the forces of Russian and Belarusian societies.


Author(s):  
Jason Lim

The term “overseas Chinese” refers to people who left the Qing Empire (and later on, the Republic of China or ROC) for a better life in Southeast Asia. Some of them arrived in Southeast Asia as merchants. They were either involved in retail or wholesale trade, or importing and exporting goods between the Qing Empire/ROC and Southeast Asia. With the decolonization of Southeast Asia from the end of World War II in 1945, overseas Chinese commerce was targeted by nationalists because the merchants were seen to have been working together with the colonial authorities and to have enriched themselves at the expense of locals. New nationalist regimes in Southeast Asia introduced anti-Chinese legislation in order to reduce the overseas Chinese presence in economic activities. Chinese merchants were banned from certain trades and trade monopolies were broken down. Several Southeast Asian states also attempted to assimilate the overseas Chinese by forcing them to adopt local-sounding names. However, the overseas Chinese continued to be dominant in the economies of Malaya (later Malaysia) and Singapore. Malaysia introduced the New Economic Policy (NEP), which has an anti-Chinese agenda, in 1970. The decolonization process also occurred during the Cold War, and Chinese merchants sought to continue trade with China at a time when governments in Southeast Asia were suspicious of the People’s Republic of China (PRC). Attempts by merchants from Malaya and Singapore to trade with the PRC in 1956 were considered to have failed, as the PRC had other political concerns. By the time Singapore had gained independence in 1965, the door to investment and trade with the PRC was shut, and the Chinese in Southeast Asia turned their backs on China by taking on citizenship in their countries of residence.


2021 ◽  
Vol 65 (2) ◽  
pp. 123-134
Author(s):  
Daniela Popescu

"The Escape to Turkey. Ways and Methods of Illegal Border Crossings into Turkey from the perspective of SSI documents (1945-1948). Romania`s first years after the communist regime took political power in Romania, concurrent with the onset of the Cold War, meant a reshuffle of the state institutions at first and later a dramatic impact on people`s lives. The political and institutional purges were the first signal that soon repression and terror will follow, thus prompting numerous Romanian citizens to leave the country. Yet, due to the strict surveillance of the Secret Police Services which did not easily allow traveling to Western countries, the only way to escape was through illicit border crossings. One of the most common destinations was Turkey, with documents issued between 1945 and 1948 by the Secret police services revealing an impressive number of such cases. Keywords: Illegal border crossings, escape, communism, Romania, Turkey. "


2019 ◽  
pp. 144-165
Author(s):  
Mary Augusta Brazelton

This chapter investigates the role of mass immunization in Chinese medical diplomacy programs during the 1960s and 1970s. While most scholarship has stressed the influence of barefoot doctor and other paraprofessional training programs in the emergence of the People's Republic of China (PRC) as a global model for rural health services, mass immunization programs in China had measurable results—in terms of lowered incidence of disease—that helped legitimize these training efforts and the nation's program of rural health care more broadly. Ultimately, the global popularization of Chinese public health was a consequence of regional competition within East Asia. During the Cold War era, the PRC used medical aid to foreign countries to compete for power and influence with the Republic of China on Taiwan, where institutions and personnel that the Nationalist Party brought to the island after 1948 built upon practices established during the period of Japanese colonial rule (1895–1945). The involvement of Taiwan in medical diplomacy reflected the expansionist agendas of its Western allies in the Cold War as well as competition with the PRC for recognition as the legitimate government of mainland China.


1964 ◽  
Vol 26 (2) ◽  
pp. 257-286 ◽  
Author(s):  
Paul F. Power

Among the foreign policies of the new states which have emerged from the Western colonial empires, that of India occupies a leading place. The first non-Western nation to become a member of the British Commonwealth, India became a symbol and catalyst of self-determination for several nationalist movements. India proceeded on an “independent” path in world politics and had numerous emulators in the world. Where India's role in the state-making revolution has met with considerable approval, its strategy of nonalignment has been debated in the West, and even in India since the open appearance in 1959 of the Sino-Indian dispute. The criticism has included questions about the wisdom of nonalignment, doubts as to its feasibility, and charges that its application has shown preference for the communist states during periods of the Cold War. The Indian defense includes assertions that nonalignment serves India's welfare and often the world's, answers about its workability, and claims that application has been consistent with professed ideals.


Author(s):  
Ana Grgic

This paper examines how certain contemporary audio-visual works from post-socialist countries in the Balkan region, employ archival footage from the communist period, to address and problematize the notion of remembering and suppressing national history through collective memory. I specifically focus on the work of the Albanian artist, Armando Lulaj and his videos Albanian Trilogy: A Series of Devious Stratagems (2011, 2012 and 2015) exhibited at the 56th Venice Biennale. By re-using images and narratives produced during Enver Hoxha’s regime, and still ingrained in Albanian visual memory, these films provide alternative readings of Albanian history from the Cold War to the present day. What is more, some of this archival material is made public for the first time, while the rest has been dormant and purposely forgotten in archival vaults. Lulaj’s playful excursions, create connections between a problematic and suppressed past and the difficult and selective present, by juxtaposing evocative and politically charged visual records and contemporary footage of artist’s commissioned performances.


2014 ◽  
Vol 4 (2) ◽  
pp. 205
Author(s):  
MA. Bilbil Kastrati

After the end of the Cold War the North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) and the European Union (EU) enlargement were two main political processes in the European continent. Both organizations since their inception, promoted the idea of integrated Europe without borders, which meant creating a Europe without divisions and bringing back all Central Eastern European (CEE) countries into the European family where they belong. However, after half a century of isolation in the totalitarian communist system the CEE countries (CEEC) had to undertake fundamental institutional, political, economic, military and other reforms in order to join NATO and the EU. In order to ease the process of accession, both organizations set certain criteria for membership for the CEECs. While NATO’s requirements for membership were more general and flexible, the EU’s requirements, on the other hand, were non-negotiable and closely enforced.Therefore, this article will explore NATO’s and the EU’s enlargement process eastwards, its similarities and differences. In addition, it will analyse the difficulties and challenges with special focus on Russia’s opposition to this process.The author will identify the similarities and differences between NATO and the EU’s enlargement and will argue that the eastern enlargement marked the final end to the Cold War antagonism and it created conducive preconditions for more secure and prosperous Europe.


2019 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
pp. 161-180
Author(s):  
Amarilio Ferreira Jr.

The aim of this article is to explain the political and trade union stance of the British National Union of Teachers (NUT) – representing the teachers of England and Wales – against the arms race and nuclear warheads set up in the European Continent during the Cold War (1947-1991). After adopting resolutions in support of «Education for Peace» at its Annual Conferences (Jersey, 1983 and Blackpool, 1984), the NUT held an International Peace Conference (1984) involving Western and Eastern European countries in which teachers’ unions from the following countries participated: the United States, Finland, the Soviet Union, the German Democratic Republic and Bulgaria. The international event was held in Stoke Rochford Hall (England) during the British miners’ national strike against the socioeconomic reforms instituted under the governments of Margaret Thatcher (1979-1990). The article started from the methodological presupposition based on the principle of political connection on an international scale within the scope of the trade union movement of teachers. Indeed, despite differences in nationalities, the educational processes institutionalized by schooling have acquired a universal character. Thus, teachers, irrespective of their nationality, are workers who are politically committed to the cultural values consecrated by the knowledge accumulated by humanity throughout history, especially when it comes to peace among peoples. It should be emphasized that the topic addressed has never before been analysed on an international level, and that primary sources that fall within the historical context of the facts studied were used in the production of the article.


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