Ein Plädoyer für politische statt ethnischer Nationen – Konsequenzen des Abkommens von Prespa für den Streit zwischen Bulgarien und Nordmazedonien
A Plea for Political Instead of Ethnic Nations – Consequences of the Prespa Agreement for the Dispute between Bulgaria and Northern Macedonia

Summary/Abstract: Combining procedures for reconciling national histories and admission to the EU is not necessarily conducive to either subject. Nobody should be surprised, that the conclusion of the Greek-North Macedonian treaty in Prespa (2019) would be seen by the Bulgarian side as an invitation to follow this example. Today, it is not reasonable for North Macedonia to have to accept Bulgaria’s demands as a condition for beginning admission negotiations without obtaining Bulgarian concessions beyond the lifting of the veto. Moreover, most of Bulgaria’s demands are likely to prove incompatible with the contents of the Prespa Agreement: It not only established as legally binding a Greek, but also the Macedonian ethnonational view of history, which Bulgaria vehemently rejects. According to the broad consensus of research and the debate of the past 40 years, an ethnonational approach to history leads astray, including in (post-)Ottoman Europe.

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