The Balkans and the Near East- A Joint History
The Balkans and the Near East - A Joint History

Summary/Abstract: The article addresses three problems and one cluster of observations. The first section analyses the challenge of globalization for area studies, the second, more specifically, pays attention to the emerging global history approach for historical area studies and the third one questions the heuristic value of categories such as .Southeastern Europe. and .Balkans. as well as the traditional disciplinary division of Balkan studies and Near East studies, which is only perforated by disciplines such as Byzantine and Ottoman studies. In the fourth section selected observations about the longterm imprint of the Ottoman Empire on post-Ottoman Balkans and post-Ottoman Near East will be offered. // There is an urgent need for re-thinking of Balkan and Southeast European Studies as well as of Middle/Near East studies. The historically grown division of these two big fields with all their sub-divisions becomes contradictious to many ongoing developments. Certain imprints of the Ottoman Empire on the post-Ottoman world are obvious . even nine decades after. Only three examples can be presented here: state autonomy with its low level of mutual social cohesion between the state and its citizens, only weakly rooted institutions of political participation as well as comparatively weak developed economic institutions still constitute remarkable imprints of the Ottoman Empire.

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