Turkey’s Imperial Legacy and the Potential for Conflict in the Balkans
Turkey’s Imperial Legacy and the Potential for Conflict in the Balkans

Summary/Abstract: Turkey is the only Eurasian state nearly surrounded by a circle of acute hot and “frozen conflicts”, ranging from low-intensity violence through terrorism to full-fledged wars. The prevailing pattern of inter-communal and interethnic conflicts in the Balkans and on Cyprus has long been different from the patterns of conflict in the rest of Europe and in the Near East. This difference is closely related to the fact that these lands experienced in the past a centuries-long rule by the Ottoman Empire, whose legal successor is the Republic of Turkey. The inter-communal conflict potential in the rest of Europe used to differ substantially from the one in the Balkans, but the difference has been greatly reduced as Western Europe has in one respect become “balkanised”.

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