Wolf Oschlies for the Macedonians

Serbian Studies Research, 2020

Article describes the crucial events of the Macedonian national awakening at the turn of the 19th and 20th century in the context of great and local (Bulgaria, Serbia and Greece) powers policy. It has been divided into several parts. The first one deals with the definition of Macedonism, next with the Macedonian question in connection to the Congress of Berlin and propaganda actions of Bulgaria, Greece and Serbia, last describes the creation of Internal Macedonian-Adrianople Revolutionary Organization and the course of Ilinden uprising. Study brings view on crucial events of Macedonian history from unbiased perspective elaborated on the basis of central European, western and former Yugoslav historiography.

Macedonian Studies Journal - Journal of the Australian Institute of Macedonian Studies Melbourne, Australia

The Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia came into existence in 1991. This newly emerging state was not a country that was recreated after centuries, nor one which, having been destroyed or absorbed by others over the years, was once again restructured and reappeared, as was the case with Chechoslovakia, Israel or Palestine. As a matter of fact, there was never a country or a state bearing the name “Macedonia”, only the geographic region of ancient Macedonia, a region affiliated and interconnected with the history, language, civilization, culture and religion of Ancient Hellas. In 146 BC, the Romans, wishing to eradicate the Hellenic identity of the Macedonians, created a large dominion extending the ancient borders of Macedonia (see relevant paper in this edition of the MSJ), and calling the new territory Macedonia Prima (Provincia Macedoniae). When Roman General Quintus Caecilius Metellus defeated Andriscus of Macedon, Rome established a new province incorporating ancient Macedonia, which also included Epirus, Thessaly, and parts of Illyria, Paionia and Thrace. This created a much larger administrative area, to which the name of Macedonia was still applied. Hence, any sort or type of national irredentism regarding the name “Macedonia” as an ethnic or national nomenclature is anthropologically pseudonymous and politically irrational. Irredentism is the nationalist belief that a territory belonging to another country should be annexed for ethnic or historical reasons. Irredentist claims are usually justified on the basis that the irredentists' ethnic group, now or historically, formed the majority in that territory or that the territory was part of the irredentists' nation-state at some point in the past. In the case of the people of FYROM, the Macedoslavs, who try to emerge unilaterally as the “Macedonians”, nothing of the above is validated. The constitutional name of “Macedonia” that they were inspired to use for their country was never a territory exclusively or primarily or historically occupied by “Macedonians”; “Macedonians” never formed the majority in this territory and most importantly this region was never the nation-state of the “Macedonians.” Furthermore, irredentism is to be distinguished from territorial expansionism, in that irredentism claims to advocate taking back land that is "rightfully ours," while expan-sionism advocates annexation regardless of whether the territory was "ours" in the first place. Hence, the actual mode of irrational behaviour of the Macedoslavs should be called expansionism and not just irredentism in the Balkans; a tendency which inflames ethnic and national unrest and creates instability to the wider European community. The name of the hypothetical country resulting from successful annexation frequently contains the word "Greater", such as, for example, in Greater Serbia, Greater Albania, or Greater Russia, as we have recently experienced with the annexation of Crimea. Then there comes the third means of nationalism: secessionism. The scholarship on irredentism and secessionism suggests that the former is more likely to become violent and result in war than the latter. Irredentist conflicts are often instigated by sovereign states, whereas, secessionist conflicts are usually initiated by minority groups. Since sovereign states have military capability to fight full-scale wars, irredentist conflicts tend to be more violent and/or turn international. Given that minority groups lack military resources to fight for their causes, secessionist conflicts on the other hand normally do not escalate to interstate war. However, what happens if a sovereign state with a full-fledged army decides to support a secessionist cause? We refer our readers to the Ukraine experience and the prolonged civil war there. Since 2006, the Macedoslavs of FYROM, via their ultra-nationalist government of Nicola Gruevski and its agencies have attempted to implement within their new national borders and in the Macedoslavic Diaspora all three expressions of nationalism, namely irredentism, expansionism and secessionism, thus acting as a serious source of instability in the Balkans and the greater European community. They preach irredentism by posing as “Macedonians” when they never historically formed the majority in Macedonia or Macedonia Prima. In their delirious nationalism they masquerade their Macedoslavic identity and adulterate their culture with Hellenic statues and Greek cultural monuments belonging to another nation-country, namely Hellas, simply to pose as ancient Macedonians. Hence, they demonstrate disrespect and betray their own renowned Slavic culture and civilization. They preach expansionism infiltrating the conscience of the few thousands of Greek bilingual citizens in Ancient Macedonia, the birthplace of Alexander the Great and Aristotle, a region in which they desire to find their “enslaved compatriots”, the Egejski Makedonci. Finally they preach secessionism both within their national borders as well as in the Diaspora via their propaganda machine, their consular staff and their publications producing maps of the Greater Macedonia. Historically, there have been many territories that have changed hands very often, and territories in which the ethnic composition has changed over time. This means the claims of different irredentist movements of what is "rightfully theirs" very often overlap. Since the borders of nearly all nations have changed over time, irredentist attitudes can be found in most parts of the world. Usually, they are part of nationalist ideologies, though by far not all nationalist ideologies and groups include them. Fortunately, irredentism usually does not receive the official support it once did. The Gruevski government constitutes an extreme form of irredentism, expansion-ism and secessionism, seeking to expand its newly emerged country to a maximum extent, regardless of whether the Macedoslavs ever actually formed the majority in the territory in question. The government of FYROM should be reminded that similar expressions of nationalism, expansionism and secessionism are also displayed by other ethnicities within its national borders. According to the Gallup Balkan Monitor 2010 report, the idea of a Greater Albania is supported by the majority of Albanians in Albania (63%), Kosovo (81%) and the Republic of “Macedonia” (53%). This clearly demonstrates that it would be more prudent to safeguard the welfare of the Macedoslav people, build constructive relations with neighbouring countries, reinforce the social cohesion of citizens rather than waste the country’s human and material resources to chase ghosts and imagined enemies in the south.

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Historein 21:1, 2023

Alexis Heraclides’ book on The Macedonian Question and the Macedonians is a major contribution to the existing bibliography on the issue. Published a year after the signing and ratification (2018–2019) of the Prespa Agreement between Greece and North Macedonia, which aimed at solving the name row between the two countries, Heraclides’ book traces the long and complex history of the Macedonian Question since the mid-nineteenth century. Combining a historical and international relations perspective, this comprehensive discussion of the different aspects of the issue offers significant insight into the conflicts brought about by the antagonism between Greece, Bulgaria and Serbia over the former Ottoman territory of geographical Macedonia, as well as the gradual emergence of the Macedonian nation and the creation of the Macedonian state. In the last chapters, the book deals with the Prespa Agreement, especially its clauses on identity issues and their significance, and with the latest developments regarding the turbulent relations between North Macedonia and Bulgaria.

South European Society and Politics, 1999

The sound and the fury of the 1991 declaration of independence by the former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) is gradually finding its expression in the social scientific literature on the topic. The 1991-95 (and to a lesser degree still ongoing) diplomatic battle ...

International Journal of Recent Research in Arts and Sciences, 2023

Macedonian question is emerging on the world scene. Macedonia's membership into NATO and the Macedonian aspirations for the EU membership are becoming the stumbling block in the eyes of many states which have open political aspirations to concur and eliminate the spirit of the Macedonian people. Historical lessons from the period of the Balkan wars, the 1 st World War and the 2 nd World War, have never been learned. Macedonian struggle for independent state lasts for centuries. Severely suppressed by the Roman Empire, than by the Byzantine Empire, than by the Ottoman Empire, have transformed the Macedonians into a people with anger, strong zeal, and strict commitment, traumatized for their future, to live in its own fatherland and fully recognized independent state. The crown of the chauvinism toward the existence of Macedonians are the Greek extremism and their historical complex over the Macedonian Biblical and glorious name and history. "From the Greek nationalist perspective, then, the use of the name 'Macedonian' by the 'Slavs of Skopje' constitutes a 'felony', an 'act of plagiarism' against the Greek people. By calling themselves 'Macedonians' the Slavs are 'stealing' a Greek name; they are 'embezzling' Greek cultural heritage; they are 'falsifying' Greek history. As Evangelos Kofos, a historian employed by the Greek Foreign Ministry, told a foreign reporter 'It is as if a robber came into my house and stole my most precious jewels-my history, my culture, my identity' (

The dispute between Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM) is a symbolic struggle concerning legitimate rights over " Macedonia " —the name, the territory, and the loyalty of its inhabitants. The dispute was created by two conflicting national narratives. In the Balkans, nation-building has emphasized particularistic over universalistic criteria. Local national narratives were instrumental in establishing the legitimate possession of a territory by a particular ethnic group. Historically, these narratives are tied to local nationalisms since their function is to designate a territory as the exclusive homeland of a particular nation. The Macedonian narrative views Macedonia as occupied by the Macedonian nation and suggests the existence of national minorities in Bulgaria and Greece. The Greek narrative does not acknowledge the existence of a Macedonian nation and considers the existence of a Macedonian minority within Greece to be a manifestation of Macedonian irredentism. The Macedonian narrative directly questions the Greek narrative's assumption of historical continuity. The strong Greek reaction against FYROM's declaration of independence is a response to this implicit threat to modern Greek identity. In the following discussion, I attempt to analyze the controversy between Greece and the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM). My specific intention is to explicate the origins and character of the Greek response to FYROM's declaration of independence. However, the Macedonian Question is a complex political issue, and discussion of the origins and social construction of the Macedonian nation as such falls outside the scope of this essay. 1 Theoretically speaking, this political controversy is seen as a manifestation of Balkan nationalisms' elevation of the concept of nationhood as the essential element for nation-building, and their concomitant subordination of citizenship. In this context, I attempt to illustrate the importance of nationhood for modern Greek identity by [End Page 253] connecting the Greek popular response to FYROM's declaration of independence to Greek historiography's interpretation of the Macedonian Question. I should point out that most of the scholarship surrounding the Macedonian Question is strongly partisan, with opposing sides attempting to prove the righteousness of their own beliefs. The following discussion is an attempt to move beyond the partisanship of this debate in order to explicate why the interpretation of the historical record regarding Macedonia has become an issue of great political importance. Nationhood and citizenship in the Balkans The theoretical issue underlying this political controversy concerns the usage and construction of national narratives as a way of developing the " imagined community " of a nation. In turn, these national narratives must be interpreted in the context of the competing Greek and Macedonian nationalisms. Most scholars of nationalism consider this phenomenon to be a product of the last 200–500 years, although national narratives usually trace the history of a nation back many hundreds of years. 2 Since the issue addressed is that of nationalism as an ideology that facilitates the growth of a political movement, the rise of subjective national identification is seen as the outcome of a variety of social processes— economic, political, and ideological. The solidity of the concepts of " nation " and " national identity " is rendered problematic and the conceptual ground shifts from issues regarding a population's " nationality " to issues concerning the creation of a " nation " as a category that

Crossroads of the Old Continent. Central and Southeastern Europe in the 19th and 20th century. eds. K. Popek. M. Balogh, K. Szadkowski, A. Ścibior, Kraków: Petrus 2021, 2021

Humanitarian intervention is a relatively new concept in international relations. Although the origins of interventionism can be traced back well in history, its humanitarian aspect had been gradually formulated during the course of the 19th century. In my paper I focus on the ideas and proposals of the London-based Balkan Committee to solve the “Gordian Knot of the Balkans”: the Macedonian Question. In 1903, after the abortive Ilinden Uprising, the European Great Powers concerted to pacify Ottoman Macedonia and to implement reforms in the judiciary and administrative systems, which became known as the Mürzsteg Program. The representatives of the Committee such as its founder Noel Buxton or the well-known journalist at the time, Henry N. Brailsford, suggested international control for Macedonia “by establishing a Government responsible to the Powers.” I argue that their ideas were influenced by the notions of contemporary international law which deeply internalized the period’s European perception of civilizational hierarchies of the world.