Unravelling border constructions between the EU and the Western Balkans : Impact of borders on Serbia’s Europeanization

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2012
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en
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Abstract
Although the European Union (EU) expanded on large-scale over the last twenty years, the Western Balkans are not part the EU (yet). The perception most of the people from Western-Europe have from the Balkans resembles mainly as negative images. On one hand these perceptions are a matter of ignorance, but on the other side these images are based on borders, constructed over the years. Unravelling these particular border constructions between the EU and the Western Balkans is what this thesis is all about. This thesis contains a literature review on the concepts of borders, the process of Europeanization and discourses on the existing borders between the EU and the Western Balkans. An empirical part is included, where the interview results show the importance and impact of the imaginary borders in present day Europe. This imaginary border is connected with culture, values and the position a single person is in. While physical borders within the EU rapidly are being removed, the imaginary border, which is part of the mental map, does not vanish with it. This process may take several generations to overcome. As the process of Europeanization is ongoing in the Western Balkans, each of the Western Balkan countries has its own luggage to carry and therefore their own path towards a possible EUmembership. Today’s Western Balkans does not match with present-day Europe (i.e. the EU), but with the past. In the meanwhile the borders (both imaginary and physical) do influence the process of Europeanization. The way towards EU-accession does not remove the borders, but it may reduce the borders. If is to believe that borders are being reduced, this is not done in a single swipe. For the Balkans there is obviously a need for change to cure them by turning into a normalized region and to get rid of the growing nationalism and nationalistic myths. Even though, most of the respondents stressed that even when the Western Balkans become part of the EU, the imaginary borders will remain and the (Western) Balkans will last to be a less favoured, mysterious EU-region.
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Faculteit der Managementwetenschappen