Year: 2015
Type: article
Abstract: This article argues that there is much confusion surrounding Serbia's landmark decision to engage in a process of normalization with Kosovo. Rather than undergoing a process of Europeanization, whereby a fundamental transformation in the underlying rationale and processes of decision‐making occurred, as some have argued, the changes in Serbia's policy are in fact based on material concerns. By tracing relations in the EU‐Serbia‐Kosovo triangle, the article shows that change in Serbia's approach towards Kosovo is based on pragmatism and political opportunism, rather than absorption, adaptation, convergence or identity formation. What we have witnessed is a more short‐term, interest based policy shift serving very specific economic purposes. In conceptual terms, this is better understood as a policy of rationally instrumental ‘pre‐Accession Europeanization’ rather than as a process of adaptive normative Europeanization as more conventionally understood in the literature.
DOI: 10.1111/jcms.12238
Authors: Spyros Economides, James Ker‐Lindsay
Institution: London School of Economics and Political Science
Language: English
Field: Social Sciences
Domain: Social Sciences
Open Access status: green
OpenAlex ID: W2170017876