THE EMPIRE CREATES A NEW NATION
THE EMPIRE CREATES A NEW NATION

Summary/Abstract: Using the research of the late Bulgarian historian and theologian Teodora Toleva, the author analyzes how the Austro-Hungarian Foreign Ministry formed the Albanian nation as a political project par excellence the effects of which are still felt in the Balkans. In her PhD dissertation, defended at the University of Barcelona in 2008, based on previously unpublicized sources – mostly political reports written by Austro-Hungarian Foreign Ministry high officials and representatives in the Ottoman Empire – Toleva provided clear and indisputable evidence that the formation of the Albanian nation, alphabet, schools, literature and national consciousness had been devised by Viennese politicians, with the intention of halting the advance of Russian influence in the Balkans, as well as Serbian expansion in Kosovo, Macedonia and northern Albania. The documents clearly reveal not only that the Albanians are one of the youngest European nations, but also the “soft power” technique which uses culture to create new national entities. The author contrasts Toleva’s work with that of Serbian historians, in which, for decades, many facts had been kept away from the public for the sake of “political correctness.” The author documents the destructive consequences of Austria-Hungary’s policy which, although the empire has been absent from the political scene for over a century, continues to live through the political activities of its successors on the international scene – the EU, Great Britain, Germany and the U.S.

• Details
• Contents