"From the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottomans to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Russia, Eastern Europe has been a battleground between the East and the West and a region of fluid frontiers. In Contested Frontiers in the Balkans Irina Marin follows the history of the Banat of Temesvar, a province situated on the edges of these competing empires and currently divided among Romania, Serbia and Hungary. The history of the Banat is, on a small scale, the history of Central and Eastern Europe as a whole - with its overlapping imperial rules, redrawing of boundaries, composite identities, Procrustean nation-states straddling multi-ethnic regions, the legacy of Communism and its vagaries, and the resuscitation of regionalism within the framework of the European Union. It is also the place where the Romanian Revolution of 1989 started which brought Ceau escu's Communist dictatorship to an end. The first history of its kind, this is an important study of Serbian and Romanian ethnicity, culture and influence explored through archival documents and a transnational historical approach, and provides new insights into the major empires of history and their relationship with the Balkan lands."--Bloomsbury publishing.

From the Holy Roman Empire and the Ottomans to the Austro-Hungarian Empire and Russia, Eastern Europe has been a battleground between the East and the West and a region of fluid frontiers. In Contested Frontiers in the Balkans Irina Marin follows the history of the Banat of Temesvar, a province situated on the edges of these competing empires and currently divided among Romania, Serbia and Hungary. The history of the Banat is, on a small scale, the history of Central and Eastern Europe as a whole - with its overlapping imperial rules, redrawing of boundaries, composite identities, Procrustean nation-states straddling multi-ethnic regions, the legacy of Communism and its vagaries, and the resuscitation of regionalism within the framework of the European Union. It is also the place where the Romanian Revolution of 1989 started which brought Ceau escu's Communist dictatorship to an end. The first history of its kind, this is an important study of Serbian and Romanian ethnicity, culture and influence explored through archival documents and a transnational historical approach, and provides new insights into the major empires of history and their relationship with the Balkan lands.

Examines the origins of political violence in the Balkans since the 19th century, while treating the region as an integral part of modern European history, reminding us that political violence and ethnic cleansing are hardly unique to this region.

A source of up-to-date information on current water resources, their quality and quantity, in every country in the Balkans. Institutional structures, water management issues and water monitoring problems are analyzed, with special reference to international waters, using characteristic case studies, including the Sava River, Lake Ohrid, The Nestos/Mesta River, the Neretva River estuary, and coastal waters in Turkey. Contributions written by experts from France, the UK and the USA demonstrate state-of-the-art electronic networking and the management of distributed water databases. The protection of water resources in the Balkans has become a high profile issue since the collapse of communism in the area, the break up of former Yugoslavia, and ethnic tensions in Kosovo. Transboundary river pollution and the development of international water basins call demand urgent regional co-operation, which will be facilitated by the International Network of Water-Environment Centres for the Balkans, the initiation of which is described in the final conclusions of the book.

This text asks what happens to historical memory and cultural identity when state borders undergo radical transformation. Concentrating on Trieste and the Istrian Peninsula it explores displacement from both the viewpoints of the exiles and those who stayed behind.

This authoritative reference follows the history of conflicts in the Balkan Peninsula from the 19th century through the present day. The Balkan Peninsula, which consists of Albania, Bulgaria, Romania, Moldova, and the former Yugoslavia, resides in the southeastern part of the European continent. Its strategic location as well as its long and bloody history of conflict have helped to define the Balkans' role in global affairs. This singular reference focuses on the events, individuals, organizations, and ideas that have made this region an international player and shaped warfare there for hundreds of years. Historian and author Richard C. Hall traces the sociopolitical history of the area, starting with the early internal conflicts as the Balkan states attempted to break away from the Ottoman Empire to the assassination of Archduke Franz Ferdinand that ignited World War I to the Yugoslav Wars that erupted in the 1990s and the subsequent war crimes still being investigated today. Additional coverage focuses on how these countries continue to play an important role in global affairs and international politics.