Dark Histories, Brighter Futures? The Balkans and Black Sea Region: European Union Frontiers, War Crimes and Confronting the Past

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Acknowledgements

This article introduces a collection of studies linked to the work of the War Crimes Research Group (WCRG) at King’s College London, which provided critical and evaluative support for it. A number of the authors are members of the group (see http://www.kcl.ac.uk/despsta/war/researchgroups/wcrg). Others have previous or current association with the WCRG, or the Department of War Studies at King’s. While the articles do not—and cannot—represent a comprehensive assessment of the record of atrocity and conflict in the broad region identified in this article and treated throughout the special issue—the legacy of conflict and war crimes in that region, and the responses to that record and legacy—they are a set of relevant analyses of one of these themes or another. This is in line with the invitation to authors to address some aspect of the legacy of past conflict and atrocity in the region in the context of EU partnership and enlargement. The collection is possible only with the crucial support that also came from the seven anonymous peer reviewers, who deserve the thanks of all involved for critically reading the draft articles—with particular note due to the one reviewer who read and commented on all the articles to ensure a consistent overview.

Notes

[1] ‘Neighbourhood’ is used here to refer to the physical‐political neighbourhood of the EU, including the countries of the Western Balkans, which are not covered as part of the policy, but separately under programmes of Stability and Association Agreements, geared towards potential membership of the Union. However, while in a different category politically and practically for Brussels, in effect, they share a place with the countries to the north and east of the Black Sea and elsewhere, covered by the ‘Neighbourhood Policy’, which is their relationship with the EU and its logic of partnership and inclusion.

[2] On the evolution of partnership policies, see Gow (2005), and on the evolution of Neighbourhood thinking, in particular, see Danreuther (2004).

[3] While not wholly inconsistent with the multifaceted political‐military approach laid out in the EU’s strategy document A Secure Europe in a Better World (EU 2003: 12).

[4] All of this, of course, is once more to underscore just how important is Charles King’s history (King 2004). It is to be hoped that there will be others that engage with it, but it is testimony to the quality of this book that, whatever that engagement holds, it will stand strong.

[5] The other part of the EU’s ‘New Neighbourhood’ would be a suitable case for a complementary study to the present collection, although the specific issues are different—in particular, the record of atrocity is not comparable, even if there are some similar statehood questions.