This innovative book documents border porosities that have
developed and persisted between Greece and North Macedonia over
different temporalities and at different localities. By drawing on
geology's ...approaches to studying porosity, Dimova argues that
similar to rocks and minerals that only appear solid and
impermeable, seemingly impenetrable borders are inevitably
traversed by different forms of passage. The rich ethnographic case
studies, from the history of railroads in the southern Balkans,
border town beauty tourism, child refugees during the Greek Civil
War, mining and environmental activism, and the urban renovation
project in Skopje, show that the political borders between states
do not only restrict or regulate the movement of people and things,
but are also always permeable in ways that exceed state
governmentality.
The wars that accompanied the breakup of Yugoslavia in the 1990s were the deadliest European conflicts since World War II. The violence escalated to the point of genocide when, over the course of ten ...days in July 1995, Serbian troops under the command of General Ratko Mladic murdered 8,000 unarmed men and boys who had sought refuge at a UN safe-haven in Srebrenica. Shocked, the United States quickly launched a diplomatic intervention supported by military force that ultimately brought peace to the new nations created when Yugoslavia disintegrated.
Peacemakersis the first inclusive history of the successful multilateral intervention in the Balkans from 1995--2008 by an official directly involved in the diplomatic and military responses to the crises. A deadly accident near Sarajevo in 1995 thrust James Pardew into the center of efforts to stop the fighting in Bosnia. In a detailed narrative, he shows how Richard Holbrooke and the US envoys who followed him helped to stop or prevent vicious wars in Bosnia, Croatia, Kosovo, and Macedonia. Pardew describes the human drama of diplomacy and war, illuminating the motives, character, talents, and weaknesses of the national leaders involved.
Pardew demonstrates that the use of US power to relieve human suffering is a natural fit with American values.Peacemakersserves as a potent reminder that American leadership and multilateral cooperation are often critical to resolving international crises.
This paper reviews a broad set of indicators of competitiveness in the Macedonian economy and estimates the equilibrium real effective exchange rate (REER) using different methodologies. Although the ...REER is broadly in equilibrium at present, structural factors are found to hamper competitiveness. While a more competitive exchange rate might improve short-term export performance, sustained improvements require enhanced productivity and resource reallocation to more dynamic sectors, which depends on reforms to improve the business environment.
