Inaug.-diss.--Leipzig. / Lebenslauf. "Literatur": p. [99]-105; bibliographical foot-notes.

This thesis is a case-study of Slobodan Milosevic as a prototype of the "criminal" leader. Challenging the existing consensus among Western liberals, for whom Milosevic is unquestionably criminal, it asks whether and to what extent Milosevic is a criminal leader. It approaches this by first dissecting the Western construction of Milosevic as a criminal leader into its key components -- his actions and intentions, his motivations, his personality and psychology, and his comparison with other "criminal" leaders. This normative-driven construction is then empirically tested, using two main sources. The speeches of Milosevic, fundamentally misrepresented by many Western commentators, are analyzed. The second primary source used is semi-structured interviews (supported by public opinion poll data). Strongly influenced by bottom-up studies of the Hitler and Stalin regimes, two leaders that can be seen as crucial cases of the criminal leader, this research is particularly concerned with exploring how ordinary people in Serbia - heavily neglected in the existing Western literature - view Milosevic. This allows us to ascertain whether and to what extent the Western, liberal construction of Milosevic as a criminal leader has domestic/field validity. What the interview data reveals is a sharp discrepancy between the external (Western) and domestic (Serbian) viewpoints. The Serbian interviewees overwhelmingly view Milosevic not as a criminal leader, but as a "bad" (unsuccessful) leader and/or as a victim. This discrepancy is translated into, and used to develop, a general concept of the criminal leader. This conceptualization emphasizes both the externally constructed nature of the criminal leader (policy dimension) and the importance of studying the criminal leader from below (domestic dimension).

In the post-Cold War era, the Balkans came to exemplify the power of resurgent nationalisms freed from the straitjacket of bipolar stability. The break-up of the Yugoslav federation suggested that exclusivist ethno-national identities trumped the logic of political and economic integration. Yet, by the early 2000s, regional cooperation made significant inroads into South East Europe. This study addresses the puzzle of why the Balkan states have engaged in a number of multilateral schemes in fields such as military security, trade, infrastructure development, energy, despite the region's divisive historical legacies and political instability. The thesis explores the impact of three factors: regional interdependence denoting the socio-economic and political linkages which contribute to the convergence of Balkan states' material interests, external push referring to the policies for fostering regional cooperation adopted by key actors such as the EU, US, and NATO, and identity politics: the discourses on the borders, cultural make-up and history of a Balkan regional entity as well as the latter's relationship with constructs like Europe and the West. The thesis argues that external projection of power, rather than regional interdependence, accounted for the development and growth of Balkan regionalism. However, the push from outside was legitimised by Balkan collective identity built upon myths of belonging to and exclusion from 'civilised Europe'. Regionalism was not solely a reflection of the supply and demand for integrative frameworks, but amounted to a symbolic strategy for transforming the volatile Balkans into South East Europe by the adoption of the institutional norms and practices of international clubs such as the EU and NATO. The case of regional cooperation in South East Europe contributes to the debates about the politics of interest and the politics of identity in the field of International Relations, and raises questions about the nature of power in contemporary Europe and the international society.

The end of communism in Central and Eastern Europe and the choice for a market economy and democracy by these societies was the beginning of a vast process of change that affected all aspects of social life. In spite of the simultaneity of these changes, and the general realisation that integrative approaches are needed to do justice to this complexity, most scholarly analyses remain confined within existing disciplinary boundaries such as Economics and Politics. In this thesis, reflexive theories in Economics, Politics and International Political Economy are used to derive a set of working hypotheses about the relationships between the economic and political spheres, domestic and international. These hypotheses are then used to illuminate the empirical case of marketisation in Romania. The dominant neo-Iiberal explanations about the meaning and direction of postcommunist changes created a hierarchy of performance (i.e. conformity with the neoliberal ideals) between the countries of CEE. In this reading, Romania was a laggard in 'transition' and this was attributed to the incomplete democratisation of the political system and the neo-comrnunist and nationalistic ideology of the 1990-6 governments. The analysis proposed in this thesis challenges this simplistic explanation and the content and pace of economic reforms in Romania are linked to four factors. These are the fragile political consensus around reform; the structural power of industrial interests and their ability to co-opt factions of the political elite; the weak institutional basis; and the cultural gap between the expectations of the public and the requirements of a market economy.

This thesis examines the implementation of ownership reforms following the collapse of Communist rule in Romania in 1989. It concentrates upon the rural sector and, in particular, the question of what to do with the collective farms. The aim has been to provide a critical account of the roots of the post-Communist land question, going back as far as the agrarian situation in the last century. To this end, regard is had to the land question in the pre-Communist era, concentrating on the efforts made by the state to create a sustainable system of land tenure. The second part of the work investigates how the Communist regime reformed land use and agricultural production, in particular, the methods by which the private control of land was transformed during collectivisation. In this way, the recent land reforms are linked to a much longer history of struggle over land. The objective has been to examine the legal process of implementing post-Communist land reforms as a means whereby history is rewritten, both nationally and locally. The land reforms are, partly, the official recognition of abuses committed by the former regime and yet, they are also a means of restructuring the country's agricultural sector. As in other countries in eastern Europe, Communist rule in Romania transformed a predominantly agrarian society into an industrial one. Before the Communists almost three-quarters of the population lived and worked on the land. By the time President Nicolae Ceausescu fell, the proportion was less than a third. The land question in post-Communist Romania centred on the extent to which the need to compensate former landowners could direct the content of reform.

Freie Univ., Diss u.d.T.: Ledeboer, R.: Balkanologische Übersetzungen der deutschen Modalverben "müssen" und "können"--Berlin, 2002.

Inaug.-disss.--Leipzig. / Vita. "Literatur": [9]-15.

Inaug.-disss.--Leipzig. / Vita. "Literatur": [9]-15.

Inaug.-diss.--Leipzig. / Lebenslauf. "Literatur": p. [99]-105; bibliographical foot-notes.

This research project explores Romania’s process of detachment from Moscow from 1953 to 1963 within the context of the global Cold War. Through a multi-archival investigation, the dissertation investigates the first full process of peaceful de-satellization within the Eastern bloc by considering the broader framework of the bipolar international climate. In so doing, it provides both a bottom-up, as well as a top-down analysis. This project focuses, in particular, on the tenure of Gheorghe Gheorghiu-Dej (1947-65), Romania’s first Communist leader, as it was under his leadership that the country shifted from complete subservience to the Soviet Union to political and economic autonomy. In 1958, Romania negotiated a full troop withdrawal, remaining the only Warsaw Pact country without Soviet military presence until the fall of the Berlin Wall. And by 1963, it also dared to challenge Moscow’s plans for economic specialization within COMECON, thereby asserting its sovereign right to pursue national interest over the greater socialist good, and thus stymying the Kremlin’s initiative for an integrated bloc economy. This project provides an in-depth investigation into the reasons why Romania was able to boldly confront the Soviet Union without fear of retribution, by tracing the process through which Dej gradually removed Romania’s political straightjacket, and exploring those elements within the international climate which allowed him to negotiate Romania’s detachment.