A Security Conundrum: Kin-State Engagement, Identity Recognition, and the 2012 Dispute between Romania and Serbia

Abstract

Abstract This article examines the relationship between national identity and foreign policy in the context of kin-state engagement in Europe. While the engagement of many European states with their ethnic kin abroad has been long defended as a form of minority protection in so far as it protects and promotes their particular identity and culture, de facto considerations of state security that define its scope have received little attention in the international relations (IR) scholarship. I show here that already in 2012 the dispute between Romania and Serbia over the identity and accommodation of the Vlach minority in Serbia is a conspicuous case in which considerations of (kin-)state security rather than minority protection have overtly justified the engagement of the kin-state. In fact, I argue that this case study calls attention to the multiplying significance of national identity for a kin-state: as a source of obligations, as well as one of (kin-)state ontological security. Yet, in this article, the contextual exploration highlights a tension between the two that originates in a lack of congruity between kin-state identity politics and home-state multiculturalism. While it appears to be unappeasable, in agreement with some constructivist IR scholarship, I contend that it could be reconciled. To this end, this article examines the scope of kin-state engagement at the intersection between justice and security and endorses the necessity to reconceptualize a state’s ontological security as a capability to adapt to a changing normative environment in Europe.