Outcast Europe: The Balkans, 1789-1989. From the Ottomans to Milošević by Tom s> Gallagher (review)

Abstract

146 SEER, 8i, I, 2003 grain of salt. One of the reasons for maritalbreakdownwas due to changing gender relations. The reasons for a decline in the divorce rate were complex and ranged from changes in gender relations to external reasons such as the riseof anti-Semitism,which forcedJews to rely on the familyforprotection. The fourthchaptershowsthatmarriagebreakdownwasnot alwaysfollowed by divorce. By investigating divorce agreements Freeze provides us with insightsinto parent-childaswell as husband-wiferelations. In the last chapter the author discussesnot only the crisisin the familybut the failure of the state and society to solve these issues. The intervention of RussianjuristsinJewish maritallawwas an attemptto create a singleuniform law code for all Russiansubjects.However, in the end no reformtookplace in the finalyears of the Russian Empire.Women would have benefited from the reformsmost, but women had alreadylearned how to 'utilizeand manipulate the Russian administrativeand legal system'(p. 283). The studyprovides insightsinto the behaviour patternsof ordinaryJewish women and men and shattersthe notion of the intactJewish family. Since a comparativeapproachis takenat times, the book placesJewish societywithin the frameworkof the wider society. The study 'seeks to combine the social historian'squest to understand"everydaylife" with the postmodernist'sclose attention to language in examining the transformationof theJewish familyin Imperial Russia' (p. 6). Clearly this goal has been achieved. What makesthis book specificallyvaluable is itsfine gender analysis. Department ofHistory CLAUDIA PRESTEL University ofLeicester Gallagher, Tom. Outcast Europe.TheBalkans,I789-I989. FromtheOttomans to Milosevic. Routledge, London and New York, 2001. xx + 314 PP. Maps. Notes. Bibliography. Index. [55.00. THIS isan irritatingandmisleadingbook, despiteitsflashesof insightand good use of sources.Itpurportsto be aworkof history,butreadsmorelikea tractfor its own times, and not a very convincing one at that. Tom Gallagheris rightly anxious to combat the persistentview of the Balkansas the seat of endemic, age-old hatreds, but reaches for an alternative explanation of Balkan strife which is no lessfar-fetched.Gallagher'scentralthesisis that most, if not all, of the problemsof south-easternEurope are attributableto greatpower interference , 'unfavourableinternational pressure consistently applied' (p. vii; italics added).Althoughtherearemanysubjectswhichtheauthorcanonlysatisfactorily explain with reference to indigenous developments and actions, he seeks repeatedlyto root his analysisin the malignant influence of the great powers. When the latterarenot guiltyof interference,they are accusedof indifference, so that Gallagher manages to have his cake and eat it too. In Gallagher's interpretationvirtuallyeverydevelopment in the Balkans,fromnationalismto the NATO campaign of I999, is seen as malignant and imposed. The rise of nationalism, for instance, is seen as an unfortunatedeparturefrom 'Ottoman multiculturalism',with the Balkanpeoples 'luredinto mutuallyhostile "imagined communities"' (p. 35). Later, it is alleged, great power interference REVIEWS 147 thwarted 'Balkanunion' at the Congress of Berlin (p. 48), and turned 'South Slavsolidarityinto endemic BalkanSlavrivalry'(p. 57). The book's first chapter, covering I789-19I4, is the weakest and most error-ridden. There is confusion as to the origins of Orthodoxy, which Gallagher refers to (pp. 2I-22) as if it were a separate religion since the beginnings of Christianity.Worseis the author'stendency to use twenty-firstcenturylanguage with respect to historicalphenomena, such as the reference to 'ordinaryWest Europeans'defending Constantinople in I453 (P. 23), or to 'West European public opinion' in the context of the Greek war of independence (p. 37). Equally absurd is the exaggeratedly positive image projected of the Ottoman Empire, which 'allowed talented Balkan figures [.. .] to walk on a world stage' (p. 26), as if the undoubted upward mobility possible for (mainly Muslim) subjects of the Sultan were the result of some Ottoman equivalent of the Equal Opportunities Act. Once past I9I4, Gallagherstartsmakingmore sense,because he is able to devote greaterspace to internaldevelopmentsaswell as internationalaffairs.Some of the criticisms of BritishForeign Office contempt for the issue of minorityprotection in the interwarperiod are certainly warranted, and there is a reasonably coherent account of domestic developments in individual countries. Nevertheless, Gallagher attributes too much blame for Balkan woes on 'Versailles',as if Balkan governments and peoples had nothing to do with the post-war settlement. Significant home-grown movements like the Iron Guard in Romania are not discussed, and judgments such as calling King Alexander 'the only real unifying force in Yugoslavia'are questionable to say the least. The greatpowers are denounced, with little distinctionbetween them, for not promoting 'transnationalarrangements'between Balkan states...