Balkan Academic News Book Review 5/2010

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Wolfgang Petritsch, Goran Svilanovic and Cristophe Solioz (eds.), Serbia
Matters: Domestic Reforms and European Integration, Baden-Baden: Nomos,
2009, 225 pp., ISBN: 978-3832945848, Price: 28,35EUR

Reviewed by Jovana Jezdimirovic Ranito (School of Economics, University
of Coimbra, Portugal) Email:jovana.ranito@...

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This edited collection has two aims: first, to critically analyze the
current state of affairs in Serbia and second, to analyze why the
country's rapid accession to the European Union interests not only
Serbia itself but also the whole Western Balkans. For that purpose
editors divided the author's contributions in three parts: Serbia in
Europe; Nation and State: Past and Present; and Serbia and Its
Economics: Challenges Today.

This book aims to set out an agenda as to what should be done to ease
the process of integration of Serbia in European Union. This agenda
regards both issues of European Union itself and Serbia and Western
Balkan states. It is an important contribution in literature for being
the first book that searches to identify problems clearly and persuade
both Serbian political elite and those members of EU that impede
progress of Serbia in its attempt to become part of European family.

The main aim of this collection is to reconcile different types of
articles in one collection: opinions, journalist views, and academic
papers. Some of them look displaced. In several articles when we see the
data exposed, we would like to know where it comes from, and the source
of this information is not available. It can be frustrating. Readers can
find that some articles are clearly personal opinions and attitudes of
their authors, without any academic contribution and facts, and they
appear not properly integrated into the rest of the book.

In the first part, Serbia in Europe, focus is given to an explanation of
the probable future scenarios toward Serbian integration in EU, advises
on potential steps and measures for Serbia to undertake and, in some
moment reach the point in which looks like a handbook with a magic
solution for Serbia to reach integration that looks widely desired. This
part of the book has the lacuna in treating Serbia-Russia relations, by
not considering a profound analysis of this important partner of Serbia,
especially process of privatization in Serbia and Russian role in it. On
the other side, some topics such as achievements of Serbia are
repetitive. The analysis of the EULEX mission on Kosovo gives an example
of two stories that we can meet in this chapter: one told by Serbian
authors and another by authors from the rest of the Europe. For an
inexperienced reader, this could be confusing, but in fact, these are
just two very different points of the view on the same subject.
Conclusion of several authors in comparison of Western Balkan situation
regarding EU integration to "carrot and stick" tactic is well exposed by
examples. EU is accused for not having transparent and clear merit-based
process, but rather "mysterious rules in the game". This accusation is
the explanation of Slovenia's blockage of Croatian pre-accession
negotiation and Germany's opposition to further enlargement (in near
future) after Croatia's accession.

In chapter "State and Nation" political history of Serbia and importance
of Kosovo for it is described and commented. It is given an accent on
analysis of possibility for Serbia's EU integration and scenarios in a
case that this does not happen. This historical overview passes since
Ottoman period over formation of Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes
to nowadays. There are some interesting new proposals, such as
comparison of the Tito´s Yugoslavia with EU, in order to explain future
of EU and challenges it sees to come. Formation of the Serbia, as a
state and nation, through the history, is explained in order to explain
the cause of the problems it faces nowadays. It argues that its own
history conditioned its behaviour and culture that are difficult to
rapidly change. The critique of this section goes to lack of existence
of some logic that articles are chosen. There are some topics that are
frequently repeated (such as issue of Dutch veto over Serbia's
approximation to EU integration and division inside of EU over Kosovo)
and others that are just tackled, as for example question of human
rights in Serbia and approximation of national constitution to the
requirements of the EU.

The chapter "Serbia and economic challenges today" gives emphasis to an
instability in an economy due to a lack of strategy. It focuses current
political financial crisis and its effects on Serbian economy, outing in
the second plan deeper analysis of the Russia-Serbia-EU economic
relations. Some authors are even claiming the lack of anchor in Serbian
economical policy. Briefly passes over subjects such as labour and
capital markets and lacks in-deep analysis of the potential that Serbia
can have in EU as well as the benefits that EU would have from entrance
of Serbia in its family.

Overall opinion is that book is a great contribution in this area, as it
is the first of its kind. Its clear goal to influence policies and
politicians is notable. However, lack of academic rigor of part of the
articles limits its quality. The idea to organize the book in the way it
is published (divided in three chapters), gives the impression of being
appropriate. Nevertheless, profound analysis of some issues needs to be
covered in order that this book can be considered successful in
addressing issues that are proposed initially.

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Book Review Editors: Birgul Demirtas-Coskun (birguld@...
<mailto:birguld@...>), Olivera Simic (maliraj2002@...),
and Andreas Hemming (andreas.hemming@...)

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© 2010 Balkan Academic News. This review may be distributed and
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