Cultural Transitions in Southeastern Europe

Nada Švob-Đokić

Institute for International Relations Zagreb, Croatia

Transition versus transformation

• What is transition?– systemic social change, that occurs within the same

system or in-between different social systems– encompasses very different areas of human activities

and therefore involves different values– transition is defined differently by different social

sciences and professional specializations (Wagener, H.J., Economics of Transition: A new Field of Economics, 1997.)

– long-term, eclectic, multiphase

Transition versus transformation

• What is social transformation?– interactive social change that may (and need

not involve) systemic changes– transformation encompasses parts of the

system and is confined to different specializations

– transformation defines the type and nature of transition

Transition versus transformation

• Transition/transformation frameworks– functional market integration– global economic interdependence– technological and scientific development– communication and trade– de-territorialization– other aspects of globalization

Cultural transitions I

• Change of cultural contexts: cultural and extra-cultural

• Change of cultural structures: from basically national to basically global

• Change of cultural spaces: ethnic, national, individual; rural, urban, regional, continental

-cultural hybridity-multiculturalism / interculturalism

Cultural transitions II• Overall and systemic change of cultures and

cultural contexts• Increased de-standardization of cultural values• Increased cultural differences• Blurred view of cultures: what kind of culture is

emerging out of reshuffled national cultures, broken identities, reaffirmed national and religious values, tendencies to enter global cultural trade, mediation of cultures, emerging cultural industries, etc.

Contextualizing Cultures• Cultures are ever more influenced and shaped by

developments and activities which are not strictly cultural. This is particularly visible in the extra-cultural regulations that ever more influence cultural field and define a new position of contemporary cultures.

• Cultures have merged with production processes and markets.

• The new cultural contexts are no longer exclusively dominated by ethnic and national cultures. Cultures have opened up to diversities and the «inner» character of cultures is no longer monolithic, but crumbled and made up of arbitrary value choices.

Cultural context and cultural space

• inherited ideas on culture and inability to define culture

• cultural space as a national space• cultural space as international space• global cultural space:

– regional (complementary to the regional development arrangements: Southeastern Europe; Black Sea Region, etc.)

– continental (European, Latinamerican: complementary to the free trade agreements)

Cultural transitions• Time of crisis

(second half of 20th century; postmodernism)

• Culture as a producer of values «in its own right» : cultural products and cultural markets

• Balance between cultural transition and cultural transformation

• Inner restructuring (19th/20th century: defined national cultures; second half of the 20th century: from ethnic and national cultures to global cultural space)

Cultural transitions• from national to international cultural space: already

standardized transition embodied in the practice of international cultural cooperation

• globalization and formation of «integrated cultural zones» (e.g. European – European cultural policies; Latino –Mercosul da Cultura)– basically concentrated on education (e.g. European reform of

higher education – the Bologna process; promotion of Spanish/Portuguese bilingualism in LA)

– redefinition of (cultural) identities– minority cultures (ethnic, national, feminist, queer, etc.)– rapprochement between consumer capitalism and

multiculturalism (S. Žižek, American authors)

New cultural contextualization

• value aspects: symbolic meanings and spaces

• policy aspects: participation of states, non-governmental organizations, individuals. Large scale democratization. Dehierarhization of cultures. Trade and marketing of cultural goods.

• culture as a resource (market value of cultural production; employment in culture)

• culture as a context for identification: redefining cultural identities

• cultural communication: opening up cultural exchanges

The Expediency of Culture(George Yudice, Duke University press, Durham&London, 2003.)

• ... labor stands at the heart of culture. (330.)

• Labor is the attention extracted from audiences, which is in turn sold to advertizers. ...at the heart of this process is the mediation provided by curators, who can commission artists to mobilize the labor of publics. Their function goes beyond that of author to that of producers who carry out the curatorial, administrative, educational, marketing and public information tasks, as well as serve as intermediaries of global politics. ... codirectors work closely with the curators, artists, and contacts (coinvestigators) necessary to carry out the projects. ....exhibitions and programs require high managerial expertise, the kind of necessary for devising marketing plans, and the curators (like the artists) are brought to realize these plans. The new structure of cultural institutions requires such knowledge / cultural management. ... a new form of labor is emerging out in so called postmodern age, a form of labor patterned on the creative, innovative practices of the artist. We might say that artists are the «mental workers» who bring the notion of «assemblage» into the postmodern era of flexible production. The very term «cultural workers» ... conveys the specialization in the production and reproduction of publics. (331. )

• Culture is «freed» ... to become a generator of value in its own right. (336)

Southeastern Europe 20th century history of Southeastern Europe / history of nation

building– The century of wars: Balkan wars (1911-1913), First World War

(1914-1918), Second World War (1941-1945), Wars of the dissolution of Yugoslavia (1991-1995)

– Creation of kingdoms: The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes; Kingdoms of Romania, Bulgaria, Greece, Albania after the First World War

– Creation of national states and federations: Federative Popular Republic of Yugoslavia, Popular Republics of Romania, of Bulgaria, of Albania after the Second World War

– Projects of Balkan federations: 1866-68 (Serbia, Montenegro, Greece, Romania against Turkey); 1912 (Serbia, Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro against Turkey); 1913 (Serbia, Greece, Montenegro against Bulgaria); 1943 (six national republics to establish Yugoslavia); 1954 Balkan Alliance Agreement (Greece, Yugoslavia, Turkey), etc.

– Transition and re-creation of national states– Integration into the European Union

Southeastern Europe

Redefinition of cultural identities• Pre-national stages: Ethnic identities / Ottoman Empire,

Austro Hungarian Empire• National stages: Establishment of national identities –

dominance of ethnic identities / Kingdoms in the Balkans• Federation: Corporate identities, internationalism /

Socialist systems• Dissolution of federation: Re emergence of ethnic and

traditional national identities / Transition• New national states: Transition / National identities

versus a parallel European identity: nationality versus multiculturality

Southeastern Europe

A rational analysis• Cultural diversity: multiculturality, interculturality;

a basis for communication, cooperation and mutual respect

• Emancipation of cultures: from cultural heritage to the redefinition of cultural values

• Cultural convergence: structural analysis, communication, technologies

• Cultural development: iindividualization of identities and values

• Strategies for entering (and leaving) modernity; global niches and fractal cultural structures

SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE some regional concepts

• a mythical project, romantic approaches• the idea of a region and hybrid identities:

“common experiences and ever changing boundaries”

• methodological inconsistency• identity politics / co-existence of hidden

markers europeanism ethnicism cosmopolitanism nationalism

SOUTHEASTERN EUROPE some regional concepts

• the idea of unity: “last link between politics and culture”, cultural nostalgia

• the idea of disunity: political emancipation and new states; transparent cultural identities

• political, social and cultural inconsistency, individual identity• geographical spaces navigating between imperialism and

nationalism (Dedijer)• shared regional identity: multiculturalism, interculturalism

• Frameworks for an European region: Western Balkans enlarged – members: Greece, Bulgaria, Romania– candidates: Croatia, Macedonia– waiting countries: Bosnia and Herzegovina, Albania, Serbia