Beyond the Albanian–Slav Divide: Political Cooperation and National Identities in the Balkans at the Turn of the Twentieth Century

Abstract

This article investigates how some prominent and less known Albanian activists perceived their Southern Slav neighbors at the turn of the twentieth century. The research explores the way in which the spread of nationalism conditioned the positioning of Albanians and Slavs in the process of identity construction and how such identities mirrored their reciprocal political claims. Recent scholarship has often emphasized that the affirmation of national ideas led to the fragmentation of Balkan communities by turning Albanian-speaking populations and their Slavic-speaking neighbors into “others.” My analysis expands this assertion by elaborating a theoretical approach that allows us to explore the impact of nationalism on the post-1878 Balkan context from a more dynamic point of view. National discourses did not only lay the foundation for a differentiation between the Balkan communities, but were also tools for promoting joint political activism. National activists often felt it necessary to cooperate in order to deal with the challenges posed by the surrounding environment, which was common to both Albanians and Slavs. Various contingent circumstances led Albanian activists to project long-term forms of coexistence with their neighbors, and to imagine forms of political, cultural, and social synthesis with the Slavs.