Notions of Violence and Ethnic Cleansing on the Eve of the First World War: The Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 (South-East European History)

Panagiotis Delis

ISBN 10: 1636672264 / ISBN 13: 9781636672267

Published by Peter Lang, 2024

About this Item

Hardcover, viii + 188 pages, NOT ex-library. Book looks unread, with crisp pages and unmarked text, clean and bright throughout, free of inscriptions and stamps, firmly bound. Issued without a dust jacket. -- Historians and scholars of modern conflict will find here a transnational, microhistorical analysis of how mass violence and ethnic cleansing were institutionalized behind front lines during the Balkan Wars - revealing their role as laboratories for the broader patterns of 20th-century warfare. -- The book covers mechanisms of violence across multiple borderland zones between 1912-1913, focusing not on battlefield strategy but on interactions among regular armies, paramilitaries, and civilian populations that generated an "undeclared war on the sidelines." It examines localized dynamics through case studies: Bekir Fikri's operations in the Vilayet of Manastir; military occupation tactics; forced Christianization of Pomaks in Thrace; and counterinsurgency efforts along the Epirus front involving Albanian irregulars. Methodologically, it anchors macro-historical claims in granular field-level evidence - tracking how collective wartime experience normalized expulsion, religious coercion, and irregular combat as tools of territorial control. The study situates these conflicts within a longue durée framework (1804-1912) to show continuity in regional instability, then positions them as formative precedents to the Greater War (1917-1923), challenging Eurocentric narratives that begin with 1914. -- This work stands apart by treating the Balkan Wars not as peripheral prelude but as central incubators of modern ethnic violence - offering sociologists of conflict, genocide scholars, and military historians a template for analyzing how state and non-state actors jointly produce civilian-targeted brutality. Its value endures for researchers calibrating comparative models of cleansing, educators building curricula on the roots of total war, and policymakers examining how irregular warfare entrenches sectarian division - making it essential for understanding the violent genealogies that shaped both world wars and contemporary ethno-national conflicts. -- Contents: Introduction; 1 A Longue Durée Borderland Crisis: 1804-1912; 2 Bekir Fikri of Grevena: Micro Dynamics of Violence in the Vilayet of Manastir; 3 An Undeclared War in the Sidelines: The Paramilitaries and the Locals; 4 An Undeclared War in the Sidelines: The Military Occupation; 5 Notions of Violence and Ethnic Cleansing in Thrace and the Pomak Christianization; 6 The Epirus Front: A Case of Counterinsurgency and the Albanian Factor; Conclusions; Bibliography.

Seller Inventory # 012194

Bibliographic Details

• Title: Notions of Violence and Ethnic Cleansing on the Eve of the First World War: The Balkan Wars of 1912-1913 (South-East European History)
• Publisher: Peter Lang
• Publication Date: 2024
• Language: English
• ISBN 10: 1636672264
• ISBN 13: 9781636672267
• Binding: Hardcover
• Edition: 1st Edition
• Condition: Fine

About this title

Synopsis

This book examines patterns of behavior during an era of mass brutality by analyzing, in a transnational context, mechanisms of violence and ethnic cleansing in the Balkan Wars of 1912–13.

About the Author

Panagiotis Delis holds a PhD in history from Simon Fraser University. He serves as a permanent civil servant and as research associate at the University of Athens.