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 Int. J. Middle East Stud.
35
(2003), 237–256.
Printed in the United States of America
DOI: 10.1017.S0020743803000102
 Isa Blumi
CONTESTING THE EDGES OF THE OTTOMANEMPIRE: RETHINKING ETHNIC ANDSECTARIAN BOUNDARIES IN THE MALE¨SORE,1878–1912
War in the Balkans over the past decade and a half has inspired a plethora of scholarly, journalistic, and diplomatic publications, all of which have sought to capture the re-gion’s “chaotic” history. Unfortunately, much of this work assumes that conflict inthe Balkans can be understood only along ethno-religious lines.
1
This reductive lineof argument has been particularly evident in the treatment of the Ottoman period inthe Balkans’ past, a period that extends back some 600 years.
2
Consequentially, suchwork has distorted our understanding of Balkan societies both during and after theOttoman Empire.Equally problematic is the search many scholars have undertaken to locate keytransitional periods in the region’s past. Commentators correctly note that the BerlinCongress in 1878, for instance, and the territorial boundaries it drew represented anew era in Balkan political history.
3
Unfortunately, much of this scholarship hasstrictly focused on European diplomacy and, as a consequence, has ignored the socialdynamics surrounding the treaty and the fundamental changes taking place in theBalkans as a result. It is true the structural change of the world economy provided thecontext in which a “New World Order” would be conducted.
4
The four decades fol-lowing the Treaty of Berlin reveal, however, that a multiplicity of processes took placeat the local level that directly influenced how European diplomatic dictates wereimplemented. To address these shortcomings, therefore, this article will establish anew understanding of what took place among Balkan communities as they faced theconsequences of Great Power policies in the late Ottoman period. I suggest that asecond look at the events surrounding the delimitation of the Montenegrin/Ottomanfrontier in one particular area of the Albanian Alps (Male¨sia) over a period of fortyyears may shed new light on the inherent complexities of social life in the region.
5
Specifically, I will demonstrate how communities such as those in the Male¨sore so-cially and economically adjusted to the dynamics of the late 19th century, suggesting,
Isa Blumi is a Ph.D. student in the History and Middle Eastern Studies Departments, New York University,New York, N.Y. 10012, USA; e-mail: isablumi@yahoo.com.
2003 Cambridge University Press 0020-7438/03 $12.00
 
238
Isa Blumi
in the process, a new avenue of analysis for the region and what is generally under-stood as “modernity” in its non–European context.The fundamental changes of the world order initially manifested themselves in theBalkans with a scramble for diplomatic and economic ascendancy in the region. Thevarious powers—Italy, England, Russia, Austria-Hungary, France, and the OttomanEmpire—began to play the politics of religious and ethnic sectarianism, an approachto the region that often affected local communities in counter-intuitive ways. Impor-tantly, it is often presumed that “primitive” communities such as those in the Male¨sorecould not survive such forces of “modernity,” which in this case represented bothOttoman state reforms—schools, customs houses, state centralization, and a modernmilitary—and European diplomatic, cultural, and economic “penetration.” On the con-trary, as the outside world became more and more rigid in how it understood theworld during the course of the 19th century (and tried to impose these understandingson the region), the Male¨sore’s social “hybridity” and cultural “ambiguity” empoweredits inhabitants to negotiate on a number of fronts for their continued autonomy. Over the course of more than thirty years, individuals and groups alike demonstrated acapacity to adjust their formal membership claims to one group or another when andif external conditions dictated. In saying this, I do not wish to suggest that actions inMale¨sore resembled a political sphere that existed in parallel with something distinctcalled “modernity.” Rather, what was happening was an ever-changing present, real,and active interchange of primary actors in a space defined by this exchange betweenthe outside world and the local.
6
In other words, after the Berlin Congress, the Alba-nian-speaking inhabitants of the Male¨sore proved perfectly willing to concede their immediate ethnic or religious identities in return for the money, weapons, or diplo-matic support that would guarantee the safety of their homes and families. This pointis made most clearly in the second half of the study, but these
possibilities of identity
are clearly at play in the diplomacy surrounding the Berlin Congress, as well.In the course of presenting such arguments, this article addresses some of the theo-retical concerns about “borderlands” that have influenced much of my research andunderstanding of social and institutional change in the Hamidian period.
7
The caseof the Male¨sore will suggest that the constitutive nature of European-imposed bound-aries did inform local conceptions of space and of economic and social order anew.This new ordering of life in different ways shaped communal and individual identities,which in turn animated local reactions to the ebbs and flows of daily life. How thesereactions translated in a new diplomatic and political world order, however, willsuggest that a new understanding of the late Ottoman period in Balkan history isnecessary.
HISTORICAL BACKGROUND
From the Crimean War onward, a new system of governance that presumed exclusiveauthority over a state’s space and subject emerged alongside corresponding pressuresto map the world.
8
Such operational manifestations of “European” ascendancy werebased both on an exchange of mutual recognition among imperial states and on rulesand practices that were entirely new to the Balkans (and to the Ottoman Empire). AsMichael Shapiro explains, these practices ultimately sought to limit exchanges that
 
Contesting the Edges of the Ottoman Empire
239did not fall within the realm of, first, categorical representations of an European “real-ity,” and second, central-state control, including the monopoly of violence, tax collec-tion, and diplomatic representation.
9
It is in this 19th-century diplomatic context that political and economic forces,which drew large portions of the region’s population toward industrializing Europe,challenged Istanbul’s sovereign claims to the Balkans.
10
Correspondent to the adjust-ments that weakened Ottoman direct control over much of the Balkans, the rise of imperial Russia and its growing rivalry with Austria would translate into new possibil-ities for local
elites
(the possibility of identity) who began to champion Europeancultural and economic patronage.
11
One of the main benefactors of the rising Russianpresence was the future ruler of Montenegro, Nicholas I, who since the 1850s haddirected a regional, multi-ethnic resistance movement against Ottoman rule.
12
Ottoman military defeat in 1877–78 to the Russians intensified growing fearsamong European powers that the Tanzimat reforms instigated since the 1840s werenot succeeding in strengthening the empire, a key requisite to maintaining the balanceof power in the Balkans. To many, the weakening of the Ottomans’ hold on their Balkan subjects allowed Russian intrigue to threaten European peace and develop-ment. Although Istanbul’s departure from the Balkans seemed inevitable, the way itwas conceived in the San Stefano treaty (a treaty imposed by Russia after its 1878military victory) proved unacceptable to the other European powers.
13
The Berlin Con-gress, therefore, was a European-wide attempt to halt the imminent scramble for terri-tories by Germany, Italy, Austria, and Russia in newly ceded Ottoman territories.
14
ESTABLISHING A MODERN ORDER TO THE MALE¨SORE
A close inspection of the proceedings of the Berlin Congress and the events thatimmediately follow suggests that Russian and Serb ambitions to secure access to theAdriatic were the principal reasons for the expansion of Montenegro into the Male¨-sore.
15
To better make their case, Belgrade intellectuals and Russian Pan-Slavists be-gan a public-relations campaign in the West that asserted Serbian historical claimsto “Southern Serbia” (Kosova and northern Albania), of which Montenegro was anextension.
16
The Male¨sore itself became a bone of contention precisely because Eu-rope awarded Montenegro the mountain regions of Gusinje and Plava as a “conces-sion” in response to the Ottoman Empire’s continued control over Novi Pazar (separat-ing Serbia from Montenegro) and the redefined vilayets of Kosova and Is¸kodra.Interestingly, from the very beginning of the Berlin Congress, Ottoman negotiatorsseemed willing to hand over Gusinje and Plava to Montenegro. Judging from Ottomandocuments, Istanbul was ready to concede these parts of the Male¨sore largely on thebasis of demographic arguments made by Russia at the time.
17
That Ottoman officials disowned large tracks of the Male¨sore on the grounds thatits population was “Christian” is a remarkable demonstration of Hamidian diplomacyat the time, a policy identified by some as seeking to consolidate the Islamic character of the empire.
18
While I do not fully subscribe to this reading of Hamidian policy, itis nevertheless intriguing that officials were willing to cede “Christian” territories thathad never been captured by Serbian, Russian, or Montenegrin forces and that hadbeen part of Ottoman territory for 500 years. As a result of these narrowly defined
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