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Revolutionary

Communist

;

he may w e l l , asRose maintains,

have

expected

that

the dictatorshipofthe Equalswould soon giveway tosomecombination

ofrepresentative

government

and d i r e c t popular

c o n t r o l ;

but he can only be

c a l l e d

a

democrat

i f

that

term

is

equated, as

Rose

consistently

equates

i t

with

revolution and the serene acceptance, at l e a s t on paper, of the

necessityof

eliminating

a l l

opposition

by wholesale

slaughter.

Even granted

that

the matter was never put

to

the

t e s t ,

i t

is d i f f i c u lt

to concur

withRose's

conclusion

thatwhenBabeuf died

he had

done a l l that

one man coul d do to

vindicatethe i d e a l s of equalityandfreedom.''

Carleton

University

M. J .

Sydenham

The Establishment of the Balka n

National States,

1804-1920, by

Charlesand Barbara J e l a v i c h . Vol. v i i i of A Historyof East Central

Europe,

edited

by Peter F.

S u g a r

and

Donald

W. Treadg old.

Universityof

W ash in g t o n

Press,Seattleand London, 1978. xv, 3 44

pp. 18.95

This is the eighth of eleven volumes projected for the Uni versity of

Washington'sserieson theHistory

of

EastCentral

Europe

which, accordin g

tothe dustcover,aimsto a t t r a c t thescholarwho is not a s p e c i al i s t inthe

area

under consideration

as

well

as the student who

is considering

such

s p e c i a l i z a t i o n .

These

aimsare by no

means

as concordant as they

sound,

and l e a s t of a l l toanyone challenged towritesuch abook;but i f the other

volumes

match

thi s one, e s p e c i a l l y organizationally,the completedset willbe

a

valuable

resource

f o r

any

u n i v e r s i t y

or

large

public

l i b r a r y .

The extremely complex character of Balkan society

e t h n i c a l l y ,

r e l i g i o u s l y , l i n g u i s t i c a l l y ,

h i s t o r i c a l l y

iscommemoratedgastronomically

in

that

salad ofmanyingredients,vigorouslymixed,knownas amacdoine.

Historiansof the nineteenth centurymovements

leading

to the indepen

dence,

in turn,of severalBalkan nations are thus recounting astoryof

e x t r i c a t i o naswellas

s e l f - r e a l i z a t i o n .

But the h i s t o r i a n s themselves are

changing, and inplace ofthat e a r l i e r v i s i o n of Balkannation-buildingas an

east

European

extension of a

west Europan

l ibe ral

resurgence,

have

i n

the

l a s t

two or three

decades

become more s e n s i t i v e to the impact of the

c o l o n i a l experie nce which Balkan peoples shared forcenturiesunder

Ottomanr u l e ;

andmoreaware also

of

the

waysin

which Balkan

nationshave

learnedfrom one another,

about

the very techniques ofnational

r e v i t a l i z a -

tion, i f nothing e l s e .

The Jelavich volume, though dedicated to a consideration of the

emergence

of the separate Balkan

nations,brings

out very

well

the shared

experiences,the

c u l t u r a l

interdependence aswell as independence, the

mutual

i n s t r u c t i o n

as

well

as the

rival rie s .

Explanation for

t h i s

success is

c h i e f l y to be found in the

i n t e l l i g e n t

pre-planning of chapter structureand

content before the actual w r i t i n g

began.

Beginners in Balkan

h i s t o r y

frequently

put

down

survey-volumes

f o r

the

same

reason which

leads

others

toputdownRussiannovels toomanycharacters

with

impossiblenames,

toomanydigressionswhich only thecommittedsurvive.Thisbookshould

encouragethe student who

is considering

a Balkan s p e c i a l i z a t i o n. Itis

c l e a r .

It neverabandonsthemain narrativeli ne. It is well-proportionedand

generally

r e l i a b l e .

The w r i t i n g is

p l a i n ,

at

moments

embarrassed, but

students

do not expect verve or elegance from h i s t o r i a n s , which

is

as

w e l l .

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not a s p e c i a l i s t who neverthelessquicklygets the

f e e l

of abook, may well

noticetwo c h a r a c t e r i s t i c s in t h i s volume. F i r s t , i t grows quite notably in

i n t e r e s t as

well

as authority

a f t e r

the

openingof

the

c r i s i s

of 1876. Secondly,

the authors are

far

more

at

ease

with the diplomacy of Russia than

that

of the

other bigpowers.

Greeceseemstocomeoff

p a r t i c u l a r l y

badly, e s p e c i a l l y in the e a r l i e s t

chapters. Did

thi s

reviewer

imagine

the

boredom

of the authors with the

o f t - t o l d t a l e

ofGreekindependence?The weaknessesof

t h e i r

accountare

c e r t a i n l ynot imaginary, and thei m p l a u s i b i l i t i e s of the

c u l t u r a l

explanation f o r

the

r e v o l t

are

s t i l l

given

precedence

over the

economic,

which

by now has an

accretion

of

good, c h i e f l y p e r i o d i c a l , l i t e r a t u r e

to bemined. The

m u l t i p l i c i t y

of

Greekleaders, as against the charismatic one or two in other Balkan

s i t u a t i o n s ,

poses

an important question,

worth

consideration,

about

the

maturity

of theGreek

u p r i s i n g .

The data on

foreign

intervention

i s i n

places

archaic

or simply

wrong (philhellenism

as a

propellantof B r i t i s h

policymakers

no longer holds up) and at

moments

d i s t u r b i n g l y so; thus, one rubsone's

eyes

(p.

47) in coming across a

Robert

Castlereagh1 descri bed as a

B r i t i s h

prime-minister.

Serbiaand Bulgaria receive themostc a r e f u l and readable treatment,

thoughRumaniai s not f a r behind. As

mentioned,

the i n s i g h t s i n t o Russian

interventionismhavemuchto do witht h i s , and thec u l t u r a l linkagesbetween

St.

Petersburg and the Balkan

c a p i t a l s

are convincingly

delineated.Thus,

one

of

themostsuccessful

passages

treats

of

the disillusionmentand

dismay

in

Belgrade, Bucharest and Athenswhenthe San Stefanoarrangements

becamep u b l i c :

students usually

hear

only of the

hood-winking

of

A u s t r i a .

Compare

with

thi s

the

near

neglect of

French

and

B r i t i s h i n t e r e s t s ,

the

underplaying of the r e s i d u a l l o y a l t y to the Turks, and a lack ofstresson

Vienna's

chronic fears of Austro-Hungarian d i s s o l u t i o n , and one

sees

why,

nevertheless,

the

reality

of Russiandominance

i s

overplayed.

If students are to be won over by

lively discussion

as wellas the inherent

i n t e r e s t of the subject matter,

perhaps

the authors should alsohave picked

up

some

neglected

opportunities

in

t h e i r

own statements. The

background

chapters on the

Ottoman regime

(chapters 1, 7) assert rather than

demonstrate

or discuss the idea that a stronger current

sought

the

abandonmentof the oldways inIstanbul;and is i t r e a l l y true that the

reformerssquaredthe c i r c l e

combining

progressive ideas with anemphasis

on

Islamic

t r a d i t i o n s ? In these

days

of

Pahlavi

e x i l e ,

and with a triumphant

mollah

c a l l i n g

for Islam anddemocracy inIran,the compatibilityof East

andWesthas

perennial

i n t e r e s t . Also,the Braudelianp o s s i b i l i t ie s of Balkan

h i s t o r y

allow

someconstructive

playing with

some

new fashions

in thinking:

besides

castigating

the obscurantism of the

Greek

church

in

Bulgaria,

what

of

the

r o l e

of theGreek merchant as a purveyor of

western

ideology? Or

political

a c t i v i s t s

who were s o c i a l revolutionaries?

This

d i l a t i o n

on a few

flawsin

a

goodbook

should not be misunderstood.

It

is because

a

work

of reference should be as free as possible

from

small

errors

that

one wishes,

f o r instance,

to seecorrections

made

to thesecond

map on p. 154, and to see thebibliographymorediscriminatinglycompiled.

On Austriaalone, readerswouldsurely savour recent

work

by Schroeder,

and older c l a s s i c s byAndrassyand G. P.Gooch. Per

contra,

someof the

very recent titles on other places andtopicshave been received with almost