‘Perceived Co-Ethnics’ and Kin-State Citizenship in Southeastern Europe

Most nation-states in Southeastern Europe have proactive policies towards citizens of neighbouring countries who self-identify with the majority ethnic group of these states. Often obscured in the analysis of citizenship policies are the ‘perceived co-ethnics’ an interstitial category that further complicates the triadic nexus (Brubaker 1995) between national minorities, nationalizing states and kin-states. In my terms, ‘perceived co-ethnics’ are defined as people who are recognised by the citizenship (or ethnizenship) conferring state as belonging to its main ethnic group although they themselves do not embrace that definition.

            Often, a bundle of political and/or social rights is bestowed upon transborder co-ethnics including the access to citizenship, even if the legitimacy of their stake (Bauböck, 2008) in the polity of the kin-state is questionable. However, as group identifications and ethnicity are subjective, malleable, contextual and driven by situational logic, there is a discord in some cases between a state’s recognition of who its ethnic kin is and the affected people’s ethnic self-identification.  The main aim of the paper is to show why and how states confer citizenship or related rights (based on perceived co-ethnicity) to people who do not adopt a political stance of politically identifying with the kin-state majority. The paper will use examples such as Vlachs or Bunjevci among other cases in the context Albania, Croatia, Greece and Serbia.