John R. Lampe

John Lampe wrote to explain Balkan events to westerners. However, Lampe tightened the scope of his work to geographical region of Yugoslavia. His purpose was narrow, yet ambitious: to account for Yugoslavia and its successor states. Lampe arranged his material chronologically with subdivisions which focused on specific areas or groups. He provided an introductory chapter that capsulated the thousand years before 1800. Lampe is professor of history with a specialization in economics. Lampe did not limit himself to military and political events; he offered economic statistics on banking, trade, industry and agriculture, as well as tables of literacy rates, voting patterns, ethnic migra-tion and mortality rates to round out his examination of Yugoslavian life. Lampe’s approach seemed, if not of the Annales school, then at least reminiscent of the cliometric variety.
Lampe contended that the horrors of aftermath of Yugoslavia’s dissolution could be rationally explained by examining relatively recent events rather than relying on “the region’s ‘age-old antagonisms’�€?. He implied that western writers found it more convenient to use this over-simplified explanation and furthermore, that they would abandon it for an equally simplistic, opposite account when that suited their purposes. Although he did not voice the idea as specifically as Misch Glenny in _The Balkans_, Lampe indicated that great powers tended to view Yugoslavia as it suited their needs. The interaction of the great powers and Yugoslavia tended to be expressed in terms of how Yugoslavia could benefit the external powers more than vice versa.
Lampe emphasized two main points. The first point was that western politicians and analysts were apt to misunderstand and underestimate the Balkans and the region’s importance. Second, the great powers framed their stance on Balkan affairs in their own, usually over-simplified, terms with little regard to the needs of the Balkan people or to the facts of the matter.… (meer)