SECURITY DIMENSION OF OPEN BALKANS: CONTEMPORARY SECURITY CHALLENGES AS A CHANCE FOR REGIONAL SECURITY PLATFORM

Marjan Gjurovski; Mitko Arnaudov

doi:10.51738/Kpolisa2024.21.2r.1ga

Authors

Marjan Gjurovski Faculty of Philosophy of Ss. Cyril and Methodius University, Skopje, North Macedonia https://orcid.org/0009-0001-9283-3733
Mitko Arnaudov Institute for International Politics and Commerce, Belgrade, Serbia https://orcid.org/0000-0002-3274-347X

DOI:

https://doi.org/10.51738/Kpolisa2024.21.2r.1ga

Keywords:

Open Balkans, security cooperation, contemporary security threats

Abstract

The Open Balkans initiative primarily is focused on the cooperation within the economic framework between participating actors. But, bearing in mind reached declarations between Albania, North Macedonia and Serbia related to the cooperation in the fields of security, there are no doubts that this initiative also could provide a contribution in the regional security infrastructure, at this moment between participating states, but later also within the whole Western Balkans region. Leading research question of this paper is whether Open Balkans, as an initiative with pre-dominant economic sign, could also contribute in the process of creation regional security sustainability from the contemporary security threats angle. From the theoretical point of view, contribution of this paper is foreseen in the context of analysis how much regional cooperation in the field of security could contribute in wider security infrastructure. Primarily the research would be focused on the so-called soft-threats, which do not include "traditional" security threats such as territorial integrity, possibilities of foreign aggression, as well as traditional ways of war.

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