Constitutionalism in Post-Ottoman Southeast Europe during the 19th Century

Serbia, Greece and Romania in Comparative Perspective

Abstract

The essay investigates the emergence of constitutional statehood in post-Ottoman Southeast Europe during the 19^thcentury in comparative perspective on the example of Serbia, Greece and Romania. It locates central turning points and highlights similarities as well as peculiarities of these processes in relation to the paradigm of Europeanization which functioned as the guiding principle in all three cases. It concludes that Europeanization, respectively “De-Ottomanization”, although dominating Southeast European political discourses, was not a clear-cut uniform concept but to a considerable degree influenced by specific regional factors, in particular the imperial legacies of the region, which have to be considered in order to make the Europeanization-paradigm a viable analytical tool for historical research.