Balkania (proposed state)

{{Short description|Proposed state in the Balkans}}

{{distinguish|Balkan Federation}}

File:State of balkania.png of Balkania: Kosovo (light red), Serbia (yellow), and Montenegro (light blue)]]

Balkania, otherwise known as the Balkan Federation, was the name of a hypothetical confederacy proposed as an independent successor state to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the Balkans, suggested by the Kosovo Albanian politician and human rights defender Adem Demaçi in 1996.{{cite book |author-last=Koinova |author-first=Maria |year=2013 |chapter=International Agents, Self-Reinforcement of Conflict Dynamics, and Processes of Change |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=ZwpuDCcN8AIC&pg=PA114 |title=Ethnonationalist Conflict in Postcommunist States: Varieties of Governance in Bulgaria, Macedonia, and Kosovo |location=Philadelphia |publisher=University of Pennsylvania Press |pages=114–117 |isbn=9780812245226 |jstor=j.ctt3fhscq.8 |lccn=2013012707}}{{cite book |author1-last=Janjić |author1-first=Dusan |author2-last=Lalaj |author2-first=Anna |author3-last=Pula |author3-first=Besnik |year=2013 |chapter=Kosovo under the Milošević Regime |chapter-url=https://books.google.com/books?id=IDMhDgCJCe0C&pg=PA293 |editor1-last=Ingrao |editor1-first=Charles |editor2-last=Emmert |editor2-first=Thomas A. |title=Confronting the Yugoslav Controversies: A Scholars' Initiative |location=West Lafayette, Indiana |publisher=Purdue University Press |series=Central European Studies |pages=293–295 |doi=10.2307/j.ctt6wq753.13 |isbn=9781612492285 |lccn=2012029231}}

Intended as an alternative, peaceful resolution to the Serbo–Albanian ethnic conflict, it would have transformed the rump third Yugoslavia into a confederation consisting of the democratic Republics of Kosovo, Serbia, and Montenegro. The proposal became moot when the Republic of Montenegro declared its independence from FR Yugoslavia in 2006, and after the still disputed Republic of Kosovo declared its independence as well in 2008.

Another confederation with the same name, "Balkania", was proposed during the Interwar period by the Romanian historian Victor Papacostea in 1936, in order to solve regional conflicts between Bulgaria and Romania.{{cite journal |author-first=Blagovest |author-last=Nyagulov |year=2012 |url=https://www.ceeol.com/search/article-detail?id=266056 |title=Ideas of federation and personal union with regard to Bulgaria and Romania |journal=Bulgarian Historical Review |location=Sofia |publisher=Bulgarian Academy of Sciences |issue=3–4 |pages=36–61 |issn=0204-8906}}