The discursive making of a neighbor: shifting geopolitical representations of the Former Yugoslavia in Slovenia

Rogelj, Boštjan (author)

This article examines the evolution of Slovenia’s geopolitical imagination regarding the post-Yugoslav space from the 1980s to the present through the lens of critical geopolitics. It traces how dominant Slovenian geopolitical representations of this area have evolved over time and argues that these shifts were primarily shaped by transformation in Slovenian political and economic goals. The article examines which geopolitical representations prevailed in different periods, how they were constructed, and why they underwent transformation. The analysis identifies four historical-geopolitical phases: the late socialist period, characterized by discursive differentiation from other Yugoslav republics; the post-independence period, during which the former Yugoslavia was largely tabooed as part of Slovenia’s European identity construction; the post-EU-accession phase, marked by a patronizing rediscovery of the Western Balkans; and a more recent phase in which narratives of Slovenian discursively articulated superiority have been increasingly challenged, giving rise to a more complex and interdependent geopolitical imagination.

• Language: English
• Keywords: critical geopolitics, geopolitical imagination, Slovenia, former Yugoslavia, Western Balkans
• Work type: Article
• Typology: 1.01 - Original Scientific Article
• Organization: FF - Faculty of Arts
• Publication date: 01.01.2025
• Year: 2025
• Number of pages: Str. 115-134
• Numbering: No. 53
• PID: 20.500.12556/RUL-179676
• UDC: 911.3:32(497.1:479.4)"1980-2026"
• ISSN on article: 2303-8950
• DOI: 10.35666/23038950.2026.53.115
• COBISS.SI-ID: 268684547

Copyright

Licenca CC BY 4.0 je navedena na spletni strani revije.

• Publication date in RUL: 19.02.2026

Record is a part of a journal

• Title: Geographical review
• Shortened title: Geogr. rev.
• Publisher: Geographical Society in Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Department of Geography, Faculty of Science, University of Sarajevo
• ISSN: 2303-8950
• COBISS.SI-ID: 22411784

Licences

• License: CC BY 4.0, Creative Commons Attribution 4.0 International
• Link: http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by/4.0/
• Description: This is the standard Creative Commons license that gives others maximum freedom to do what they want with the work as long as they credit the author.

Secondary language

• Language: Slovenian
• Keywords: kritična geopolitika, geopolitična domišljija, Slovenija, nekdanja Jugoslavija, Zahodni Balkan