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This introduction presents an overview of the history of migration within the Southern Balkan region since the end of Ottoman rule, in this way providing a broader context for the individual contributions. The existing literature on migration within the region since the Ottoman period consists of two main and separate bodies of literature: one deals with forced migration in the service of nation-building and the other with post-war labour migration in the context of globalization. Given the complex ethnic mosaic of the southern Balkan region creating nation states was a very difficult task. From the foundation of the first state to gain independence (Greece) to the Second World War, ethnic cleansing and demographic engineering were crucial aspects of nation state building.

Despite historically important labour migration in the region (Hristov), until the fall of the Berlin Wall most of the cross-border migrations within the region still contributed to the homogenization process of recent nation states. The largest migration flows were of Muslims to Turkey (Icduygu and Sert), and of Orthodox Christians to Greece. However, lesser-known ethnic migrations such as Slavs from Greece to Bulgaria (Detrez, Vukov) were of some magnitude and were important factors in regional state-building. Since the collapse of the Communist bloc, labour migration has taken off—most significantly of Albanians to Greece (Vullnetari, Kokkali, Van Boeschoten)—but also from other Balkan states, such as Bulgaria (Hatziprokopiou and Markova, Van Boeschoten). Yet, doubtless owing to the complex multi-ethnic history of the region, it is frequently difficult to distinguish between short-term labour migration, permanent migration and ethnic migrations. The boundaries have become increasingly blurred; equally, some migrant groups have exhibited complex strategies of integration (Kokkali, Parla) that seem to link their Balkan past with their current needs. Such strategies also vary—with very different outcomes—by gender (Van Boeschoten).

The complexity of the Balkan region is best understood from a variety of viewpoints. Leading authorities, drawn from many countries, have authored specially-commissioned texts for this volume, providing an unique glimpse into a fractured yet interconnected regional space.

Petko Hristov describes and analyses a traditional system of labour migration known as gurbet or pečalbarstvo as it existed in two mountainous regions of the Southern Balkans—Šopluk and Mijak. These traditional migration systems, which also existed elsewhere in the region, have disappeared, yet despite their differences from modern labour migrations the word gurbet is still used and the memory of these past migrations still plays a role in relating to the present.

Raymond Detrez deals with one of the major population movements in the region in the early twentieth century—namely Bulgarians from Greece, Turkey, and Romania moving to Bulgaria. He discusses the role of population exchanges in the process of nation-building and irredentist policies in interwar Bulgaria. By using the refugees as tools for their irredentist claims, the process of adaptation to their new homeland was retarded.

Nikolai Vukov looks more specifically at the history of Thracian refugees and their organizations in Bulgaria. He also examines the revival of activities of Thracian organizations after the fall of the Berlin Wall, their renewed claims to compensation for lost properties and the continuing and revived memories of their homelands.

Ahmet İçduygu and Deniz Sert tell the history of migration from the Balkans to Turkey from the end of the nineteenth century to the present. They relate this history to nation-building, but also to economic conditions and specific Turkish concerns, such as the perceived need for immigration to compensate for a declining population at that time. They also demonstrate that after 1990, ethnic migration decreased and irregular labour migration became more important.

Ayse Parla deals in great ethnographic detail with the changing importance of ethnic migration after the 1990s, as irregular labour migration rose to the fore. Over the past two decades the legal status of Turkish migrants from Bulgaria changed significantly. While in the past they were received as ethnic kin and prospective citizens, today they have become dispensable labour migrants moving back and forth between Bulgaria and Turkey.

Ifigeneia Kokkali asks why Albanian immigrants in Greece are so inconspicuous, why they seem to change their names and even their religion more easily than most immigrants do. In trying to answer these questions she looks not only at discrimination, but also at how history has shaped conceptions about national identity among both Greeks and Albanians. She examines several aspects involved, such as the strong link between national identity and religion among the Greeks and the tradition of religious diversity and syncretism among the Albanians.

Julie Vullnetari takes a very different look at Albanian migration to Greece. Her interest is in temporary or circular migration—a topic also addressed by others in this volume. This chapter looks more specifically at seasonal migrants in agriculture. These migrants, drawn from the poorest strata in Albania, constitute an interesting segment of the Albanian population in Greece, specifically in view of the renewed interest in seasonal labour migration and its relation to the socio-economic development of ‘sending’ regions.

Riki van Boeschoten examines the renegotiation of gender identities among Albanian and Bulgarian migrants in Greece. She focuses on two major issues that emerge from the life stories of male and female migrants. The first is the empowerment of migrant women and disempowerment of migrant men, which seem to contradict the ‘patriarchal backlash’ in their home countries. The second is the striking differences between the gender identities of Albanian and Bulgarian migrant women. Van Boeschoten locates these trends against a backdrop of gender relations in Albania and Bulgaria and also the particularities of the migration process after 1990.

Panos Hatziprokopiou and Eugenia Markova examine the development of labour migration from Bulgaria to Greece over the past 25 years—placing it in the context of other forms of human and capital mobility in both directions. They argue that in this way the Balkan space is regaining the unified character it used to have in the Ottoman period. Greece, in particular, is also reacquiring some of the ethno-cultural diversity that used to characterize the Balkans—notwithstanding the recent popular hostility to immigration and immigrants, not only in Greece but in Europe as a whole.