Imperial Borderlands: Institutions and Legacies of the Habsburg Military Frontier.BogdanPopescu, (Cambridge University Press, 2023. Pp. 300. 40 figs, 29 tabs. ISBN 9781009365161. Hbk £85)
研究了哈布斯堡帝国在克罗地亚设立的军事边疆制度对当地经济发展、社会规范和政治态度的长期影响，利用断点回归分析现代数据，发现该制度在公共品供给等方面的影响至今仍可观测。
Imperial Borderlands by Bogdan Popescu is a worthy contribution to the growing literature on the long-term effects of institutions. For more than three centuries (until 1881), Croatia was split by political fiat into two territories operating under very different regimes: on the one hand, a Civilian Croatia, which operated by the laws and institutions similar to other areas of the Habsburg Empire and on the other, the Military Frontier, a narrow strip of land serving as a militarized buffer against Ottoman invasions and run by the Habsburg army. Popescu argues that the institutions enforced by the Austrian Hofkriegsrat in the Military Frontier penetrated down to the level of individual families and clans, and affected everything, from the operation of the criminal law through land ownership to the availability of crafts and industries and provision of public goods. On balance runs the verdict that they were a hindrance to successful economic development and are still today affecting political attitudes and interpersonal trust among contemporary Croatians. Helpfully, Popescu starts by devoting one chapter to the broad theoretical considerations, outlining the overarching argument, and another chapter to the historical context before presenting the heart of the evidence: chapter 4 deals with the impact of military colonialism on economic development and access to public goods, chapter 5 with impact on social norms, and chapter 6 with impact on political attitudes and social capital. Methodologically, the effects are captured through a series of discontinuity regressions, applied to an impressive collection of datasets, measuring, at a very local level, all kinds of things: hospital access, sanitation infrastructure, risk of poverty, land inequality, interpersonal trust among family members and among strangers, perception of corruption, gender attitudes, and more. Most of the measures come from modern datasets, such as the EBRD's Life in Transition Surveys (2006, 2010, and 2016) but a few of the variables, particularly those concerning the operation of agriculture, date back to the late nineteenth and early twentieth century. The overall conclusion, as may be expected, is that in some instances (e.g. in public goods provision) the divide is still visible today, even a century after the Military Border was abolished, whereas in others (e.g. attitude towards women) it is not. An important part of the whole argument involves fleshing out the mechanics of institutional persistence. The book highlights several important channels. One, for example, is the excessive use of violence, which was more severe and common in the Military Frontier. Another is the zadruga, which was such a widespread and crucial phenomenon, and one so characteristic of the Balkans that it makes an appearance in nearly every chapter. I really liked the case study of the Varzić family in chapter 5. In an overwhelmingly agricultural country, zadruga, as a form of collective ownership of land joining together several families, must surely have exercised some effect on how the land was tended – and indeed, figure 4.13 shows convincingly that the distribution of land ownership was very different between civilian and military Croatia. Now, in contrast to the statistically documented economic and social outcomes, the channels of persistence, while explicated at some length, are treated predominantly in a narrative fashion. That is to say, the book does not offer much empirical data on the intervening period between the abolition of the Military Frontier in 1881 and the modern-day consequences, which are mostly measured as of the early twenty-first century. Partly, this is an inevitable consequence of the chaos and upheaval of the tumultuous twentieth-century history of the region, which was not conducive to continuous and consistent data collection. Yet, that same twentieth-century havoc is the reason why the burden of proof to flesh out the persistence weighs all the heavier: one is naturally more inclined to buy the long-term persistence argument in a place which is relatively peaceful and stable and where social change is gradual. In contrast, in a region where, over the last hundred years, scarcely any political regime, institutional structure, or country border survived for more than a generation, the notion that something abolished back in 1881 somehow still casts a shadow today and that its effect has not been completely smothered and wiped out by subsequent shocks is a much harder sell. Here is where more data on the intervening period would have helped to bolster Popescu's case. Still, those discontinuity results along the erstwhile intra-Croatian civilian–military border, reported in chapters 4 and 5, are real and significant both statistically and practically. Thus, where else could they come from, right? This monograph thus highlights both the strengths and the challenges of identifying and assessing the long-term effects of institutions, made harder by its focus on a region where realities are complicated and difficult to untangle. It is therefore all the more commendable that Bogdan Popescu faced down so many of the challenges and wrote an accomplished book that is well researched, carefully considered, and consequently, very informative and persuasive.