The political and cultural identity of the Albanian nation

In this Prishtina Talks presentation, the well-known writer and publicist from Skopje, Kim Mehmeti, takes up in depth the political and cultural identity of the Albanian nation — the difference between the two, the contradictions of the present, and why this is so hard to pin down in the contemporary Albanian context.

Mehmeti argues that while Albanians have no problem with their ethnic identity, they have deep problems with their political identity, because political identity is not settled by a people but by its political elites — and our elites tend to “carry out other people's politics” rather than build an authentic Albanian political ideology. A coherent political idea for parties to organise around is missing, and as a result the parties exist only as structures for handing out jobs, not as carriers of a political idea.

In the second half, Mehmeti turns to cultural identity, which he sees as the strongest point but also as the place of the deepest misunderstanding. He rejects any hierarchy of “Albanianness” based on religion, argues that Islam is every bit as European as Christianity — which was itself born in no European capital — and that Albanian identity is at once unified along its national axis (the language, the culture, the tradition) and multicultural in its influences. The Ottoman inheritance, he argues, is not “foreign” to Albanians: without those five Ottoman centuries Albanians would not have survived as a nation. The lecture closes on the need for a whole identity, one that holds religious values, culture, tradition and the political reality of the day together.

Some of the points covered: 📌 The difference between ethnic, political and cultural identity 📌 Why the Albanian political elites carry out other people's politics 📌 The missing coherent Albanian political idea 📌 Political parties as structures for handing out jobs, not carriers of an idea 📌 Rejecting a hierarchy of Albanianness based on religion 📌 Islam as a European tradition every bit as much as Christianity 📌 The Ottoman inheritance as fundamental to Albanian survival 📌 Albanian identity as unified and multicultural at one and the same time

📍 Prishtina Talks