REACTIONS FRANÇAISES FACE AU REGICIDE SERBE DE 1903. ÉMOTION OU POLITIQUE EUROPEENNE?

Ксениа Смоловић

Сажетак

In June 1903, the Serbian king, Alexandre Obrenovic, and his wife were murdered in their palace in Belgrade. In Europe, the great powers felt shocked. Yet, this violence was not unusual: Vladimir Dedijer counts 89 political murders between 1792 and 1914. This article studies the French reactions to this event and the French actors’ different perceptions. As France just came back in the European concert, after the Congress of Berlin, did diplomats and journalists react the same way to the murder? What provoked emotions in the French society? Did the stereotypes influence the political or media analysis? French Ministry of Foreign Affairs carefully observed the reactions of the Russian and Austrian diplomats and tried to act the same way. The minister Delcassé wanted to follow the Russian politics and France to be included in the political and strategic issues in the Balkans. There was a delicate balance between Austria and Russia and Austrians blamed the predominance of Russians in the dynastic change. However, French press and French people who lived in Serbia were shocked: this shock was first real, provoked by fear, incomprehension and surprise, it then reawakened orientalist fantasies and stereotypes which emphasized the emotion. Thus, this emotion grew, without helping political goals: the French government was impervious to it. These observations lead us to the conclusion that French reaction is very different from the British reaction, which interrupted their diplomatic relations with Serbia. As French government accepted the situation without emotion and followed Russia in its move, it reveals its political goals in the Balkans.

Референце

Corbin, A. (ed.) (2011) Histoire de la virilité, T. 2 Le triomphe de la virilité. Le XIXᵉ siècle. Paris: Seuil.

Courtine, J.-J. (ed.) (2017) Histoire des émotions. De la fin du XIXe siècle à nos jours. Paris: Seuil.

Dedijer, V. (1967) The Road to Sarajevo. Londres: Macgibbon & Kee. Mackenzie, D. (1996) Serbs and Russians. New York: Columbia University
Press.

Marès, A. Rey, M.-P. (2014) Mémoires et émotions. Au cœur de l’histoire des relations internationales. Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne.

Markovich, S. (2000) British Perceptions of Serbia and the Balkans 1903-1906. Paris: Prologue.

Prochasson, C. (2008) L’Empire des émotions. Les historiens dans la mêlée. Paris: Demopolis.

Rajić, S. (2011) Aleksandar Obrenović – vladar na prelazu vekova: sukobljeni svetovi. Belgrade: Srpska književna zadruga.

Rastović, A. (2003) “Britanske novine o Majskom prevratu u Srbiki 1903.”, in Zbornik matice srpske za istoriju, 67/68: pp. 105-119.

Ristović, M. (2003) Black Peter and Balkan Brigands. The Balkans and Serbia in German Satirical Journals. Belgrade: Udruzenje za Drustvenu Istoriju.

Sretenović, S. (2006) La France et le nouveau Royaume des Serbes, Croates et Slovènes (1918-1929): des relations inter-étatiques inégales. Florence: Institut universitaire européen.