| Abstract | The article presents a research in the field of ethnic conflict being aggravated by geographic, economic, political, or legal variables chiefly concerned with the Balkans. It is only through "subterranean traditions" one can attempt to interpret the peculiar variety of deeply rooted antagonisms power ethnic struggles, and which eludes a strictly behavioristic analysis. Western-style democracy seems to work only when the competing parties share certain underlying principles. In the region formerly known as Yugoslavia, from 1918 to the present, there seemed to be no underlying consensus. A more worrisome issue, in a global sense is that of the spread of ethonational feeling to the remainder of Europe. The former Soviet Union has already had its bloody encounters with these forces in its Muslim areas, and the three Baltic republics of Latvia, Lithuania, and Estonia, whose Versailles Treaty foundations are very weak, may be looked to apprehensively as ethnic flashpoints. While there is no way to quantify a cultural memory, it is crucial to understand in examining ethnic conflicts.
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