“At the end of the 20th and the beginning of the 20th centuries, the Balkans have, on one side, seemed to have reached an impasse. Not too many democratic changes have been successfully implemented in most Balkans states, even though Croatia is now a member state of the European Union. Old problems are now combined with new ones. How do the Balkans states deal with their own visions of their past? How are policies and state governance influenced by old and new issues? In the first OPAL volume published by the Center for Good Governance Studies (a double Open Access Library volume), several scholars from various fields and geographical regions have joined forces to debate current problems that the Balkan states are facing nowadays, as well as the emerging issues of confronting the past and managing good governance in the future.”