The first war between Austria and Turkey began in 1714 and ended with the
establishment of the Austrian rule in Belgrade and northern Serbia, which lasted
until 1739. In 2014 the memories of the beginnings of the Baroque Belgrade
associated with the period of Austrian governance have fallen into the shadow
of the WW I Centennial. The actual memory and the value distortion related to
the mutual historical failure that leaded Austria and Serbia to the opposing sides
in the unfortunate conflict could be of particular importance in this matter. A
whole of the cultural history of Belgrade during the last three centuries could
be considered in the almost paradoxical continuity of discontinuity of wars,
devastation, irrational decisions and unfulfilled visions. Belgrade was a central
point in the wars between Austria and the Ottoman Empire in the 18th century
that was reshaping also its cultural background. Belgrade became during the
19 th century the most important benefit for the Serbian national revolution,
1804-1830, and a cultural challenge for the revolutionary backward peasant
society, faced with the dilemma of modernization.^1
Belgrade’s utopia was the belief that a regulated and cultural community could
be established along the mythical “East-West” border in a secure distance
from the European civilization, in a poor rural environment, and under the
obsession of the nationalist agenda. The refusal of the European integration
and the rule of law in recent times underline additionally the utopian
character of this belief. That usually leaded to a self-destruction and on the
micro-level to wars, occupations, chaotic migrations, poverty, and also urban
disorder, mismanagement of the public domain, arrogance and arbitrariness
by both institutions and individuals. The low urbanization level was on the
other side the result of a poor industrial development. The Western Balkans
remained through a century limited to trade with basic goods, with a weak
and vulnerable economy, closely related to the state and to privileged groups,
instead to a business-orientated urban society. The low living standards