Greater Albania () is an irredentist and nationalist concept that seeks to unify the lands that many Albanians consider to form their national homeland. It is based on claims on the present-day or historical presence of Albanian populations in those areas. In addition to the existing Albania, the term incorporates claims to regions in the neighbouring states, the areas include Kosovo, the Preševo Valley of Serbia, territories in southern Montenegro, northwestern Greece (the Greek regional units of Thesprotia and Preveza, referred by Albanians as Chameria, and other territories that were part of the Vilayet of Yanina during the Ottoman Empire), and a western part of North Macedonia.
The unification of an even larger area into a single territory under Albanian authority had been theoretically conceived by the League of Prizren, an organization of the 19th century whose goal was to unify the Albanian inhabited lands (and other regions, mostly from the regions of Macedonia and Epirus) into a single autonomous Albanian Vilayet within the Ottoman Empire, which was briefly achieved de jure in September 1912. The concept of a Greater Albania, as in greater than Albania within its 1913 borders, was implemented under the Italian and Nazi German occupation of the Balkans during World War II. The idea of unification has roots in the events of the Treaty of London in 1913, when roughly 30% of the predominantly Albanian territories and 35% of the population were left outside the new country's borders.
Terminology
Greater Albania is a term used mainly by the Western scholars, politicians, etc. Albanian nationalists dislike the expression "Greater Albania" and prefer to use the term "Ethnic Albania". Ethnic Albania () is a term used primarily by Albanian nationalists to denote the territories claimed as the traditional homeland of ethnic Albanians, despite these lands also being inhabited by many non-Albanians. Those that use the second term refer to an area which is smaller than the four Ottoman vilayets, while still encompassing Albania, Kosovo, western North Macedonia, Albanian populated areas of Southern Serbia and parts of Northern Greece (Chameria) that had a historic native Albanian population. Albanian nationalists ignore that within these regions there are also sizable numbers of non-Albanians. Another term used by Albanians, is "Albanian national reunification" ().
History
Under the Ottoman Empire
Prior to the Balkan wars of the beginning of the 20th century, Albanians were subjects of the Ottoman Empire. The Albanian independence movement emerged in 1878 with the League of Prizren (a council based in Kosovo) whose goal was cultural and political autonomy for ethnic Albanians inside the framework of the Ottoman Empire. However, the Ottomans were not prepared to grant The League's demands. Ottoman opposition to the League's cultural goals eventually helped transform it into an Albanian national movement.
Albanian nationalism overall was a reaction to the gradual breakup of the Ottoman Empire and a response to Balkan and Christian national movements that posed a threat to an Albanian population that was mainly Muslim. Efforts were devoted to including vilayets with an Albanian population into a larger unitary Albanian autonomous province within the Ottoman state while Greater Albania was not considered a priority. Albanian nationalism during the late Ottoman era was not imbued with separatism that aimed to create an Albanian nation-state, though Albanian nationalists did envisage an independent Greater Albania. Albanian nationalists were mainly focused on defending rights that were sociocultural, historic and linguistic within existing countries without being connected to a particular polity.