245 10 7MB
English Pages 326 Year 2000
IDENTITY AND SECURITY IN FORMER YUGOSLAVIA
It is always the same: once you are liberated, you are forced to ask who you are (Jean Baudrillard, French semiologist, America, “Astral America”, 1986; translated 1988).'
Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
ZLATKO ISAKOVIC Institute o f European and Russian Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa, Canada
First published 2000 by Ashgate Publishing Reissued 2019 by Routledge 2 Park Square, Milton Park, Abingdon, Oxon, OX14 4RN 52 Vanderbilt Avenue, New York, NY 10017 Routledge is an imprint ofthe Taylor & Francis Group, an informa business
© Zlatko Isakovic 2000 All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reprinted or reproduced or utilised in any form or by any electronic, mechanical, or other means, now known or hereafter invented, including photocopying and recording, or in any information storage or retrieval system, without permission in writing from the publishers. Notice: Product or corporate names may be trademarks or registered trademarks, and are used only for identification and explanation without intent to infringe. Publisher's Note The publisher has gone to great lengths to ensure the quality of this reprint but points out that some imperfections in the original copies may be apparent. Disclaimer The publisher has made every effort to trace copyright holders and welcomes correspondence from those they have been unable to contact. A Library of Congress record exists under LC control number: ISBN 13: 978-1-138-73769-3 (hbk) ISBN 13: 978-1-315-18522-4 (ebk)
Contents List o f tables List o f abbreviations
vii viii
1 Introduction 1.1 Main questions and dilemmas 1.2 Methodology
1 5 13
2
1g
3
4
Slovenia 2.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry 2.2 State traditions 2.3 Religious affilation 2.4 Language and culture Croatia 3.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry 3.2 State traditions 3.3 Religious affiliation 3.4 Language and culture Bosnia and Herzegovina 4.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry 4.2 State traditions 4.3 Religious affiliation 4.4 Language and culture
5 Yugoslavia 5.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry 5.2 State traditions 5.3 Religious affiliation 5.4 Language and culture 5.5 Conclusions v
16 16 28 28 34 35 37 56 58 75 76 76 100 104 112 113 114 172 177 189
vi Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia 6 Macedonia 6.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry 6.2 State traditions 6.3 Religious affiliation 6.4 Language and culture 6.5 Conclusions
193 194 211 213 218
7
222
Conclusions and outlook for the future 7.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry 7.2 State traditions 7.3 Religious affiliation 7.4 Language and culture 7.5 Concluding considerations 7.6 Prospects 7.6.1 Slovenia 7.6.2 Croatia 7.6.3 Bosnia and Herzegovina 7.6.4 FR Yugoslavia (including Serbia (with Kosovo) and Montenegro) 7.6.5 Macedonia
Notes Bibliography Index
192
222 223 250 252 255 260 260 261 262 264 266 276 292 311
List o f tables Table 1.1
Ethnonational structures of the Second Yugoslavia and its successor states
6
Table 1.2
Nation in states A and B
7
Table 2.1
Ethnic composition of Slovenia
24
Table 3.1
Ethnic composition of Croatia
34
Table 4.1
Ethnic composition of Bosnia and Herzegovina
75
Table 5.1
Ethnic composition of Third Yugoslavia
112
Table 5.2
Yugoslavs in the capitals of Yugoslav republics and provinces (1971)
132
Table 5.3
The highest inflation rates per month in history
149
Table 6.1
The ethnic composition of Macedonia
192
Table 6.2
Religious composition of the population in Macedonia
211
vii
List o f abbreviations AY BP COPRI CrDP CSCE DPA DPK DPMNU DPSM DIIA EC EU EURUS FRY FYROM HDU (HDZ) HPR (HSP) HRREC HSWP IFOR IMRO
Army of Yugoslavia (Vojska Jugoslavije) BalkanPeace International Research Network, http://outtawa.ca/associations/balkanpeace Copenhagen Peace Research Institute Croatian Democratic Party (Hrvatska Demokratska Partija) Conference on Security and Cooperation in Europe Democratic Party of Albanians (Partia Demokratike Shqiptare) Demochristian Party of Kosova (Partia Demokristiane e Kosoves) Democratic Party for Macedonian National Unity (Demokratska Partija za Makedonsko Nacionalno Edinstvo) Democratic Party of Socialists of Montenegro (Demokratska partija socijalista Cme Gore) Danish Institute of International Affairs European Community European Union Institute of European and Russian Studies, Carleton University, Ottawa Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Savezna Republika Jugoslavia) or Third Yugoslavia Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia Croatian Democratic Union (Hrvatska demokratska zajednica) Croatian Party of [state] Right (Hrvatska stranka prava [drzave]) Human Rights Research and Education Centre, University of Ottawa Hungarian Socialist Workers’ Party Implementation Force Interior Macedonian Revolutionary Organisation (Vnatresna Makedonska Revolucionema Organizacija) viii
List o f Abbreviations ix ICS IPTF KFOR KLA LCY OAU OSCE PDP PDPA PDPAM PIC SASA SDA SDLM SDP SFOR SFRY SNPM SPS SRM SRP IFF UNHCR UNPREDEP UNSC
Institute of Canadian Studies, University of Ottawa International Police Task Force Kosovo Force Kosova Liberation Army (Ushtria Clirimtare Kosoves) League of Communists of Yugoslavia (Savez komunista Jugoslavije) Organization for African Unity Organisation for Security and Cooperation in Europe People’s Democratic Party (Partia Demokratike Popullore) Party for Democratic Prosperity of Albanians (Partia Prosperitetit Demokratik Shqipetare) Party for Democratic Prosperity of Albanians in Macedonia (Partia e Prosperitetit Demokratik Shqipetare ne Maqedoni) Dayton-Paris Accords Peace Implementation Council Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts (Srpska akademija nauka i umetnosti) Party of Democratic Action (Stranka demokratske akcije) Social Democratic League of Macedonia (Socijaldemokratski sojuz na Makedonija) Serbian Democratic Party (Srpska demokratska stranka) Stabilization Force Socialistic Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Socijalisticka Federativna Republika Jugoslavia or The Second Yugoslavia) Socialist People’s Party of Montenegro (Socijalisticka narodna partija Cme Gore) Socialist Party of Serbia (Socijalisticka Partija Srbije) Socialist Republic of Macedonia (Socijalisticka Republika Makedonija) Serbian Radical Party (Srpska Radikalna Stranka) Transnational Foundation for Peace and Future Studies United Nations High Commissariat for Refugees United Nations Preventive Deployment UN Security Council
x Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia UNTANS YPA YUL YUP
United Nations Temporary Authority for a Negotiated Settlement in Kosovo/a Yugoslav People’s Army (Jugoslovenska narodna armija) Yugoslav United Leftists - Jugoslovenska ujedinjena levica YU.Peace - Centre for Peace and Conflict Research of the Institute of International Politics and Economics and the Institute for European Studies, Belgrade (Centar za istrazivanje mira i konflikata Instituta za medjunarodnu politiku i privredu i Instituta za evropske studije, Beograd)
1
Introduction
The term societal security was first used in Buzan’s book People, States and Fear. In the same book, the author defined security generally as the “pursuit of freedom from threat” (1991: 20), later saying that “evaluating what is, and what is not, a threat, to whom, in what way and over what time-scale can be a tricky business” (1993b: 43). He located societal security initially as just one among five sectors of state security (along with military, political, economic, and environmental security), i.e. society was just one sector where the state can be threatened (see 1991). A couple of years later Wsever went a step further in the anthology Identity, Migration and the New Security Agenda in Europe, arguing that the five-dimensional approach was not tenable any more as a framework for societal security (1993: 25) and proposing the concept consisting of a duality of state and societal security. This approach was utilized and more details were given in later works on the concept of societal security (see Wsever, 1994; Waever, 1995; Buzan and Wsever 1997). They noted that the previous approach to broadening the security concept had consisted in adding dimensions to the military one while keeping the state as the subject of security; this makes sense for some dimensions, but not for societal security, where the nation, rather than the state, is to be seen as the subject and dynamics to be studied in the duality of state (“national”) and societal security. This volume moves on from general theoretical deliberations to specific analyses of societal security in the Yugoslav successor states. Societal security itself is defined as “the ability of a society to persist in its essential character under changing conditions and possible or actual threats”, when it comes to perceive its identity as threatened, and when, on this basis, it begins to act in a security mode triggering certain kinds of behaviour (Waever, 1993: 23). The main purpose of this volume is to apply the concept of societal security systematically to one area: the five states into which the Second Yugoslavia have now been divided (Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Third Yugoslavia and Macedonia), looking at the past and present and trying to draw implications for the future. Threats to a society’s identity may range from the conquering of historic territory and the deportation or killing of members of the community, to the suppression of society’s expression of its own identity and interference
1
2 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia with its ability to reproduce itself, including forbidding the use of language (denying language rights), names and dress, through closure of places of education and worship (denying freedom of worship). It was noticed that if the institutions that reproduce language and culture are forbidden to operate, then identity can not be transmitted effectively from one generation to the next. However, the same kind of threats “may not only come from forbidding something, but also allowing it.” Forbidding something will often be in terms of a threat to the minority group from the majority group. Allowing something, however, may be the other way around: allowing a minority group something may threaten the homogeneity of the state...” (Buzan, 1993b: 43).
According to nature of used means, threats to societal security may be military ones (killing members of the group, conquering historic territory) as well as non-military ones (denying language rights, freedom of worship) (Roe, 1997a: 9). It was also noticed that “the nation state may be accused of injustice both if it promotes equality and if it promotes difference”. In the case when the state emphasizes equal rights and duties, members of a minority may complain about disrespect for their cultural distinctiveness. On the other hand, if the state emphasizes cultural differences, members of a minority may complain that they were actively discriminated against. After the eventual separation of minorities, new minority problems may be created, this time at another level (Eriksen, 1992: 222). It was suggested that the implications of the societal security concept for policy are “far from clear”, arguing that the authors did not attempt “to develop any complete or coherent prescription. They acknowledge the familiar dilemma: is there not a risk that raising the agenda of societal security might seem to legitimise xenophobia and nationalist reactions against foreigners or against European integration?” They argue that this danger, however, “has to be set against the necessity to use the concept of societal security to try to understand what is actually happening” (Blunden, 1996: 24; cf. Buzan, 1993a: 188-9). As Buzan noticed, “societal security is less self-defining than state security, but not necessarily less real” (1993a: 187). Elaborating his concept, Waever said that the difference between the pure state definition and the one of state security via societal security is of vital importance if nation2 and state do not coincide. In that case, “the security of a nation will often increase the insecurity of the state - or more precisely if the state has a homogenising ‘national’ programme..., its security will by definition be in conflict with the societal security of
Introduction 3 ‘national’ projects of subcommunities inside the state”. In some cases, the more that members of the subcommunity develop and practise their own ‘national’ project, the less success there will be for the state homogenising ‘national’ programme, and in some others, the state is more secure when the members of a minority nation feel secure in regard to their national identity and survival, i.e. societal security in a federal state. The differences between the state and societal sector of security could be expressed by other words stating that while the existence of the state primarily depends on the maintenance of its sovereignty, the existence of the ethnic group, it has been argued, depends very much on the preservation of its identity. Thus whereas state security is concerned with threats to its sovereignty (if the state loses its sovereignty it will not survive as a state), societal security is concerned with threats to a society’s identity (if a society loses its identity it will not survive as a society) (1993: 25). Societies are fundamentally about identity. They are about what enables a group o f people to refer to themselves as ‘we’. ... The defining modes of ‘we’, ‘us’ and ‘them’ are all challenged by the formation of new identities, and the movement o f people carrying different identities (Buzan, 1993c: 5-6).
In Wæver’s opinion, societal identity (that what enables the word ‘we’ to be used), the main unit of analysis for societal security, has two main sources: politically significant ethno-national and religious identities. Both identities “have acquired particular prominence compared to other social groups because of their historical association with the development of the modem state”. The association is partly complementary (for example, when societal identities provide governments with legitimacy) and partly contradictory (for instance, when societal divisions provide assaults against governmental authority and legitimacy with their basis) (1993: 23). According to some opinions, the national identity is one identity in itself, and others hold that it constitutes various other identities, including first of all political and cultural identity. The political national identity is based on emphasizing a civic ideology, a compact well-defined territory as well as the expression of the nation in a single political will or subjectivity of the state. This conception of the nation (often called civic) is regularly connected to the French Revolution, and some elements of French political thinking (see Buzan, 1993b: 47; Wæver, 1993: 29, 32-3; Holm, 1996). In French tradition citizens of state make up its people (the civic definition of nation), and in the thinking of French Enlightenment the state or, more specifically, the citizens’ state defines the nation {patrie). The civic nation
4 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia is created by means of bureaucratic incorporation, or by nationalism from the top. Utilizing state military, administrative, fiscal and judicial apparatus, “the aristocratic ethnic state was able to define a new and broader cultural identity for the population, even though in practice this often entailed some degree of accommodation between the dominant and peripheral ethnic cultures within the parameters set by the power of the dominant core” (Smith, 1991: 55). Two authors consider that political identity is a “sense of political community” and sharing a political project, while ethnic identity is “a cultural organic sentiment of being a larger family and ultimately deriving one’s own identity and meaning of life from the community” (Waever and Kelstrup, 1993: 61). In German tradition the people are a cultural community; German Romanticism took the view that the nation ( Volk) has a primordial existence by virtue of being a cultural community (but it is not clear what constitutes it) and it calling for a state if it does not already have one. An ethnic-genealogical concept of cultural national identity emphasizes descent, popular mobilization, vernacular language and traditions (Smith, 1991: 12). “According to this tradition belonging to the nation is an objective matter: you are bom into the nation and remain a member no matter what you do. The German romantic concept of the nation as formulated by Herder is often mentioned as representing this ethnicgenealogic concept of the nation.” For him the state was not just unnecessary but ‘“a cold monster’, which could not do the nation any good”. In this concept, “there is in other words not necessarily the same close connection between state and nation as in the civic, territorial conception of the nation. In practice elements from both conceptions of the nation have entered the concrete concept of the nation, also in France and Germany” (Hansen, 1993: 2). A nation of this type is created by means of common mobilization of a community by an intellectual group, on that way forming a nation around “the new vernacular historical culture that it has rediscovered” (Smith, 1991: 64). The societal security concept could be used to define answers for question “how does a society speak?” and also for the essential question “what does the society speak?” (Buzan, 1993a: 187). As societies are often made insecure because of insecurity of important groups within them, the studies of the Copenhagen security school was therefore often focused on the insecurity of specific groups. However, “this has to be kept conceptually separate from the security of a society, societal security”, which “is relevant in itself and not only as an element of state security,
Introduction 5 because communities (that do not have a state) are also significant political realities, and their reactions to threats against their identity will be politically significant”. This was the reason for modifying the idea of the five sectors security agenda focused on the state, which is its primary referent object. “At the collective unit level (between individual and global) in fact there are two organising centres for the concept of security: state security and societal security. Both of these centres are subjected to influences of ‘individual’ and ‘international’ levels.” It was concluded that “society is not just a sector of state security, but a distinctive referent object alongside it” (Waever, 1993: 26-7). It was concluded that “whereas Realists have focused their attention on the level of the state as the only proper referent object of ‘security’, ‘Idealists’ (including a large part of the peace research ‘movement’) have maintained that people, i.e. individuals are what really matters in final analysis”. It may be worth striving for state security to the extent that it contributes to the security understood as the well-being and survival of people. “The state is, at most, a means but never an end itself.” Thus focusing on the lowest level, attention is inevitably also drawn to the highest level (Mankind as a whole). It was concluded that “individual and global security are thus two sides of the same coin” (Moller, 1993: 12-13). Societal security is different from state security. Societal security deals with nation in the sense that nation is not synonymous with state. When one deals with traditional security studies, the agenda is already well defined (sources, strategies, possible future developments and what one can do about that). When one get into societal security field - there is a less defined agenda. 1.1 Main questions and dilemmas It was noted that ethnonational movements in the Second Yugoslavia, unlike the most post-communist countries in Europe,3 have acquired a social basis for radical centrifugal (separatist) orientations. The pre-war ethnonational mobilization all over the Second Yugoslavia and particularly wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina have left little room for class mobilization in most of the Yugoslav successor states with the exception of Slovenia.
6 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Table 1.1 Country Bosnia and Herzegovina Croatia Macedonia Slovenia Second Yugoslavia5 Third Yugoslavia
Ethnonational structures of the Second Yugoslavia and its successor states Percentages of the largest group
Percentages of the Percentages of the second largest group third largest group
44 Muslims 78 Croats 67 Macedonians 91 Slovenes
31 Serbs 12 Serbs4 21 Albanians
36 Serbs
20 Croats
63 Serbs
14 Albanians
-
17 Croats -
10 Muslims 4 Montenegrins
Source: The World Almanac and Book o f Facts 1995, supplemented by Wiberg, 1995b: 96.
In Table 1.1, most of the Yugoslav successor societies have heterogeneous ethnic structures, though not as many as the society of the Second Yugoslavia. At the end of the wars in Croatia (by the so-called Erdut Agreement) and Bosnia and Herzegovina (by the 1995 Dayton-Paris Peace Accords) new state and quasi-state boundaries were drawn and created on large portions of the Second Yugoslavia’s territory. However, the boundaries do not completely match the pre-war ethnic distribution of populations, and in some cases even the post-war ethnic distribution. As a result, political and societal neuralgic points on maps of the Yugoslav successor states seem to be western Macedonia; Kosovo and Sandzak in Second Yugoslavia, Baranja, Eastern Slavonia and Western Sirmium and Knin Krajina regions in Croatia, regions of Mostar, Sarajevo and some others in Bosnia and Herzegovina, etc. (see Wiberg, 1995b: 96-97). There are several main questions that this work is going to define, investigate and to which it will try to find appropriate answers. First, it seems important to know what studying societal security entails in these particular cases. Trying to answer this question, one should mention that there are two theories on the main possible sources of identity. According to the first, it is a result of governments’ activities directed towards their populations, which can be manipulated almost endlessly. Doing this, politicians try to resolve the problem of legitimizing their positions at the same time. The second holds that the truth on that issue is extremely complex, and assumes that identity is a kind of popular belief (see Rot, 1989: 295-300), which occurs thanks to social dynamics in the first place, and that politicians can do very little with it. In a practical sense, this dilemma opens, at least for
Introduction 7 the Second Yugoslavia society and its successor states, the important questions (“How does a society speak?”, “Who speaks for society if not the state?”, etc.) and also to find out an answer to the essential question: “What does the society speak?”, and who are the main creators of the beliefs and what are their main expressions? One of the most crucial questions is: what might be the relationship between state and nation? Wiberg started answering that question from the starting point of nation, trying to look at some ideal types or patterns of the relationship identifying, for illustrative purposes and with some simplifications,6 nations by languages. If a nation N is taken as the point of departure the following possibilities result: (1A) a nation may exist in one state as the only nation there; (IB) a nation may exist in one state as the majority nation; (1C) a nation may exist in one state as the largest group (like the Serbs in all three Yugoslavias); (ID) a nation may exist in one state as a minority in the statistical sense (like the Serbian minority in Romania and Hungary). Cases IB and 1C were collapsed into one category (“main group”) and the situation which exists after that was presented within Table 1.2. Korea and Germany are case 2A or 2B, depending on where one draws the line between monopoly and main language. Nation in states A and B
Table 1.2
Nation N in state A
ea
•S £
Monopoly Main group Minority
Monopoly
Main group
Minority
Case 2A
Case 2B
Case 2C
Case 2D
Case 2F Case 2G
Another way of starting to answer the same question could be from the point of view of a given state S, in which one or more languages may be spoken. In the case of one language only, one can identify the following situations: (IA) spoken only in S (the same as the situation 1A); (IB) monopoly or main group elsewhere; (IC) minority language elsewhere (like the Hungarian language in Second and Third Yugoslavia). Wiberg concluded that there were three basic ways to avoid violent conflicts from discrepancies between political and ethnic boundaries. First, to
8 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia agree that the use of violence could not resolve such conflicts, but leads to endless wars (as was agreed by the creators of the Charter of the OAU or the Helsinki Final Act in 1975), secondly, to make state boundaries increasingly irrelevant (as in the EC and later the EU), and, thirdly, to use careful architecture designed to create a perfect fit of borders (as in the case of the Danish-German boundary drawn in 1920) (see 1991: 6-20). However, as none of these methods was used during the disintegration of the First and Second Yugoslavia, conflicts escalated violently. The above and other definitions of nation enable the determination of various combinations of the main elements of national identities. According to the results of previous research efforts (see Wiberg, 1991; 1992; 1993; 1994; 1995a), the national identities of the nations living in the Yugoslav successor states could include myths and shared memories on common origin, state traditions, religious affiliation, language and culture. Other divisions and classifications are also possible, but no single one seems to be perfect. There is also the important question of assessing what is the most significant component of the national identities of certain nations and which actor can claim to speak on behalf of a nation. As in most other cases, studying societal security in Yugoslavia’s successor states entails looking at populations and how the elements of national identities are combined with different weights to define the identity of different nations, and whether these are majority or minority nations in the states where they are found. Doing this one has to keep in mind that the relative weight of components of national identities could be changeable in time and in space even within die population of the same nation. According to the above-mentioned concept, one should look and decide whether certain phenomena (in the first place differences in the main elements of national identities) should actually be treated as societal security threats or as something else. For instance, in Germany the existing differences in language are not a problem, except for immigrants who may perceive them in that way. Religion affiliation is divided, but there are no threats between Protestants and Catholics as previously. An at least implicit answer that has been noticed could be that within the region the most important societal security threats originate from conflicts, and thus it also seems to be useful to present a short genesis of the conflicts within the First and Second Yugoslav state.7 An additional problem is how to identify a situation where one group of people sees another as a societal threat and how to distinguish this from other kinds of threats. One direction is language (mainly propaganda); the other is behaviour. In case of language, sometimes the speaker is the state
Introduction 9 itself, which is the protector of state security and in some cases societal security. A minority can also speak on its societal security through its political parties, organizations and/or intellectuals. In any case, rhetoric consists of words and it is easier to deal with. As actions do not speak for themselves, except in some cases, they are more difficult to be interpreted as being seen within one other kind of security. Finally, there is a rule saying that the more one argues that a conflict is in terms of societal security, the more civilians are targets. A series of ethnonational movements appeared in Western Europe in the late 1960s and early 1970s fulfilling three important conditions. First, economic affluence and growth, although it was reduced after the first “oil crisis” in 1973. Secondly, there were democratic constitutions and, more important, democratic cultures, which were old and rooted, handled conflicts by political means and prevented political violence to gain any legitimacy. Thirdly, the integration process caused state borders to have less and less meaning, first in the Nordic countries and in what is nowadays the EU. In Central and Eastern Europe those kinds of movement emerged only in the 1980s, with the exception of Kosovo in 1968 and Croatia in 1971 under very different conditions. First, although there was often far lower economic stagnation, it was followed by an accelerating economic crisis with increasing unemployment, inflation and falling of GDP and living standard (for more details of the Second Yugoslavia see Schierup, 1991). Secondly, there were rare vital democratic traditions, and political ambitions and new constitutions were not sufficient substitutes. Thirdly, the previous integrative organizations (the WTO and COMECON) were dissolved without replacements, and borders achieved an increasing significance as symbols for (re)gained sovereignty. Wiberg concluded that “the prognosis was therefore very much worse than in Western Europe” (see 1995a: 39-47). He also concluded that, although there are many examples of different nations living peacefully together in one state, historical statistics shows that multinational states run higher risk of civil war than others, and the risk seems to be “particularly great where both Christians and Moslems are large groups, no matter which of them is the biggest one.8 Since the average state in Central/Eastem Europe is more nationally heterogeneous than that in Western Europe, we also have to count with a worse prognosis” (1995a: 44).
10 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Generally speaking, if a national heterogeneity is seen as a potential or actual problem by actors in a state, one can make the following list of options that have been attempted by actors to solve the problem: 1. genocide organized by state, which caused the disappearance, of severe reduction, of several nations; 2. getting rid of as much as possible of the minority populations by stateorganized deportation, terror or other sorts of mass expulsion in more legal forms; 3. “neutralizing” the minorities politically (making it impossible or difficult to get the same status as the “state carrying” nation) by using voting legislation or citizenship; 4. establishing different social orders for different groups; 5. establishing a high degree of local autonomy concerning the choice of official languages and/or having two or more official languages; 6. creating “transethnic” identities (such as “British”, “American”, “Swiss”, “Finlander”, etc.); 7. minorities can be assimilated into the majority group using sticks and/or carrots. The first, most versions of the second, and some variations of the third method have created or entailed conflicts that are far worse than those they were supposed to solve, and present-day they violate international law carrying risks for international sanctions. It is considered that it is difficult to combine the fourth with the modem states’ formal requirements of equality before the law. Particularly some variants of the third and seventh method and also some of the others carry a considerable likelihood of generating resistance that may lead to armed conflict either by itself or by the means used for suppressing it. “What the predominant group sees as ‘law and order’ may be seen as intentional discrimination by others; and what the former sees as peaceful assimilation may look like planned ethnocide in the eyes of others” (Wiberg, 1995a: 49). Methods five and six appear to have the best prospects for conflict management. However, one main problem with the fifth method is the fact that autonomy and multilingualism may be combined in different ways. The maximal form of bilingualism exists when the state official languages also have the same role at all administrative and political levels, with numerous complicated issues concerning language ability of government staff, financing of school systems, etc. There can be no state religion; but “the state cannot be mute, nor can it handle addressing issues in any language
Introduction 11 that some citizens may count as mother tongue” (Wiberg, 1995a: 50). Maximal autonomy and minimal multilingualism often appear together; the central government is the only institution that is multilingual; and each language is exclusive in the territorial unit where it is biggest. One version of the above-mentioned sixth method is the so-called “citizen state” characterized by greater solidarity and identification with the state than to the nation and class or other phenomena that the citizens may identify themselves with to the extent that they collide. Wiberg concluded that, “in any case, the existence of such a superidentity seems to be a necessary condition for such a citizen state”; and “examples also suggest that if a state has arrived sufficiently far in this direction, it may also get stable as a state, whatever other grudges its citizens may harbour” (1995a: 50). Among other examples, from 1945 to 1964, the Second Yugoslavia tried to create a Yugoslav identity along with the national ones. In addition, “in a citizen state the citizens must have influence, and it was on this point that Ex-Yugoslavia failed” (1995a: 54). The more political mechanisms for fighting out ethnic conflicts on societal security are available the less is it likely that they are going to become violent conflicts which endanger state security. Identification and solidarity should be acquired by the state in order to avoid catastrophes. “It is not sufficient, however, since such a state may well develop from a potential to a real monster, where the suppression of class conflict is legitimised by corporatist or other authoritarian ideologies, and that of ethnic contraditions by the same or other ‘harmony ideologies’, equating any form of ethnic mobilisation with treason and terrorism. History is replete with cases of a fledgling democracy collapsing under the influence of such tendencies, or at least degenerating to sheer symbolism in a strongly authoritarian state” (1995a: 54). A tamed state is one which is relatively unimportant. “To put it more cautiously, it is required that a number of other dimensions are important enough to be able to balance the state, and furthermore that the state does not have a monopoly within its own dimension, but is balanced by ‘lower’ identities in one direction and a measure of regionalism or even globalism in the other.” It is considered that, however, there may - in what is clearly a paradox - be room for some optimism for the future. “This optimism would ... be based on the position that the remarkable thing is not so much that there have been so many wars and collapses, but that in so many states there has been sufficient creativity and wisdom among the parties to have permitted the states to have coped so far in spite of grim prognoses that can
12 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia be made on a theoretical and empirical basis. This indicates that we should not let research focus too much on the states where things went seriously wrong;9 there will also be something important to learn from what happened in those states where things did not go too catastropically wrong” (1995a). This work, however, is mainly devoted to Yugoslav successor states, in most of which things have definitely been going too catastropically wrong, which started in 1991 or even earlier, depending on the historical point one takes as the beginning of the crisis in the Second Yugoslavia. One of the phenomena which have been adding to the catastrophe seems to be that for most of the successor states minorities have been seen by majorities as a threat in societal security terms. This opens a question of determining what is seen as threatening. Is it that what is different within national identities can be seen as more threatening than what is similar? In the North and West of the observed area quite different minorities are recognized, but the most similar are unrecognized. As German sociologist and philosopher George Simmel (1858-1918) once stated, the more similar groups are, the more they draw sharp boundaries. When it comes to defining “nation”, one of die first questions is how scholars define it and by what criteria, and a somewhat different question is that of how actors think of a nation. For this last kind of legitimization, the crucial issue becomes: who are the people? In this respect, we find two major traditions of thought, which became gradually hybridized. One can discuss whether it is possible to find a definition of nation on which all scholars would agree, and utilize it to find out who belongs to what nation? In different areas of the world different concepts are dominant. In the Balkans the concepts of clash and of imagined community are not used by many actors, but people see their belonging to a nation as a solid fact about which they cannot decide. One of the key questions that could be discussed within this volume seems to be whether it was possible for weak Yugoslav successor states to become strong states relatively soon after the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia and in that way to avoid the weakness which used to characterize their ancestor state during the last decade of its existence. As previous research attempts showed that in the Yugoslav successor states there is usually a negative interaction between problems of state security and societal security (see Wiberg, 1993: 107), the general purpose of this volume is to examine the agenda of societal security as well as - at least partly - state security in the states. More precisely, the purpose of this volume is to detect whether nations in Yugoslav successor states are faced
Introduction 13 with identity and related threats and to detect their sources. If the answer to the first question is positive, attempts will be made to determine what the specific kinds of threats are, and, if possible, their intensities. One can assume that this study is different from, but relates to, traditional national security studies. Here, the (perceived) threats to be analysed, with all the difficulties entailed, are those against national identity in its above-mentioned sense. There is also the classical question of whether (“objectively”) large or small differences are seen as constituting the greater identity threat. 1.2 Methodology The societal security concept “can be seen as a kind of analytical lens, able to give an insight into familiar problems. Like all lenses it gives a partial view, making some things clearer and pushing others in to the background” (Buzan, 1993a: 185). As identity has a multidimensional nature, this project has a complex methodology composed of combined groups of methods that are usually used in sociology, anthropology, ethnology, social psychology, philosophy, linguistic studies, studies of religion, political sciences, economy, (modem) history, theory of international relations, theory of law, certain law disciplines and some other more or less related disciplines. This methodological conglomeration is used to define possible concrete answers for the questions related to societal security. This elaboration of societal security in the Yugoslav successor states will first deal with Slovenia, whose case - observed from a present-day perspective - belongs to history. The cases of Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina will be the next ones, as it seems that societal security threats there did not disappear with the ending of wars in these two states. The Third Yugoslavia will be the fourth case study in this book as in this country most intensive societal security threats are at least partly linked with the ethnic conflict in Kosovo which has recently escalated. Finally, the case of Macedonia will be analysed as the state in which existing intensive multiple threats could be greatly intensified in the event of future ethnic conflict(s) escalation. Finally, it is important to mention that this volume was prepared between the years 1996 and 2000, mainly in COPRI but with some parts researched and written in YUP, CEU, BP, ICS, HRREC and EURUS. The book stemmed from the project topic "Societal Security in the Yugoslav
14 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Successor States" and the writing was funded by a grant provided for me by COPRI in 1996, which I have very much appreciated. I owe much gratitude to members of the COPRI Board and to Prof. Hakan Wiberg, Director of COPRI, an objective scholar who has a substantial and wide knowledge of the situation in the Second Yugoslavia and its successor states; the strong support he has given me, both as a friend and colleague, has gone far beyond my highest expectations. I would like to acknowledge my particular and deep appreciation to the reviewer of this book, Prof. Constantine P. Danopoulos of San Jose State University, for his very helpful discussions and comments. Research was also conducted during 1997 study trips in the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia and through later cooperation with scholars from some of the successor and neighbouring states. I owe special gratitude to (in alphabetical order): Prof. Silvo Devetak of the University of Maribor; Blendi Dibra of the Association "Intelektualet e rinj, Shprese", Shkoder; Dr Lidija Georgieva of the University of Skopje; Agron Loci of the Albanian Foundation for Conflict Resolution, Tirana; Prof. Maijan Malesic of the University of Ljubljana; Prof. Joze Mencinger of the University of Ljubljana; Amb. Vasile Sandru of the Black Sea University, Bucharest; Prof. Olga Murdzeva-Skarik of the University of Skopje; Dr Jovan Teokarevic at the Institute for European Studies, Belgrade; and Prof. Biljana Vankovska of the University of Skopje. I wish to thank the participants at the EUR group meetings on 23 August and 28 September 1999 and the highly respected members of the Copenhagen Security School who are, again in alphabetical order: Prof. Barry Buzan; Dr Phil Thomas Dietz; Dr Lene Hansen; Ph.D. Candidate Isil Kazan; Dr Geaorid O'Tuathail; Prof. Lars Tragardh; Dr Jaap de Wilde; and Prof. Ole Waever. I have to express my great gratitude for the successful and efficient cooperation provided by my publisher Ashgate, and particularly to Kirstin Howgate, Commissioning Editor, and Anne Keirby, Administrative Coordinator, Ashgate Social Sciences. I also appreciated the cooperation of Martin Noble, a writer and editor from Oxford, who never tired of showing the secrets of the English language to me. If the reader finds that the ideas in this book are expressed in clear English, this is largely thanks to his help. Thanks also go to Sidsel Westi Kragh, Assistant, and Anita Elleby, Librarian, both at COPRI, who were so kind as to prepare the camera ready copy for this book.
Introduction 15 Last but not least, as writing a book can be a draining experience as well as an adventure and a joy, I am grateful to my wife Smilja and my daughters Milena and Bojana. All my love goes to them in these uneasy and uncertain times for our family.
2
Slovenia
2.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry According to the existing evidence and present-day myths, in ancient times the territory of modem Slovenia (regions of Julian Alps and the Karst plateau) was inhabited by Illyrians and Celts who were ruled by Rome since the first century BC. Ancestors of the Slovenes, proto-Slovenes or Alpine Slavs, who were loyal to the Avars, settled the region in the sixth century AD (for more details, see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). 2.2 State traditions When the Byzantine emperor Heraclius defeated the Avars, a Slavic kingdom ruled by Samo (who reigned from 623 to 658) was established on the territory from Leipzig to Sava river valley and lasted until 748, when it came under Frankish rule. During the next two centuries, Bavarians and Magyars assimilated Alpine Slavs who were populating parts of presentday Austria and western Hungary. The Slovene boundaries were thus narrowed to the South, but a Slovene tribal duchy in Klagenfurt region managed to endure during the next two centuries. Carantania’s independence lasted from the sixth century to the middle of the eighth century when it became part of the Frankish Empire. Slovenes’ lands were passed to the Bavarian dukes’ hands in 843 (the independent state established by Prince Kocelj (869-874) was another short-lived Slovenes’ state experience), and in the tenth century they became part of the German defence of Magyar invaders. In fact, they were divided and became parts of the marks or border marches Styria, Carinthia and Camiola. In that time, Slovenes became serfs, who were called Wends (in English Winds) by German lords and peasants. The construction of Slovenes’ modern identity includes the Slovene nation’s affiliation to the cradle of Slovenia in the legendary ancient principality of Carantania or Carinthia, which was some three times larger than Slovenia today and also covered parts of present-day Hungary and Austria. This area used to be the centre of the Celtic state Noricum. Later it used to be a Roman province, which was conquered by Teutonic tribes, 16
Slovenia 17 Avars, Slavs, and Bavarians. In the late tenth century Carantania became an independent duchy, but soon it became part of the Bohemian state, and was included in the German state in 1276. After the First World War Carantania was made part of Austria, and during the Second World War and the Germany’s Anschluss of Austria it was included in the German Third Reich. After the war it became part of Austria, whose independence was restored. Though it is still imperfectly understood, and its present-day population contains just a thin Slovene minority, the Carantania serves as a symbol of nationhood for modem Slovenes, presented as “famous for its democratic institutions, strong legal system, popular elections of ruling dukes and progressive legal rights for women.” This Slovene “homeland” became central in the demands for independence in the late 1980s as well as in the later explaining of reasons for independence in the early 1990s. “By linking the independent Slovenia with the mythic Carantania, an unbroken chain of ‘being Slovenian’ through the ages is established, even if Slovenes had to wait for more than a thousand years for renewed independence.” However, “the description of Carantania as a modem state is of course an anachronism adapted to the twentieth century Western vision of how a democratic state should be designed. There is, in fact, little knowledge of Carantania beyond the legends. Even during the period of ‘independence’ - when the Slovene duke was a vassal to the Moravian duke - Carantania did not correspond to, nor was center located within, the present Slovenia. Nor, of course, was its name Slovenia.” Hansen concluded, “but despite these shortcomings, Carantania has turned out to function as a powerful political category. From the vantage of independence and operating within the logic of continuity, the eleven hundred years between Carantania and an independent Slovenia seem shorter, and less of a disturbance of the natural order of things - and that order is identity between the Slovenian nation and the Slovenian state” (1996: 474-5). The first banknote of the independent Slovenia had an etching of the “prince-stone” used by princes of Carantania during a ceremony of taking their oath from the middle of the eighth to the fifteenth century. As the stone is in what is now the Austrian province of Carinthia, the employed image evoked powerful reactions in Austrian nationalists, even though Slovenian officials declared that Slovenia has no territorial demands. The Habsburgs took Styria in the thirteenth century, and Camiola and Carinthia, Istria, and the Trieste area during the next century. In the
18 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia thirteenth century, similarly to Samo, Otokar II of Bohemia, tried to establish a Slavic empire. Considering Slovene national identity and the eventual threats to its identity, it seems important to mention a few additional facts. First, although Turks were attacking from time to time, Slovenes have never lived under Ottoman rule. Secondly, during the rule of Napoleon I most of the Slovene lands became parts of the Illyrian provinces. Third, the base of the Habsburg rule was an own bureaucracy which was sharing power with local aristocracy. Thanks to the direct linkage between the Austrian crown and Slovene lands, Slovenes did not experience many of the economic and political turbulence that affected life for the other South Slav nations who were living within the Habsburg Empire. Vienna authorities suppressed the first Slovene national programme formulated in 1848, which demanded the unification of a Slovene province within the Austrian Empire. However, one explanation for Germany’s and Austria’s biased stands and actions during the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia says that a kind of common nostalgia exists among Slovenes, Croats, Austrians, Hungarians and some other Central European peoples for the times of the Austrian Empire which was defeated and disintegrated after the First World War (for more details see Isakovic, forthcoming). In May 1917, Slovene and other South Slav deputies in the Austrian Reichsrat made a declaration in favour of the unification of territories of the monarchy populated by South Slavs in “one independent political body” within the Habsburg dynasty. This idea of the political association of South Slavs known as Trialism was not realized as the Central Powers were defeated, and Austria-Hungary collapsed in October 1918. After the collapse, Slovene politicians collaborated in the process of the speedy creation of the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. It should be mentioned that on the Slovenian and Croatian side there were simultaneously some idealistic as well as pragmatic reasons for establishing the kingdom. The second kind of reasons were based on a presumption that association with Serbia, which victoriously came out of the First World War on the side of Entente forces, could be a way for them to preserve their national interests and territories (see Simic, 1993: 202). As Slovenia and Croatia were parts of a defeated power, their unification with Serbia - thanks to its distinguished war record - could improve their situation and even gain a favourable place at the postwar peace conference. On the other hand, “the creation of Yugoslavia completed the historic mission of successive Serbian governments to unite all Serbs in one state. The result turned out to be a multinational country, but by no means an
Slovenia 19 utterly incongruous one.” Zametica concluded, “there was idealism as well as Realpolitik on all sides. Admittedly, the new state could be seen as a ‘Greater Serbia’, but the Serbs genuinely believed that they had liberated the Croats and Slovenes from the Habsburg yoke” (1972: 7). After the war, the Paris Peace Conference gave Italy the areas that used to be the Slovenes’ exit to Adriatic Sea (Goricia, Trieste, and Istria). The newly established kingdom of the South Slavs contained the regions of Prekmurje and southern part of Styria as well as a thin part of southern Carinthia, and in October 1920 a local plebiscite decided the future of the rest of southern Carinthia which remained in Austria. Thanks to the solutions just described almost one-third of Slovenes were left outside of Slovenia. The essence of the problem within the multiethnic First Yugoslavia was the relations and misunderstandings between the two largest ethnic groups - Serbs and Croats. Slovenes and others were too small and too weak to do anything more than shift alliances and manoeuvre between these main groups (see Remington, 1994a: 73; cf. Doder, 1993: 9-10). In addition, as a province of Yugoslavia, Slovenia’s autonomy was limited in the first place to cultural affairs. After the German invasion of Yugoslavia in 1941, Slovenia was divided between Italy, Germany and Hungary. During the Second World War rulers of the Carinthian and Styrian regions tried to eliminate Slovenes and the war divided the Slovenes. On one side, there were military and some other forms of resistance led by the Slovene National Liberation Front, which was constituted on a wide political and social basis and operated primarily in Ljubljana. The Partisan and guerilla movement in Slovenia was never as strong as in other parts of Yugoslavia (see Sire, 1989: 40; Gow, 1992: 35; Omerzu, 1995: 695), and the Slovene national character of the Partisan units was emphasized by the creation of distinct insignia (the Slovene Partisans had a symbol of Triglav mountain on their caps instead of a red star used in the other parts of Yugoslavia). Despite the fact that this military structure was formed in accordance with the Communist Party’s own ideological image, this military force is still highly evaluated in independent Slovenia: “With the partisan army, which was created from nothing, and in their weaponry and motivation the Slovenes were direct allies to the anti-Fascist military and resistance forces.”10 On the other hand, a part of the Slovenes, who established the National Guard, collaborated with the occupier, trying to gain an independent Slovenian state under fascist control.
20 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Between the two sides a civil conflict was fought in the central part of the Ljubljana area. At the end of the war, Tito’s army executed most of some 10,000 Slovenes who collaborated with the fascists, and the communists who led the resistance movement participated in establishing the Second Yugoslavia. The support that Tito and his regime received from some of the Slovenes was partly a result of the fact that in the Second Yugoslavia Slovenia, the most developed, industrialized and prosperous republic, succeeded in realizing greater economic prosperity in comparison with the others.11 The prevailing economic and political system of the Second Yugoslavia (called “socialist self-management”) was mostly projected by the chief ideologist of LCY, Slovene Edvard Kardelj. The 1974 constitution, basically created by the same man, transformed Yugoslavia into a loose federation or even confederation. When Kardelj and Tito died, and when the Yugoslav economy started to break down due to foreign debt burden and inflation,12 local autonomy and/or separatist movements occurred first in Kosovo and later in Croatia and Slovenia, where their views were published in Ljubljana journals Nova Revija (“New Review”) and Mladina (“Youth”). Wiberg concluded that the external factors that used to keep Yugoslavia together were also in disarray. The Cold War was over and thus its cohesional effect (1994a: 230). Gorbachev contributed to the dissolution by ending the Cold War which defined the same national security raison d ’être of Yugoslavia as that provided by pre-war fascist neighbours. This weakened one of the main Slovenian reasons for remaining in Yugoslavia. The fall of East European Communist regimes contributed to multiparty elections in all republics in 1990, first in Slovenia and Croatia, and finally in Serbia and Montenegro. Slovenian communists were the first to realize that - due to essential changes on the international scene by the end of the eighties - an attempt to preserve a single-party communist system in any form was doomed to fail and therefore was contrary to the vital national interests of any European nation. The growing pressure of the Slovenian liberal intelligentsia and other forces, which advocated the introduction of political pluralism as well as protection of the Slovenian national interests, largely motivated their attitude. Wiberg stressed that previously agreed rules for interaction had permitted the actors in Yugoslavia to operate “pretty much like the European balance-of-power system of the nineteenth century”. Coalitions were issue-related and shifting rather than ideological and permanent. When these rules collapsing, Yugoslavia drifted from “mature anarchy” into a “raw anarchy” (see 1994a: 231-2). Present-day President Milan
Slovenia 21 Kucan, a former communist leader, won the first multiparty elections in Slovenia, and in December 1991 the referendum in favour of the proposal for a sovereign and independent Slovenia voted more than 90%. “Given the cumulation of factors mentioned above, elections came at the worst possible moment. Ardent nationalists won everywhere, irrespective of party colors; the runners-up included even more extreme nationalists, giving the winners little leeway for compromises.” It was stressed, “they engaged in various demonstrations of sovereignty, accelerating the conflict spiral: attacks on remaining pan-Yugoslav institutions increased Serbian fears and actions inspired by these fears” (1995b: 100). Introducing an economic blockade of Slovenia, the government of Serbia awakened the Slovenes’ second main reason to remain in the country: the Yugoslav market. Serbian and Montenegrin politicians did not want to accept the Slovene and Croatian proposals for a looser Yugoslav confederation, and Slovene and Croatian politicians rejected the Serbian and Montenegrin proposal for so-called modem federation. In fact, the “modem federation” project was first defined by the federal Presidency and later (by the end of February 1991) by Serbia and Montenegro. “In these documents Yugoslavia was seen as a ‘sovereign republic’ and ‘democratic federation’. The intention of the proposers conflicted, however, with principles, which were unable to express structural specifics of the Yugoslav community.” Simic considered that “in Yugoslavia it was impossible to mechanically apply the principles of federalism, which produced good results in different communities. Underlying the complex legal argumentation of this proposal was in fact the desire of the Serbian people to continue living in one instead of several states” (1993: 205-6). The leaderships of Croatia and Slovenia perhaps wanted to improve their own economic situations by getting rid of the rest of Yugoslavia and getting closer to the EC (Croats taking away the territory of Croatia populated mostly by Serbs), and the leaderships of Serbia and Montenegro have perhaps tried to establish centralization of the Yugoslav state (using the total numbers of their populations in such a “modem federation” as a political advantage) or, should it not succeed, to support the Serbs from Croatia (and later those from Bosnia and Herzegovina) seeking to remain in the same state with Serbia, etc. After former President of Serbia Slobodan Milosevic expressed his attitude a few times that, as far as he was concerned, Slovenia could go, one author later concluded, “Slovenia, with few Serbs, was of no interest to Milosevic. He publicly blessed its independence several months before it occurred” (Doder, 1993: 17). One can
22 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia consider that the case of Slovenia cannot be observed as a clear case of secession after Milosevic declared that Slovenia - as far as he was concerned - could leave the Second Yugoslavia. However, one can mention that Milosevic was not in charge of such an act; the problem was that, according to Article 5 of Yugoslav constitution, the precondition for a change of borders of the Second Yugoslavia was the consent of all republics and autonomous provinces. It seems that Slovenia preferred “dissociation”, probably trying to establish its position as one of the legal successors of Yugoslavia. In the first half of the year this republic took steps toward achieving its independence, dictating the pace of the Yugoslav crisis and the behaviour of other republics, first of all Croatia (see Simic, 1993: 207). On 25 June 1991, Slovenia seceded and two days later the YPA attacked border posts previously taken over by Slovenia’s forces. It was noted that further threats of Yugoslav centralism, Yugoslavization and YPA were eliminated relatively quickly when the Belgrade political and YPA leaderships decided during the Ten Days’ War (“the last gasp of the federation and its army”) that they did not have enough interest in Slovenia to warrant a prolonged war (see Hansen, 1996: 473). Slovenia also won the complex endgame with Croatia in which neither wanted to separate alone, and both intended different dynamics of separation. “If its strategy can be reconstructed from actions, it was to rely on Slovenian resources only; to be well armed and prepared; to force Croatia’s timing by announcing that Slovenia really would proclaim independence on 25 June; and to demonstrate Slovenian defence capability, hoping to give Ljubljana and Belgrade common interests in excluding Slovenia from the Serb-Croat conflict, thus saving Slovenia the all-out defensive war it was also prepared for. This strategy was perfectly calculated and capably executed” (Wiberg, 1993: 101-2). However, soon after its independence, Slovenia had boundary disputes with Croatia in Piran Bay, Raskrizje, Trdinov vrh and the Primorska region. In 1994 Slovenia became the first successor state of the Second Yugoslavia to enter NATO’s Program Partnership for Peace. In this capacity Slovenia took part in bilateral and multilateral military exercises with NATO and Partnership for Peace members, and hosted a session of the PoliticalMilitary Steering Committee on Partnership for Peace. From the perspective of Slovenia’s government, there is a security vacuum in the Central and Eastern Europe and the Balkans region, “which can produce a lot of uncertainty if left to itself. In many cases, uncertainty and lack of security are brought about by neglect, an attitude that it would be best if everyone were left to fend for himself up to a certain point.” Slovenia’s
Slovenia 23 government considers NATO as “an indispensable instrument of stability in Europe and its enlargement is the only means which can be used to address the security vacuum in Central and Eastern Europe” (Ignac, 1996). Although Slovenia was not among the group members included in that military organization in 1999 (Czech Republic, Poland and Hungary), its government is expecting to become a member within the next step of NATO enlargement. Observers see this cautious move regarding Slovenia in the first place as a result of the fact that Slovenia is too close to the conflict region of the Second Yugoslavia and the Balkan region in general. As Slovenia is not engaged in any conflict within or outside the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia, it would not benefit much from NATO’s offered support for strengthening Slovenia’s will to resolve conflicts in a peaceful way. In addition, by taking part in NATO’s peace missions Slovenia may be possibly involved in conflicts wherever such missions may be undertaken. Finally, it is not known what financial efforts Slovenia will be expected to make should it enter NATO (see Isakovic, 1998: 51-53). Italian nationalist political forces have expressed demands in several ways for territories that belonged to Italy before the Second World War (parts of Peninsula Istria that are now parts of Slovenia’s territory) (see Drzar-Murko, 1996: 592). There are also demands for the autonomy of the whole of Istria as a “supra-state category” (Gombac, 1996: 144), i.e. not respecting the existing borderline between Slovenia and Croatia. To Fubini, the next steps ostensibly would be Istria’s independence and then its inclusion in Italian territory (1996: 300). Within this context Slovenes view with a certain suspicion various acts of the Italian government: in the first place putting conditions on Slovenia’s entering the EU,13 offering and granting Italian citizenship to some 100,000 Slovnes and Croats (Filli, 1994: 4) as well as some of the acts of refugees organizations and groups from Slovenia and a support granted by te Italian government to them (see Gombac, 1996: 12). Some Slovene authors also complain that the Slovene minority in Italy (with a population of around 100,000 people) is prevented from enjoying most of its rights, and the Italian side is demanding more and more rights for 4,000 Italians, which occurred in Slovenia mostly after the Trieste crisis in 1954, when one part of the Free Territory of Trieste in Istria peninsula was included in Yugoslav territory. In that way Slovenia had an exit to the Adriatic Sea again and fewer Slovenes remained outside Yugoslavia (see Gombac, 1996: 145; Krunic, 1997: 208). Hansen also
24 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia concluded that Slovenia’s Italian minority has better political and cultural opportunities than the Slovenian minority in Italy (1996,487). Table 2.1
Ethnic composition of Slovenia
Nation Slovenes Croats Serbs Muslims Yugoslavs Others Source: 1991 census.
Population 1.718.000 54.000 47.000 27.000 12.000 17.000
The above-mentioned threats may be observed in terms of state security, but they can also eventually become threats in terms of societal security. The same conclusions could be reached for the fact that in Slovenia it was noticed that during the war in Croatia a battalion “Garibaldi” (composed of Italian volunteers) was fighting on the Serbian side (Fubini, 1996: 298). In addition, some Serbian nationalists were proposing to Italian nationalists common armed actions against Croatia (the Adriatic town of Zadar was suggested as a meeting point) (Fubini, 1996: 293). This appeal generated fears that the proposed alliance could be harmful for Slovenia’s territory too (Krunic, 1997: 208). Article 5 of the Constitution of Slovenia regulates the protection of and guarantee for the rights of autotochtonous minorities whose members are declared to be Italians and Hungarians. According to Article 64 these two minorities, which make up 0.71% of the total population, have special national rights (the right to use their national symbols, to form organizations that help preserve their national identity, to be educated in their own languages, and to get a seat in Slovenian parliament). In addition, Article 65 of the Constitution prescribes that the legislator needs to regulate special rights for the Gypsy community in Slovenia. However, the larger and non-autochthonous minorities from the other former Yugoslav republics do not have the same rights as the Italian and Hungarian minority (see Devetak, 1997: 56). Serbs have lived since the mid sixteenth century in the territory of the present-day sovereign Slovenia, and could rightfully claim a constitutional-legal status that was recognized by the Hungarian and Italian minorities. The region of Bela Krajina was inhabited by Serbs
Slovenia 25 who had preserved their autochthony to the times in which migrations and moving away from the rural areas and urbanization became massive phenomena. Basic considers “non-respect for relevant historical and demographic facts and limitation of the rights with regard to citizenship, leaves room for doubts about the sincerity of the Slovenian élite to allow the members of non-Slovenian ethnic groups to smoothly demonstrate their specific properties and practice their culture and alphabet.14 Recognition of autochtony of the Italian and Hungarian minorities in Slovenia could be a reflection of the care for their compatriots in the neighbouring countries rather than a serious care for the position of these minorities in Slovenia.” Basic maintains that “even in its communist past, Slovenia was also successful in its insistence on the principle of reciprocity and care for its minority in the neighbouring countries. The former Yugoslav federation conducted the policy of adequate protection of its national minorities in the neighbouring countries only in the case of the Slovenian minorities in Italy and Austria.”15 Such national policy is supported by the Constitution of the Republic of Slovenia by Article 5 that obliges the state to take care of the position of Slovenes in the neighbouring countries (1996: 56-7). According to Hansen’s opinion the position of members of nonautochthonous minorities from the other former Yugoslav republics could have some links with the possibility for establishing a new Yugoslavia, which could include Slovenia. “This might be partly due to the fact that none of the Yugoslavian nationalities ... were granted special rights in Yugoslavia, but it might also in part reflect Slovene reluctance to see Serbs and Croats display their national symbols and to have the right to speak their language (the former language of Yugoslavia). It is feared from time to time - most recently during the Dayton peace talks - that Yugoslavia might be forced back together again.” Hansen concluded that, “because the Slovene language has been one of the cornerstones of Slovene identity, there is some anxiety about losing it. Serbo-Croatian is relatively close to Slovene, whereas Hungarian and Italian are non-Slavic languages” (1996: 487). In Article 3 of the Constitution of the Republic of Slovenia the principle of civil state was included. It declared Slovenia as a state comprising both female and male citizens, but it considered that this constitutional right was “largely compromised by subsequent conditions and unpleasantness that citizens of non-Slovenian origin were exposed to during the procedure for acquisition of the Republic Slovenia’s citizenship”. According to the provisions of the Citizenship Law of 1991, a sufficient condition to be
26 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia granted citizenship of Slovenia is a permanent residence permit. In 1993 the provisions of the Law were amended by additional requirements with regard to entering into a marriage with a Slovenia’s citizen, such as knowledge of the Slovene language and a good financial standing (Basic, 1996: 56). Estimates of numbers of Slovenia’s refugees from the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina vary mostly from 70,00016 to 90,000 (Grizold, 1994; Markotich, 1994), and the peak level was around 100,000. As they can be represented as the burden of the Slovene economy, the right-wing nationalists would like them to be deported from the country. On the other hand, it is considered that the same refugees are, in some way, needed by Slovenia in order to prove that it possesses its own desired identity (“Europeanness”) as well as to show its own distinct undesirable identity (“Balkansness”). “Europeanness” is what Slovenia claims to be and what it wants to be at the same time; “Balkansness” is what Slovenia claims not to be and what it does not want to be. The main presumption for the abovementioned Slovenia’s (un)desiring identities is that “Europe” is a precisely defined identity as well as the “Balkans” identity; one knows what Europe as well as Balkans is. The second presumption is that “Europe” and “Balkans” are two completely different identities. However, the term “Europeanization” has no fixed meaning. Some usages were characteristic of competing positions in the security landscape of the early and mid-1980s: in this meaning it has been used to designate the development of a European pillar in NATO, the development of a Europe or Western Europe as an independent “third force”, or the growing importance of all-European cooperation. The same term has also been used since the late 1980s to designate the expectation that there would be more security in Europe if it were more self-reliant (see, for example, Buzan, Kelstrup, Lemaitre, Tromer and Waever, 1990). Furthermore it was used for European integration or the formation of European Union, connecting that process to the process of European integration. Finally, the term Europeanization can also mean “the development at the individual level in Europe of people seeing themselves as Europeans” or “the development o f a sense o f being European (the development of a European identity and/or sense of European political community)” (see Waever and Kelstrup, 1993: 62). Although there is no given European identity, the last-mentioned meaning of the term Europeanization is probably what Slovenia claims to be and what it wants to be, and most of all a democratic, free and prosperous country. During the Yugoslav crisis the total effect consisted in
Slovenia 27 decreases everywhere in the Second Yugoslavia’s successor states’ GNP per capita pressing the population down to one-quarter of the prewar level. In Slovenia, the decrease was relatively modest: 10-20% (Wiberg, 1995b: 102). In comparison with other successor states of the Second Yugoslavia, Slovenia suffered little in its struggle for independence; its economy recovered relatively quickly, and ffee-market reforms were realized, but many Slovenes are still considering that their country is in crisis. An expectation that Slovenia will probably enter the EU among the first group of new members is based, first, on the fact that - having in 1996 around $10,000 GNP per capita (Prokopijevic, 1997: 17) - it is more economically developed than other East European countries, and in some fields it reaches the level of the poorest EU members. Thus instead of being a support-giver as in the Second Yugoslavia, Slovenia would become a support-receiver in the EU. There is an open question: is the support going to be sufficient to compensate the loss of the Yugoslav market? Secondly, the expectations are based on Slovenia’s political stability which was established soon after the Ten Days’ War. Thirdly, the expectations were attempted to be established on the presentation of own identity as historically Central Europe Habsburg identity, and currently “non-Balkan,” Western identity. Consequently, from the late 1980s mentioned desired identity as well as its presentation has been developed by ideological, political, cultural, and/or communication means. In Slovenia, the initial euphoria and grand hopes of the first stage of the road towards EU membership were later moderated and at least partly replaced by some scepticism. Moreover, nationalistic politicians in the Slovene parliament started to mention and warn about the loss of Slovenia’s sovereignty and threats to the Slovenian national identity if it were to enter the EU (see Hansen, 1996: 489-490). An explanation of the above-mentioned warnings could be found in the fact that Slovenes, taking the first steps on the road which leads out of the Second Yugoslavia and towards the EU, developed their own nationalism and in the same time were faced with Austrian, Italian and variuous other nationalisms and even neo-Fascism. On Europe they are now asking themselves the well-known question: will the EU - taking the form of the nation-state - create a national European identity and thereby crush the Slovene national identity? (See Waiver and Kelstrup, 1993: 76.) In search of societal and state security, Slovenes were glad to leave the Austro-Hungarian Empire (under German influence) as well as the Second Yugoslavia (under Serbian influence). Some three of four years after the
28 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia end of the Cold War, when the relative failure of ethnonational mobilization became characteristic for most of the post-communist countries in Europe, Slovenia was the only successor state of the Second Yugoslavia where ethnonational mobilization has left enough room for class-related changes in government composition (see Wiberg, 1995b: 97). Now the Slovenian European orientation is at least to some degree comparable with the orientation of Yugoslavic movement. The right-wing nationalist discourse indicated that Europeanization could be seen as a possible threat to Slovenian state security as well as to societal security of Slovenes. It seems that the main dilemma is how a relatively small nation can protect its national and political identity from becoming a part of larger state or from what is possibly becoming a state. 2.3 Religious affiliation In the eighth century the first missionaries came from Ireland to Slovenia, and later during German rule most of Slovenes received the Roman Catholic religion. In the nineteenth century the Roman Catholic Church supported the establishment of cooperatives that enabled Slovenes to get rid of German institutions providing to artisans and peasants loans, marketing and some other services. Since the 1890s, when the first political parties were established, some of them (for example, the Slovene People’s Party and the Slovene Clerical Party) have had more or less close links with the Roman Catholic Church (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). 2.4 Language and culture After the proto-Slovenes or alpine Slavs came to the present-day territory, they absorbed the cultures of existing Romano-Celtic-Illyrian populations (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). The first missionaries from Ireland taught the Alpine Slavs to pray in their vernacular tongue. As a result, a series of religious confessions and sermons (called the Freising Manuscripts or in Slovene language Brizinski spomeniki, created around 1000) are the oldest preserved documents written in Slovenia in an old Slavic language. During the German rule Slovenes received not only the Roman Catholic religion, but also the West European civilization. This period and particularly Germanization is regarded among the most contemporary Slovenes as a national catastrophe. Adam Bohoric (1520-1600) created the
Slovenia 29 first Slovene version of the Latin alphabet (bohorcica) and published the first Slovene grammar. Although during the period of Reformation the territory populated by Slovenes remained Roman Catholic, Protestants Jurij Dalmatin (1547-89) and poet Primoz Trubar (1508-86) published the first translation of the Bible in Slovene language (1584) and disseminated the New Testament in the Slovene language. Very well known was the German-Austrian conductor and Renaissance composer of Slovenian origin Jakob Petelin Gallus Camiolus or Jacob Handl (1550-91), a choirmaster of the bishop of Olmütz and a Viennese court chapel member. His best-known works were a collection of motets for the entire year Opus musicum, Ecce quomodo moritur justus and five-voice motet Mirabile mysterium. The cultural group Slovenska Matica (Mother Bee) has been internationally active for centuries (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Slovenia’s closeness to the political, cultural and economic centres of the Habsburg Empire was the result of the relatively high levels of literacy and cultural development. This conclusion could be based, among others, on what is now the obvious fact that baroque art and culture in general were widely present in Slovenia as well as in the rest of Austria. The fact that during French rule the Slovene language was mostly in official use affected the national self-awareness of the Slovenes and generated the rise of the Illyrian movement stressing the Slovenes’ and/or South Slavs’ needs for political and cultural cooperation and even integration. According to some authors, the first Slovene-language newspaper was published in 1797; while others believe it happened in 1843 in Ljubljana (see Zvonarevic, 1976: 381-2; Bjelica, 1983: 108-86). In the first half of the nineteenth century Jemej Kopitar (1780-1844) initiated efforts to standardize the Slovene language and published the second grammar of the Slovene language in 1808. According to some opinions, he attempted to apply ideas created by the Serb linguistic reformer Vuk Karadzic (1787-1864). In practice, both of them tried to eliminate numerous words originating from foreign languages (in the Slovene case from German language) and in that way stressed the South Slav origins of their nations. A few decades later, philologist and historian of literature Matija Cop (1797-1835) was publishing literature and periodicals in the Slovene language. The first half of the nineteenth century saw the appearance of the Romantic and freedom-loving poet France Presem (1800-49), who successfully realized the literary capabilities of the Slovene language and who is considered the father of Slovene literature. In 1866 Josip Jurcic
30 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia (1844-1881) published the first Slovene novel Deseti brat (The Tenth Brother). The most popular members of the Modem school in Slovenia are its politically influential pioneers, the novelist and poet Ivan Cankar (18761918) and Oton Zupancic (1878-1949), poet and interpreter, dramatist and director of the Slovene National Theatre between the world wars. Cankar created the masterpieces Hlapec Jernej in njegova pravica {The Bailiff Yerney and His Rights) and Hisa Marije pomocnice {The Ward o f Our Lady o f Mercy). Novelist and journalist Louis Adamic (1899-1951), who dealt with American immigrants and minorities at the beginning of the twentieth century, was bom in Slovenia and immigrated to the United States at the age of 14 and was naturalized in 1918. During and after the Second World War, he supported Tito’s communists. His best-known works are Laughing in the Jungle, The Native’s Return, Grandsons, Cradle o f Life, The House in Antigua, My America etc. Adamic edited the magazine Common Ground, which was mostly devoted to the multiethnic culture and society of the United States. The Slovene literary scene during the period between the two world wars was dominated by Prezihov Voranc alias Lovro Kuhar (1893-1950), who was a realistic novelist and postmodernist poet and founder of the journal Mladina, Srecko Kosovel (1905-26) as well as by Tone Seliskar (1900-69), Anton Vodnik (1901-65) and Miran Jarc alias Janez Suhi (1900—42). Voranc, Ciril Kosmac (1910- ) and Misko Kranjec (1908- ) were the best-known members of the school of Socialist Realism during the 1930s. Edvard Kocbek (1904—) became a poet before the Second World War and as a Christian democrat took part in the Slovene and Yugoslav antifascist war movement. In 1952 his attitudes were rejected and condemned by the communists and he suffered at the hands of his excomrades. The most popular writers after the war were Ciril Zlobec (1925- ), Drago Jancar, Niko Grafenauer and Matej Bor alias Vladimir Pavsic (1913- ). The next generation of Slovene authors includes sciencefiction writer Miha Remec, poet Cene Vipotnik, Joze Udovic (1912- ) and Veno Taufer; Dane Zajc (1929- ) and Valentin Cundric belong to the modem generation (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije 1962; 1965; 1968; 1971; Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Modem writers of Slovene literature and other authors have mostly overlooked the Yugoslavic movement (in both its factions: Illyrism and Slovenism) from the beginning of the twentieth century and earlier, or see it
Slovenia 31 as a way of opposing the increasing German influence in the AustroHungarian Empire. The German influence is sometimes compared with the danger of Yugoslavization or the growing Serbian influence in the Second Yugoslavia’s last decade. Yugoslavia and its creation in 1918 are viewed as a mistake, and Slovenia’s participation in the creation of the kingdom is considered as resulting from Slovenia’s security needs, the pressure of Great Powers and Serbia’s coercion and seduction, or as the only option for Slovenia (for more details see Banac, 1984). It seems that most Slovenes are convinced that their country was too weak to be an independent state after the end of the First World War, when a few territory-thirsty neighbours surrounded the country. * * *
The major features and advantages of Slovene identity have consisted in its having a distinct and undisputed territory, name and language, for which reason Slovenes have enjoyed relative freedom from societal security threats. Slovene politicians, business people and academics alike have argued that Slovenia had always been radically different from the other former Yugoslavia republics and have perceived profound cultural differences between Slovenes and the southern Yugoslav peoples. Before the Ten Days’ War, Serbia and Yugoslavia used to be perceived as clear threats to both the state security of Slovenia and societal security of Slovenes. The Ten Days War and the recognition by the EC on 15 January 1992 were followed by a “struggle on identity”. It is considered that “the construction of the Slovenian identity involves an articulation of Slovenia as ‘European’ and the other republics as ‘Balkan,’ a relation of otherness that was also found within the Slovene discourse prior to the independence but which has become even stronger since” (see also Bakic-Hayden and Hayden, 1992). Hansen argued that Slovenia “belongs naturally to Europe and was kept in an ‘unnatural’ Balkan position when it was a republic in the Balkan Yugoslavia” (1996: 484). According to existing national stereotypes among Slovenes, “Southerners” are lazy, dirty, noisy, endlessly corrupted and always economic support-thirsty, and “Northerners” have approximately the opposite characteristics. Zizek has concluded: “Slovenes are afraid that Serbs will ‘inundate’ them, and that they will lose their national identity” (quoted in Hansen, 1996: 484).
32 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Hansen considered that Slovenian identity seems to be fragile. Before the First World War, German influence was perceived as a threat to Slovenian identity, and after the end of the Cold War the same influence became “a testimony of Slovenia’s European identity. The conversion of the Hapsburgs from a relation of otherness to one of identity illustrates that identities and threats to identities change over time, and that history is being rewritten from the point of view of the present” (1996: 487). On the other hand, Smith considers that the new Europe true dilemma is also “a choice between unacceptable historical myths and memories on the one hand, and on the other a patchwork, memoryless scientific ‘culture’ held together by the political will and economic interest that are so often subject to change” (quoted in Waever and Kelstrup, 1993: 67). Smith considered Slovenes as an example of ethnic-geneological nation which “came about via vernacular mobilization, that is mobilization of a formerly passive community by an intellectual group into forming a nation around the new vernacular historical culture that it has redisovered” (1991: 64). “The goal is to get the power over an all-ready established state, create an independent state inside an empire or unify previously separate political system” (Hansen, 1993: 2). Since the separation Slovenia has not been a party in the northern conflict triangle of the Second Yugoslavia. The above-mentioned and other existing domestic political and economic problems, as well as those in Slovenia’s relations with neighbouring states, can be observed as common rather than exceptional, for Central European conditions. In this regard, Slovenia’s situation can be qualified according to its geographic position rather than to its desires. Having had, before the separation, the Catholic religion, undisputed territorial identity, clear coincidence of territory and people and a distinct language and culture, Slovenia had had few identity problems. As Wiberg concluded, Slovenia was the only one of all the former Yugoslav republics in which it was clear what the word “society” referred to (1995b: 104). All these characteristics have remained more or less unchanged. For Slovenia it remains to find its own place in the West (die “Partnership for Peace” arrangement with NATO could be rather costly for the Ljubljana government) and to resolve boundary, economic and other problems with the government of Zagreb and perhaps of Rome. It could be expected that among the recently established independent countries that used to be Yugoslav republics - only Slovenia, owing to its ethnic homogeneousness, relative development and rather successful functioning of parliamentary institutions, may in the foreseeable future start to join die European
Slovenia 33 integrating processes successfully. Added to this, in a way, is the fact that armed conflict on the territory of Slovenia was rather short and produced no major destruction of civilian and particularly economic facilities. However, this republic may face economic problems because of its restricted domestic market and the fact that connections have been severed with the rest of the Yugoslav economic space, from which this republic used to import considerable quantities of raw materials and energy and sold its manufactured goods. Its closeness to economic powers such as Germany and Italy represents a mixed blessing for this republic, because Slovenia can hardly find alternative markets for products that it sold throughout Yugoslavia for decades in spite of numerous advantages from cooperation with much more developed economies. Although some economic flows on the former Yugoslav area will probably be renewed, it will take a longer period to reestablish the earlier volume of trade between Slovenia and some other former Yugoslav republics. A significant advantage over other former Yugoslav republics will probably be represented by the fact that there is no serious threat to Slovenia’s security, which will largely relieve it from military expenditures. However, how much Slovenia’s eventual NATO membership will cost, can hardly be predicted
3
Croatia
There are some 14 areas with different histories in recent centuries grouped in three complex regions of Istria (in the north-western part of Adriatic coast), Dalmatia (covering the rest of the Croatian coast) and Slavonia (north-eastern part). Croatian national identity is divided into three or more major territorial sub-identities: the sub-identity of Zagorci (living in the region of Zagorje north of Zagreb), the sub-identity of Dalmatinci (living on the Croatian part of Adriatic coast), the sub-identity of peoples living within the Zagreb area (at the first place citizens of the capital Zagreb and its suburbs), the sub-identity of Slavonci (living east of Zagreb), the subidentity of Istrians (living on Adriatic peninsula Istria), etc. In some cases these sub-identities bridge national identities. Serbs used to be the biggest minority in Croatia, which - according to some estimates - constituted more than 12% of the population in 1991. Most of Croatia’s Serbs live in urban centres like Zagreb, Rijeka, Sibenik, Zadar, some other towns on Adriatic coast, etc. More than one-quarter used to live in villages and small towns in the regions of Western Slavonia, Lika, Kordun, Banija, Gorski kotar, Dalamtinska zagora (all located between Zagreb and Adriatic coast, in this volume called Rnin Krajina), in Baranja, Eastern Slavonia and Western Sirmium regions (close to the northern border with Serbia). Table 3.1
Ethnic composition of Croatia
Nation_______________ Population Croats 3.708.000 581.000 Serbs 105.000 Yugoslavs Muslims 48.000 Slovenes 24.000 14.000 Albanians Montenegrins 10.000 Others 78.000 Total 4.760.000 Source: 1991 census.
34
Croatia 35 In addition to more than 95% of the 1991 Croatia’s Slav population, there was a great variety of ethnic groups belonging to other families of nations. Among others there are Hungarians, Italians as well as a few thousand Albanians, Austrians, Bulgarians, Czechs, Germans and other nationalities. 3.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry Until recently, according to most historians, Croats have been a Slavic tribe who moved to their present-day territory from the Ukraine or, more precisely, the lower Danube area. An another theory holds that the original Croats were nomadic or seminomadic Sarmatians from Central Asia, who first migrated to the Steps around 200 BC, and then to Europe at the end of the fourth century AD. There the Sarmatian Croats conquered the Slavs in Northern Bohemia and Southern Poland and formed a small state called White Croatia near town Krakow. A recent publication sanctioned by the Croatian government says that the first known reference to Croats dates from Persian sources in about 500 BC. However, it is considered that the notion that Croats were descendants of the ancient Persians and that they were therefore “Aryan” is, in fact, a piece of legend. Created by Croatian nationalists, who tried to define the Croats, it was supposed to justify their alliance to Nazi Germany and the mass murders carried out by the Croatian fascists against Serbs during the Second World War. “This reference, which would be an obscure and silly piece of legend if it had not been for the atrocities of WWII, is hardly reassuring to those who know the history of the fable. (The nationalist mythologies are prescriptions for endless warfare)” (Chirot, 1995: 59-60). There are two interpretations of the way the Croats inhabited the Balkans in the seventh century. A Croatian source says they joined Avars in their invasion of Dalmatia (see also Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995), and Byzantine emperor Constantine VII Flavius Porphyrogenitus (who reigned in 913-959), stated that the Croats were invited to the Balkans by the Eastern Roman emperor Heraclius I (610-641) to drive out Avars. A group of Croatian tribes split off and came to the present Croatian lands. After approximately ten years, between 626 and 635, the Croats defeated the Avars, pushing them to the north of the river Danube, and Emperor Heraclius gave Avars’ lands to the Croats who were supposed to be under the sovereignty of the Byzantine Empire (see Cirkovic, 1981: 145). This
36 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia version is corroborated by a medieval memory on migrations of the White Croats from the White Croatia to Roman Dalmatia, which they liberated from the Avars soon after their defeat in Constantinople in 626, and settled the East Adriatic area in 614 AD. The origin of the name “Croat” has been also disputable. According to Constantine VII Flavius Porphyrogenitus (905-959), Byzantine emperor from 913 to 959, “Croats” in the Slav tongue meant “those who posses much territory” (De administrando imperio, 958: 147, quoted after Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1960: 37). According to other authors, the name could be linked with the name of former inhabitants of the Adriatic island Krk (Curetes or Curibantes), with the Croatian, Serbo-Croatian or Serbian verb rvati se (to wrestle), and the name of the Bulgarian king Kuvrat, from the first half of the seventh century. At the beginning of the nineteenth century, as the first Indo-European-Slav interpretations prevailed, attempts appeared to explain the name in a philological way, which were assuming that the name originates from several Slav and few German words and names. Latter explanations linked the name with a Germanic people Goths, who originated in southern Scandinavia, with the Carpathian Mountains, etc. It is also considered that both of the names “Serb” and “Croat”, which were not used meaningfully by Balkan inhabitants until the nineteenth century, were probably taken from latter-arriving, possibly Iranian groups who were assimilated by the Slavs during the seventh century. There were also several other more or less disputed explanations based on Iranian, Illyrian as well as Slav etymology and German and Iranian influences. It was noticed that the fact that the name “Croats”, which was spread over the entire area of the Western and Southern Slavs - bearing in mind its foreign origin and links with Carpathian Mountains - can be linked with migrations of its holders from White Croatia, along the upper Vistula under Carpathian Mountains. As Croats in Dalmatia17 are more distanced from White Croatia, they only can be excluded from this development. According to this explanation, the name “Croat” was brought to Dalmatia by a separate wave of movements from a segment of the Carpathian Mountains area, i.e. zakarpatski krajevi in the Croatian, Serbo-Croatian and Serbian language. Until the eleventh century, in addition to Croats in Dalmatia, two Slavic tribes had the same name: one in Poland (in White Croatia, which used to exist until the tenth century) and one in Czechia, where there still exist three villages with the name Charvátice. Vestiges of the name “Croat”, which can be found in local names, testify to smaller groups of Croats mixed with other Slav tribes in a wider geographical area (in the first place in former and present-day Slovene territory, then in
Croatia 37 Austria, Moravia, Slovakia, Macedonia, Greece, etc.) including some disputable cases. One can conclude that the ethnogenesis of the Croatian people and the origin of its name has not been completely explained yet. Most historians believe that the Croats had purely Slavic characteristics at the time of their move to the Balkans. According to existing historical data, it was there that Croats met the indigenous Romanized Illyrian-Celtic population, who first populated the West Balkans, and members of some other peoples and tribes (for more details see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1960: 37,40-1 and literature listed there). 3.2 State traditions Wiberg detected that a problem originated in the Croatian identity’s being so closely linked to state identity, which was described as sanctity of state (1993: 103). In 852, according to a document, the prince Trpimir called himself for the first time dux Croatorum o f regnum Croatorum. Caught between the Frankish and Byzantine empires, Croats were divided in the ninth century, when two Croatian states were established, in Slavonia (former Roman Pannonia) and Dalmatia. The independent state of Croatia was established by Branimir (879-892), and under the rule of the king Tomislav (910-928) Croatia was unified. Its independence lasted for approximately the next two centuries (see Friedman, 1996: 10). A small city Knin, the capital of Serb Krajina from 1991 to 1995, means the same symbol to Croats as Kosovo to Serbs; it has been the sacred Croatian land and one of the cradles of Croatian statehood (see Wiberg, 1993: 105-6; Job, 1993: 63). According to a myth, the Croatian king Dmitar Zvonimir (1076-89) was killed on the field Kosovo near Knin by people who rejected his call to Crusade War. In 1091, after the death of the king Zvonimir, a group of Croatian nobles concluded the Pacta Conventa with Hungarian King Ladislav, who was given the Croatian crown in exchange for the autonomy of Croatia. Another Hungarian king, Colomanus dethroned the last Croatian king Petar Svacic (1093-97) and became King of Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia in 1102. However, the Pacta Conventa became the basis for a struggle that lasted for centuries in which the Croatians tried to maintain its autonomy under the Hungarian crown, and later under the Habsburgs. During the union with Hungary Croatia started a long-lasting struggle for maintaining its autonomy threatened by the Hungarian crown and later the Habsburg
38 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia emperors. The Croats have always been very keen on their statehood’s juridical foundation. It is considered that, as their sovereignty was mostly determined by the existing power balance, Croatian de facto individuality during some stages of history is disputable. Insistence on the de jure aspect of Croatia’s statehood is supposed to serve as the basis for the myth of the Croatian political community’s thousand years of legal continuity. In fact, this idea has more of an ideological than historical nature. The joining of the Croatian and Hungarian crowns forced Hungary (seeking access to the sea) and Venice (wishing to secure its trade routes to the eastern Mediterranean and to use Dalmatian timber for shipbuilding) to compete in establishing domination over Dalmatia. The rivalry resulted in 21 wars waged between 1115 and 1420. As Serbia and Bosnia also competed for Dalmatia, Dalmatian cities struggled to remain autonomous by playing one power against the others. The most successful in applying the strategy was Dubrovnik (Ragusa), a rival of Venice, which prospered by mediating between Europe and the new Ottoman provinces in Europe and trade of precious metals, raw materials, agricultural goods and slaves. The city was severely damaged in the 1667 earthquake. In 1409 the king of Naples, prince of Taranto and a claimant to the throne of Hungary Ladislas (1337-1414), sold Venice his rights over Dalmatia and by 1420 Venice controlled practically all of it, except Dubrovnik. An additional loss of territory happened after the Turkish invasions during the 1500s. Namely, in 1522 the Croatian nobility invited Austrian Archduke Ferdinand of Habsburg to establish garrisons in Croatia to block the invasion, i.e. Military Border ( Vojna Krajina in the Serbian Serbo-Croatian and Croatian language or Militargrenze in the German language). According to some authors these recruits were mostly Serbs fleeing in front of the Turkish invasion, and thus was formed a belt of Serbpopulated territory (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1971: 522-8; Danilovic, 1972; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995; Remington, 1997: 262). The different version is that among recruits there was a significant number of Orthodox Vlachs, who became a part of the Serbian nation under the later influence of the Serbian Orthodox Church and propaganda (Klemencic, 1996: 100). Another author considers that “during the Turkish wars, Croats served as soldiers on the Military Frontier” (Zunec, 1996: 214). In 1526 the Turks in battle at Mohacs destroyed the Hungarian army, and King Louis II himself died fleeing the battlefield. In 1572 Ferdinand Habsburg was elected as King of Hungary and Croatia instead of Louis. The Turks did not succeed to take Vienna in 1529, but were still threatening Croatia, Austria and Hungary. In 1553, Ferdinand appointed an
Croatia 39 Austrian general to take command and civil authority over two Military Border regions in Croatia, which were institutionalized as the Military Border and developed independently of Zagreb authorities.18 Croatia remained linked to Hungary, but the arrival of the Turks and an expanding Ottoman Empire put it under pressure. Many fled in the face of the Turkish advances in the sixteenth century. In 1699, by the Treaty of Carlowitz, Croatia was ceded by the Turks to the Habsburgs who allowed a Croatian monarchy and a good deal of independence, but considered Croatia as an annexed territory. The independence of Military Border areas - although it had the significant defence role for Croatia - generated what were perhaps the first disputes between the Zagreb authority (which tried to regain control over the Krajina territory, especially after the Turkish danger passed) and the Krajina Serbs (attempting to preserve as much independence as it was possible). The Serbian settlements in Military Border areas remained from the sixteenth century until most of their inhabitants fled during the Croatian attacks in May and August 1995, when Krajina Serbs “lost the myth of invincibility” (Calic, 1996: 128). In 1797, during the Napoleonic wars, Croatia became an Illyrian province and was reintegrated into the Habsburg Empire after the defeat of France. The Hungarian revolution in 1848-49 against the Habsburgs provided an opportunity for the Ban (Viceroy) of Croatia Josip Jelacic (who became viceroy of Croatia and Slavonia, governor of Dalmatia and Rijeka, and commander of the Military Frontier) and the Diet of Agram (Zagreb) to support the Habsburgs against Hungary. Jelacic’s army attacked the Hungarian revolutionary forces, but soon withdrew, and Russian army crushed the revolution. The emperor did not unite the Slavic regions within the Empire as he had promised, but reassigned Croatia to Hungary and introduced absolutist rule and Germanization. In the 1868 HungarianCroatian Compromise autonomy was provided for the Kingdom of Croatia and Slavonia (a special status within the Hungarian section), which lasted until 1903, while Dalmatia and Istria remained in the Austrian section. The Illyrian movement aimed in the first place at mobilizing South Slavs in opposing the attempts of Hungarization, and did not take adequate care of religious and other historical differences between the South Slav peoples. In the mid-nineteenth century the movement aimed to encourage Serbs and Croats in Austria-Hungary to achieve political unity based on the idea of common ethnic roots and shared culture. Ilirism was rejected by most Serbs in Austria-Hungary, who dreamed of a Greater Serbia, which was supposed to be enlarged by Bosnia and Herzegovina, and supported the
40 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia anti-Ottoman Christian revolts. “Nonintellectual Croats also retained their narrowly nationalistic dreams. The idea of Yugoslavism thus also disappeared between 1878 and 1903, as relations between the Serbs and Croats became increasingly marred by contradictory nationalist and territorial aspirations.” Friedman concluded that “the large Serbian minority in Croatian lands, which yearned for Serbian rule, inhibited the creation of an autonomous Croatia within the Austro-Hungarian monarchy. Similarly, Belgrade’s pan-Slavic Greater Serbian vision hindered the creation of a decentralized Yugoslav state in which autonomy-minded Croats could feel comfortable (Jelavich and Jelavich, 1977: 248)” (1996: 40-1). During the First World War Slovene and Croatian representatives to the diets in Budapest and Vienna started preparations for establishing an independent National Council. In 1918, as Serbian soldiers approached, Zagreb Sabor ended the union between Croatia and Hungary. The linkage between Croatian national and state identity had a significant role in resistance to the Habsburg Empire and other Great Powers19 before the First Yugoslavia as well as to the Serbian domination in the First Yugoslavia. Wiberg concluded that “Yugoslavia’s history of disagreements over the Constitution since (actually even before) its creation in 1918 is hardly rivaled by any other state ... and these conflicts had repeatedly brought to state to, or even over, the brink of collapse” (1995b: 98; see also Wiberg, 1992: 3-5; Djilas, 1991). Even within and between the Serbs and Croats there existed great political and other differences and divisions. In Croatia, for example, on one side, Ante Starcevic recommended the creation of a ‘Greater Croatia’ (from the Alps to Bulgaria, including Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia and Montenegro), and the Yugoslav idea, meanwhile, was supported by the Roman Catholic bishop Josip Juraj Strossmayer (1815— 1905) who was imbued with tremendous ecumenical spirit. “With Starcevic’s death, his Party of Right declined and a new generation of Croat intellectuals embraced Strossmayer’s concept. Forming a Croatian-Serbian coalition in 1905, they easily triumphed in the first elections for the local legislature. The Croats warmed to the idea of union with other South Slavs - meaning primarily the Kingdom of Serbia - for several reasons, but chiefly because alone they were powerless to wrest independence from Austria-Hungary” (see Doder, 1993: 7-8). The situation had been similar on the Serbian side. Since the very beginning in 1918, Yugoslavia has always suffered from constitutional conflicts: Croats (and Slovenes) wanted a confederal Yugoslavia (a partnership of equals), but for Serbs Yugoslavia was a unitary country, in which they could fulfil an old dream: all Serbs united in one state; the Croats and Slovenes wanted a “Swiss” state, and the Serbs a
Croatia 41 “French”. This could be a short resumé of the most significant and relatively long-lasting state and later identity problems and threats, which appeared during the seven-decades-long history of the First and Second Yugoslavia and which seem to be present even after its disintegration. The political tensions between the two visions of Yugoslavia were further sharpened by Serbian centralizing tendencies as well as Croat tactics of political obstructionism to expand their autonomy in the face of what many Croatians felt as Serbian colonization (for more details see Remington, 1994a: 73). Furthermore the more the Serbian political élite (which cherished the self-image of being the Yugoslav Piedmont) saw itself as a political ruler in the state, the more Yugoslavia represented for radicals in the Croatian and Slovenian political élite just a “transit station” to independence and vice versa. The dual forces moved the institutional organization from one extreme to the other. One kind of extreme was the rigidly centralized order (which culminated in the King’s coup d ’état in 192920) and later dictatorship and Tito’s (who was bom in Croatia, his mother being Slovene, his father Croat) authoritarian supranational mie especially during the first two decades after the Second World War. An opposite kind of extreme led to the creation of Banovina Croatia (an “embryo of confederation,” established in 1939, which came too late to prevent the catastrophe during the Second World War) and to the 1974 constitution. The 1939 agreement (“sporazum”) created an expanded Croatia, but the King’s offer of Croatia’s and Slovenia’s semi-independence (the so-called idea of amputation) under its own Ban and Sabor was not accepted by both of them. As a result of the German victory over First Yugoslavia’s army in 1941, the Ustashi came to power in Croatia led by Ante Pavelic (1889-1959). In an enlarged Croatia, which included Bosnia and Herzegovina and some parts of present-day Serbia, the Croatian regime, under the Italian sponsorship, established an army to support the Axis powers’ fighting the resistance movements that were operating in the region. The Ustashi persecuted and killed hundreds of thousands of Serbs, Jews, Gypsies, antifascist Croats and members of other nations with a brutality which was shocking even for the Germans, and from time to time motivated the Italians to intervene. They desired and realized the renewal of the Great Croatia like the one that existed under Petar Kresimir (1058-74) and Dmitar Zvonimir. However the illusion was destroyed by the Italia’s and Germany’s defeat and collapse. According to The Encyclopedia o f the Holocaust (published by Macmillan), “more than a half a million Serbs were killed, a quarter million
42 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia expelled, 200,000 forced to convert to the Catholicism of the Croatian Fascist” (quoted in Rosenthal, 1997). However, recent Croatian historiography attempts to reinterpret the historical facts claiming that Jasenovac was not a “death camp”, but a “labour camp” and that “only” 3040,000 died in it. Thus it seems that Ustasha crimes have been intentionally exaggerated by “some individuals who had some special, hidden reasons” (Tudjman, 1989: 316). After Rosenthal labelled President Tudjman as “a long time Holocaust denier”, and an interview given by the chief of Jasenovac prison camp Dinko Sakic, in which he openly spoke about his war activities in the camp, Tudjman ordered his government to demand extradition of Sakic and his wife from Argentina in 1998. Many Serbs believe that in Jasenovac and similar places Serbs and members of other people of the above-mentioned nationalities were systematically exterminated for the simple fact that they belonged to these nationalities. Many Croats believe that the people who were killed were just, or mostly, those who were against the Croatian independent state, since it had had to defend itself in that way during the Second World War. In that way, both nations have their own incompatible truths. On the other hand, when the Yugoslav Army disintegrated under the fascist attack, groups of ex-Yugoslav soldiers went into hiding under the name Chetnik, initially created for the groups of armed irregulars who attacked the Turks during the nineteenth century. The Chetnik organization aimed to establish the future Yugoslavia as a centralized country in which a Greater Serbia would have the leading role. Under the command of Dragoljub Draza Mihailovic, a royal officer, Chetniks carried out massacres of many Croats and especially Bosnian Muslims who at that time were mostly allied with the Croats. Many Serbs believe that the massacres were executed in revenge for the past and to prevent future Ustasha atrocities, while many Croats believe that the same massacres were part of the Serbs’ attacks on the Independent State of Croatia. At the end of the Second World War, when parts of the Croatian army and many civilians started withdrawal to Austria, Tito’s partisan army surrounded them. It is considered that after their capitulation tens of thousands of Croat and other quisling soldiers and civilians were killed. The slaughter of Croats executed near the Bleiburg city in Austria has been the symbol of the Croatian war tragedy. Those who were not killed there, were forced to walk up to 700-800 km in the known “death marches” starting in May 1945 with mass executions on the way. In the opinion of many Croats, they lost even more people in the Marches than there were Serb casualties in the Jasenovac camp. Many Croats think that they had the
Croatia 43 best organized and the most numerous guerrilla movement against fascists during the Second World War, while Serbs would reply that the movement in Croatia was composed mainly of Serbs from Croatia. Similarly, Croats stress that the Second World War hero, executed by fascists, Stjepan Filipovic, was a Croat who was considered by Serbs as a member of their nation, etc. Initially the physiognomy of Tito’s Yugoslav federation of six republics was much like Lenin’s formula in the Soviet Union: at the beginning, the republics were given fictional sovereignty complemented by cultural and some political institutions. In return, republics transferred political power to Tito, to his comrades and their Communist party. Later the federation was at least formally gradually decentralized. The most important step within this process was the 1974 constitution, which included some confederal elements. The constitution was preceded by a series of constitutional amendments, and until 1972 by political conflicts between supporters of modernization and stabilization, centralists and decentralists, federalist and confederalists, of the welfare state and of market economy, advocates of a “firm hand” and “liberals” etc. (see Sekelj, 1993: 179-87). As Josip Broz Tito was getting older, from time to time it seemed that he was losing control over the LCY and the Yugoslav state, but observers sometimes explained it as signs of democratization. Now it is clear that at that time political crisis was at the gate. The integrity of communist Yugoslavia (though its communism was called “liberal” or “communism with a human face”) was maintained by Tito’s arbitrary power, but this glue that held the federation together was gone with his death in 1980. In fact, Tito’s system had chosen a most dangerous combination: capital was imported mostly from the West, and rules of the economic and political game - mostly from the East or at least mixed. It seems that the “iron hands” (of both the Serbian King and Tito) over the society produced a general sense of national deprivation, which by a curious twist was not imputed to the authoritarian style of rule but was directed to other nations generating the rebirth of nationalist movements. When the economic crisis “occurred”21 and Albanians from Kosovo demonstrated, demanding their own republic in 1981 and were repressed for the second time, the two blocs with irreconcilable goals were established: federal (centralist) bloc (Serbia and Montenegro) versus confederal (secessionist) bloc (Croatia, Slovenia, and later Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina). The Serbian élite was insisting upon the legitimate right to defend integrity (inviolability of borders) and sovereignty of Yugoslavia,
44 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia while the opposite bloc was also more or less firmly requesting the legitimate right to self-determination. In addition, the distinct social profile of the élites in Yugoslavia after Tito’s death, their authoritarian spirit and inability to compromise deeply contradicted the multiethnic composition of the society. As Wiberg noted, “very few other states had been as dependent for internal cohesion on the Cold War or were, for this reason, as negatively affected by its end” (1995b: 98). The end of the Cold War and bipolarity in Europe reduced the importance of basic geopolitical assumptions underlying both the First and Second Yugoslavia. Disintegration of the USSR and disappearance of Eastern Europe marked the definite end of Truman’s or rather Kerman’s containment doctrine, while rapid changes in Poland, Hungary, Czechoslovakia, Bulgaria, Albania and Russia as well as deepening crisis in the Second Yugoslavia made it lose the significance of the “symbol of difference in the communist world” which for decades granted it a privileged position within fire US policy of “differentiation”. When the iron curtain disappeared, geostrategic importance of some border and buffer zones - like territories of Czechoslovakia, Baltic Republics, and Second Yugoslavia - became much less important than before. Since changes in the USSR have finally marked the end of the Soviet threat and bipolarity in Europe, efforts to establish a new international order on the continent, based on development of democracy and the right of nations to self-determination start to occupy the central place in the policy of Western countries. Wiberg stressed that some important motives have little to do with Yugoslavia as such, but resulted from the configuration of international relations that were in maximal flux, mainly due to the dissolution of the Soviet Union. He considered that “a ‘New World Order’ had been coined as a phrase, but with little clear content: it might mean American hegemonic leadership or an American position as primus inter pares, but in either cases it remained unclear when and how the United States was desired and inclined to act in “European affairs”. (Russia was initially treated as largely negligible, but later become more assertive about its own national interests in Europe)” (1994a: 237). In 1990 authors of the constitution of the future independent Croatia abandoned the “Swiss” model in deciding on how to organize their republic, and defined Croatia as a national state of the Croatian nation and other nations and minorities which are its citizens: Serbs, Moslems, Slovenes, Czechs, Slovaks, Italians, Hungarians, Jews et al. (Chapter 1, Items 1, 2, 3). This accounts for the fatal mistakes the consequences of which already became apparent in 1991. The members of the Yugoslav
Croatia 45 nations, chiefly the most populous Serbs, were given the status of a minority, and reference to the political rights of the Serbian minority was dropped. It is known that international law insufficiently and inadequately regulates the minority status and that a considerable part of Croatia’s population was placed in a worse, or at least less certain situation, which very soon assumed drastic proportions. Article 15 of the Croatia constitution also did not help in that regard, because it vaguely mentioned the cultural autonomy. Practice showed that there was the prejudice of disloyalty in regard to some non-Croats, because of which they were forced to sign loyalty statements (see Dimitrijevic, 1992b: 82-4). It was stressed that “a particularly difficult position has been faced by members of the Serbian nation in Croatia and Slovenia, where they are treated as foreigners and second-class citizens. As a rule, they have been attributed the vices of hegemonism and communism (Dimitrijevic, 1993: 96-97) that they had, allegedly, imposed to the Yugoslav community after the First and the Second World Wars.” Basic concluded that “in the rift between the gifts of the majority elite, in the form of existentially endurable but not at the same time in the form of a minimum dignified co-living, and the aspirations of their own elite that considered each compromise a defeat, the members of the Serbian nation suffered” (1996: 55). In 1990-91 when the flag of Croatia under which Hitler’s puppet Croatian fascist government had massacred ethnic Serbs in Croatia was even being represented on packets of sugar in Zagreb cafes, many Croats would distinguish between the honourable side of the independent Croatia during the Second World War and its dishonourable side (Ustashi atrocities). They considered that the symbols represent the first side only, and a relatively small number took the Ustashi state as something to be proud of. It was stressed that, however, when historians’ “transparently self-serving motive is to manipulate those figures to diminish the culpability of Pavelic’s Ustashi regime - so that contemporary heirs can say. ‘Well, everyone was doing it, so it’s not such a big deal” then they are, like anti-Semitic revisionists who contend that Auschwitz did not exist, reprehensible’” (Job, 1993: 62-3). As to the majority of Serbs “all symbols and behavior that resembled that Croatia were equally deadly threats to Serb security and identity”, the spiral of mutual threats was generated again. Finally, some Croats perceived the checkerboard simply as a symbol of Croatia’s independent statehood and did not care about Serbs’ fears originating from the Second World War, and vice versa; Serbs cared only about their own fears, and not about the Croats’ independent statehood.
46 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia After the exodus of the Serbs and the destruction of their property in 1995, not a single minority in Croatia met the minimum of 8% required for representation in all levels of power. Basic considered that “one may seriously doubt the sincerity of the Croatian authorities in terms of institutionalization of the Constitutional Law provisions since they were enacted after the inter-nation relations had been already deeply disrupted. A part of responsibility, but only a part, for intensified national stratification is also borne by leaders of the Serbian community who had, among other things, neglected the interests of the Serbian population living in towns and regions beyond the territory of the Republic of Srpska Krajina, having thus reduced the national issue of the Serbian population in Croatia to the territorial.” According to the 1981 census, 531.502 Serbs lived in Croatia. In eleven municipalities the Serbs had a majority exceeding one half. In eleven municipalities there was 30 to 50% of Serbs, while in nine municipalities there was 20 to 30% of them. In addition, their share in the national structure of nine municipalities was from 10 to 20% of the population, and in ten municipalities, mainly big cities, they accounted for 10% of the population. It was concluded that “the significance of this last group of municipalities may be best illustrated by the fact that only in Zagreb there lived 39.930, and in Knin 34.486 members of the Serbian nationality.22 A superficial insight into the distribution of Serbian population in Croatia, and knowledge of rudimentary historical facts provide sufficient information for a conclusion that a way towards community of the Serbs and Croats in the sovereign Republic of Croatia had to lead through development of democratic understandings and institutions23 with a high degree of guarantees for achievement of the Serbian ethnic minority rights.” In fact, “the demographic dispersion of the Serbs in Croatia guaranteed that a pronounced national homogenization could not take place except in the case of an explicit national imperilment, and it was precisely the Republic of Croatia that contributed to development and inflammation of such feelings. The response of the Serbian minority to the nation-building nationalism of the majority nation was nationalism within its ethnic group” (1996: 61-2). The mostly rural Serbs in Krajina, strongly encouraged by Milosevic and his SPS, created own administration and police, declaring that if Croatia would leave Yugoslavia, they would leave Croatia. When this led to clashes, YPA interposed its units between the parties, ostensively playing a neutral role, but de facto protecting Serb independence. As Serbs in other parts of Croatia suffered from this and more Pavelic symbolism appeared, the spiral continued. The mentioned sanctity of the state strongly
Croatia 47 contributed to the rejection of the compromises necessary to get an ethnically Croatian state territory. As the EC faced the threat of “renationalization” of its members’ security policy, the interests and national policies of certain members became apparent. The standpoint of Germany started to prevail within the EC, which supported the right of Yugoslav republics to self-determination, while within the CSCE similar position was advocated by some Central European countries (see Simic, 1993: 211-23). Wiberg concluded that “the EC position ... deepened the conflicts, being inevitably seen as threatening Serb identity - and security: local Serbs had little faith in assurances extracted from Croatia, not seeing the EC as taking its own conditions seriously” (1993: 108). A possible explanation of Germany’s behaviour is based on traditional understanding for and tolerance of ethnic nationalism, which, in contrast to the state patriotism characteristic of the French Revolution, is often called the German version of nationalism. Serbian nationalism has become the paradigm of bad nationalism, mainly because of the stereotype of Serbs as uncouth rabble-rousers, enemies and terrorists and the behaviour of the YPA and the Serbian paramilitaries, particularly their strategy of laying towns to waste, such as Vukovar, Dubrovnik24 and later Sarajevo. Serbian nationalism was perceived as communist by nature, in contrast to others in the Second Yugoslavia, which managed to present themselves as democratic, capitalist and liberal. While in the other republics communists and their obviously nonnationalist successors had been defeated, in Serbia nationalists, in the shape of communists disguised as socialists, had got 46% and in Montenegro 65% of the vote. Thanks to the electoral system, this majority took 77.6% of the seats in the Serbian Parliament and 66% in Montenegro. With just a little ill-will and lack of information, together with the nature of official Serb propaganda, it was easy to reach the conclusion that the Serbs had voted for communism and the rest for a liberal democracy. This underlay the subsequent behaviour, coloured, to say the least, by the foregone conclusion that Serbs did not want to fit into Europe or the world of democracy, the market and human rights, preferring only to dominate others, forcing upon them obsolete forms of society and politics. The prophecies of the Yugoslav military ideologists were to a certain extent fulfilled: the West tried to snatch from communism as large a piece of Yugoslavia by denying it to communist Serbia (Dimitrijevic, 1996: VIII— IX).
48 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Wiberg stressed that the EC’s perception of the conflict complex accelerated its transition from relatively low-key mediator25 (after the outbreak of the war in Slovenia), via high-power mediator, self-appointed arbitrator,26 or even conflict party in late 1991, with dramatic local consequences. A simultaneous increase in intrusiveness and partiality made it increasingly unlikely that the EC would be able to serve as arbitrator, or even as a mediator. After Slovenia and Croatia were recognized by the EC, few alternative intergovernmental mediators were left. The CSCE might theoretically have been a possibility, but it actually excluded itself by suspending Yugoslavia’s membership from early 1992. “The obvious reason for this was to avoid having a required consensus broken by a Yugoslav veto, but for that very reason the CSCE made itself it unacceptable to Yugoslavia in any intrusive role” (1994a: 240-1; 1993:101,106, 238, 241). It was concluded that introducing the international factor (EC, CSCE, UN, NATO, WEU, etc.) into the solution of the crisis initially produced at least in part contradictory effects. It seems that instead of expected calming down of conflicts, internationalization of crisis encouraged separatism of numerous ethnic groups causing a “domino effect” on the entire territory of the former Yugoslavia, and narrowing down possibilities for political solution. The situation became additionally complicated by the divergent interests of European powers in approaching this crisis, as well as by revanchism or prejudices that strongly influenced the shaping of political attitudes of local and foreign actors in the crisis (cf. Simic, 1993: 197). One author - comparing Croatian and US constitution - found out, first, that the main argument of the American Declaration of Independence was the struggle against the exploitation of the people by the Crown of England, but setting up a constitution implemented by the Supreme Court, the Americans declared in the preamble: “We the people of the United States” meaning that all men and women living on the territory were part of the people legitimizing the constitution. On the other side, the very concept of the new “Nation-States” in former Yugoslavia is based on the legitimacy of the nation and not the people, which means that men and women belonging to other nations can become citizens but with much greater difficulties. Secondly, when fifty years later the Southern states claimed independence and secession, the liberal North did not accept the secession, not because independence as such was unacceptable but because the South claimed independence in order to pursue the discrimination against the slaves. They fought against secession for reasons of individual liberties and equal rights. And as a result of the civil war, they introduced the
Croatia 49 Amendment XTV into the Constitution in order to guarantee due process of law, i.e. individual freedoms and equal protection within the states as well. Thirdly, in the preamble to the American Constitution, the legitimacy is grounded upon “the people of the United States” (the people meaning every individual living on the territory of the United States and not the American people, for this would mean a nation having the right to a territory and independence). Today on territory of the ex-Yugoslavia there are recognized republics which have formally declared themselves to be states of citizens but which in fact claim to have an inherent historical right to independence as nation states and not as states of citizens. This concept of state is based on the idea that “some nationals are more equal than others”, but the modem concept of human and equal rights must be based on the ideal that every human being living on a certain territory is vested with a right to self-determination. “He has this right not because he belongs to a certain nation, but because endowed with this right individuals will be able to guarantee in a better way human rights, individual liberty and promote common welfare respecting cultural, religious and social diversity” (Fleiner-Gerster, 1994: 78). It seems that the basic problem is that Croatian eyes see only good side in Ustashi while seeing the threatening side of Chetnici, and Serbian eyes see only the good side in Chetnici and the threatening side of Ustashi. Moreover, that which one side considers as the good side in its own fighters is exactly that which is considered by the other side as their bad side and vice versa. In war circumstances that which is seen by one side engaged in conflict as “the fighting for national liberation” is viewed by the opposite side as “the clear case of secession” or “aggression”; the “heroic” acts or ventures of one side are qualified as “coward attacks/crimes” or even “genocide” by the other side, etc. For many Serbs inside and outside Croatia its President Tudjman is the worst kind of crook and a notorious criminal, but for many Croats he is the man who succeeded in his promise “to restore a sense of Croatian national pride, establish national sovereignty, and reverse the disadvantages Croatia was saddled with in Yugoslavia”. One author considered, “this meant, among other things, an end to the overrepresentation of Serbs in Croatia’s state administration, a renewed sense of pride in Croatian historical and cultural symbols (regardless of their tarnish by the Second World War fascist regime), the passage of a constitution that deemed the Croatian nation the preeminent state building nation in Croatia, the establishment of the ‘Croatian language and script’ as
50 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia the official mode of discourse in the republic, and, ultimately, the right to secede from Yugoslavia” (Hislope, 1997: 475-6). Before the breakdown of the Serb Krajina, similar contradictory black or white opinions and qualifications had existed among Serbs and Croats regarding the former President of Serb Krajina Milan Martic and the President of Serbia Slobodan Milosevic. After the breakdown, the situation changed, at least among Serbs. The above-mentioned phenomena could form a serious methodological problem: how to compose and present a theoretical analysis that consists of two, three or even more perceptions and versions of reality, each of which is completely different? At first glance, it could seem an easier task in wars whose histories are written by winners, but in wars like those in the Second Yugoslavia from time to time all sides consider themselves victorious, particularly in their perceptions and interpretations of their political and military leaders and state-sponsored historians. Although in fact they all seem to be defeated, following the realist political theory, school or way of reasoning, after the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina Croats should be promoted as the overall winners, in the first place thanks to the fact that in Croatia almost pure ‘state security’ solutions were applied. In this regard, there are just a few unfinished or partly finished elements outside the country. Among the first cases on the list is probably Bosnia and Herzegovina or, more precisely, Western Herzegovina (so-called Herceg-Bosnia) and some other parts of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. As President Tudjman knows that any overt attempt to seize Bosnian territory would be unacceptable for the international community (to which he has shown particular sensitivity and who gave their support to Croatia in its breaking away from the Second Yugoslavia), he is very cautious in making claims over Bosnia’s people and land. It was concluded that “Tudjman can hardly argue for the territorial integrity of Croatia against claims of secessionist Serbs and simultaneously disregard this concept in the case of Bosnia without appearing hypocritical” (Hislope, 1997: 477). He had to find his own way of trying not to disappoint hardliners in HDU and nationalist-oriented followers in Croatia, extreme nationalists in Herzegovina, who both pursue the partition of Bosnia and the annexation of Herzegovina to Croatia proper, on the one hand, and the international community on the other. In that way, while at heart Croatia is nationalistic or, more precisely, chauvinistic oriented, its government is trying hard and, it seems, mainly succeeding - to represent the country to the international community as being anti-fascist oriented.
Croatia 51 The intensive nationalism of HDU, which greatly estranged the Serbs in Croatia, and particularly in Krajina, “was a contributory factor to the 1991 civil war in Croatia” (Hislope, 1997: 477), but in this regard there are even more strident political forces and orientations in the country. “Dobroslav Paraga’s HSP is a neo-fascist, right-wing party that was formed in 1990. The party took its name from the nineteenth century party of the Croatian nation-builder, Ante Starcevic, who advocated a Greater Croatia based on the notion that all South Slavs, with the exception of Bulgars, are actually Croats. In Starcevic’s scheme the borders of a Greater Croatia would extend from Austria to Bulgaria (Banac, 1984: 85-89; Gross, 1980: 15-21).” Another promoter of a programme for Greater Croatia was Paraga. The programme was justified by historical and ethnic principles. “This means that if Croats compose a majority of the population in a given area, or if a given area was even historically part of Croatia, then Croatia has a right to it today. Based on such ideas, Paraga argues that Croatia should rightfully encompass a good deal of Serbia (Eastern Srem, which was purportedly stolen from Croatia when Yugoslavia was founded in 1918), part of Montenegro (the Bay of Kotor), and all of BosniaHerzegovina (Kusovac, 1991: 28-30)” (Hislope, 1997: 476). In the Second Yugoslavia around one-fifth of the Croats used to live outside the borders of Croatia, most of them in Bosnia and Herzegovina. There has traditionally been an inclination for unification with Croatia among the Croats in Herzegovina (south-western Bosnia and Herzegovina), but it seems that it was not shared to the same degree by Croats within Croatia and those in the rest of Bosnia and Herzegovina. However Paraga considers that the “thousand-year Croatian state prerogative” is to unite Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina as they are “the same soil, the same blood, and the same nation”. The borders between Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina are seen by HPR as “a humiliating legacy of communist Yugoslavia”. In addition, to Milan Vukovic, vice-president of HPR, the shape of present-day Croatia’s territory makes it looking like a “banana republic”. The only point of difference between Tudjman and Paraga was not the configuration of a Greater Croatia. “The HSP carved out a political space to the right of the HDZ on many levels. For example, while the Tudjman regime has institutionalized a state that designates Croatians as the preeminent nation among many nationalities, Paraga takes this a step further and argues for an ethnically homogenous state.” According to Paraga’s rhetoric, “once all Croatian territories are unified, ‘only one people’ can live in Croatia; namely ‘Croats.’” It was concluded that “the
52 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia implication is that while Muslims (and Croatia’s many ‘regionals,’ i.e., Istrians, Dalmatians, etc.) can be redefined as Croatians, Serbs and Montenegrins would be future candidates for ethnic cleansing in a HSP-led Greater Croatia” (Hislope, 1997: 477). One could conclude that the historical memories and myths of Croats’ common ancestry, as one of the main elements of their national identity, are partly related to the history of the Croatian state. This is the case despite the fact that in some periods the history of Croatia’s statehood can be perceived and interpreted in different ways, at least to some degree. As far as the state status or existence is in question, various interpretations of historical events and/or changing of statuses (links, autonomy, dominance etc.) could be very important, but in the case of Croatia as well as of most of the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia, the principle could be applied that - particularly in conflicts and some other similar circumstances - it is not important what really happened, it is important what people(s) believe or consider to have happened. As Croatia and Slovenia share Adriatic Istria peninsula, the demands for an autonomous and eventually independent Istria could be equally threatening for the territorial integrity of both, and the demands of Italian nationalist political forces for Rijeka and Dalmatia are only threatening to Croatia. As the expectations of Croatia’s government that it will become an EC member soon after the secession were not realized, Croatia seems to be heavily dependent on the West not only because of its seeking to become a member of the EU and NATO, but also because of its obligations to receive escaped Serbs from Knin Krajina and to achieve reconciliation in its Eastern part (Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium). The Western part was controlled by the authorities of Croatia, and the Eastern part by the United Nation Transitional Administration (UNTAES).27 Since the beginning of the Croatian secession, the first great losers were Serbs from Croatia, who generally lost the chance to live in the same state with the mainstream Serbs in Serbia as well as with the rest of them in the Second Yugoslavia. Then Croats lost approximately one-third of Croatia’s territory in 1991, and in 1995 the Serbs from Knin Krajina became those who now have nothing left to lose, partly thanks to American training and intelligence assistance to Croatia’s army. The case of Serbs who escaped or were expelled from Croatia was discussed at numerous round tables, conferences, meetings, fora, etc. in Croatia and abroad. It was often considered that the return of refugee Serbs to Croatia must be ensured; it is not just their natural right, but the right deriving from the Croatian
Croatia 53 Constitution and numerous international conventions and acts as well as the obligation taken on by Croatia after it was indicated that it could be admitted into the Council of Europe. One could conclude that in August 1995 Knin Krajina Serbs did what they promised to do: faced with the Croatian army attack logistically supported by NATO forces and lack of support from the Third Yugoslavia, they left the independent Croatia. First they escaped mostly to the Yugoslavia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and later an unknown number of them joined the river of refugees which has been flowing into the world since war in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina started. Many of the urban Serbs stayed in Croatia as well as those from the Eastern Krajina. Many Croatian eyes see the escaped Krajina Serbs as people who made many Croats escape from their homes and land and tried to grab the part of the Croatian state territory from 1991 to 1995. Many Serbians see Croats as people who at least tried to “kill one third, convert one third, expel one third” of the Serbs in Croatia. A few Croats as well as Serbs are capable and ready to present reasons and motives for Croatian secessionism from Yugoslavia as well as Serbian reasons and motives for secessionism from Croatia. According to a US State Department’s annual report covering human rights practices around the world, in 1996 Croatia’s media were constrained, and human rights record remained poor, with the worst abuses occurring in the government’s treatment of ethnic Serbs from reclaimed areas. The report said that the Croatian government performed or tolerated the army and the police to repeated forced evictions of ethnic Serbs in the area, and even allowed Croatian refugees to expel Serbs. In addition, the right of ethnic Serbs to return to their homes was largely denied, and the government was slow in re-establishing civil authority in the reclaimed areas. The Croatia’s government and police were not protecting ethnic Serbs against murder, harassment, looting and intimidation, and did not make “sufficient effort” to investigate and charge responsible criminals. Although there was serious discrimination against all minorities in the region, key provisions on the Law on National Minorities were suspended during the year. At the end of 1997, the identity and other threats also seemed to exist within the Eastern part of the Krajina region, which was overcrowded by a poulation of some 80,000 local Serbs as well as by the Serb refugees from other parts of Croatia, mostly from those that used to belong to the former Serb Krajina as well as from Bosnia and Herzegovina (especially from
54 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia those parts controlled by the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina authorities). Some of them, who became refugees during the 1991 part of the war in Croatia, did not have citizenship for six years. On the other hand, in the rest of Croatia and abroad there were numerous groups of mostly Croat refugees waiting to return to their homes in Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium or to get a home anywhere. According to the Croatian government’s idea, displaced Croats were supposed to return to the various areas of the region, while displaced Serbs would simultaneously move back to their place of origin in Croatia or leave for permanent residence elsewhere. Those who were inside the region feared that they, their families and property could become in some way victims of those who were outside and vice versa. The key questions seemed to be: Who were both of them going to meet in and out of the region after the reintegration? How would those they were to meet react? What were their wars and other previous experiences? And what were their intentions related to the opposite side as well as to themselves? During the war and the following years of often-poor refugee life, close friends, neighbours, and even relatives could become enemies. Even those who had not previously been chauvinists could become just that and even criminals, and those who did not have identity fears could begin to fear that kind of danger. “Both the Constitution and the Electoral Law allowed the Croats in the Diaspora to vote in the election although they neither had Croatian citizenship nor had lived in Croatia for the past ten years.” As one had not completed the procedures needed for acquiring the right to citizenship, “many of those who belonged to the minority groups were disenfranchised in the 1992 election. The fact that, immediately prior to the 1992 election the President of the Republic issued an official statement clearly implying that the citizenship did not implement automatically the franchise in that election, further indicates that the gap between the normative and the factual is enormous.” In that time, “the ethnic eligibility ... was a tacit criterion of the Governing Party as well as of the Opposition for nominating candidates.” In 1992 only a Serb woman was put up as one of the candidates on the list of the CrDP. “Immediately after the list was made public this candidate was remanded in custody for an interrogation and was then told that her nomination was not convenient because of her son who studied in Belgrade. It was especially difficult for those citizens of Croatia who declared themselves as members of ethnic minorities to implement their right to vote.28” Citizens’ right to vote was restricted strictly to making a choice between candidates on the list of candidates from their ethnic
Croatia 55 community. “The feeling of being a second-rate citizen is also spread among other minorities in Croatia. The members of Italian minority in Rijeka and Pula point out that despite its constitutional obligation, Croatia does not give any financial support to the minorities or encourage their development.” A further example was the difficult position of the Italian minority, whose three grammar schools have been closed down. In that way the Convention on the Protection of the Italian Minority signed by Croatia, Slovenia and Italy has been violated. This issue was explained by Croatian authors as being due to the reality of the recent war, weaknesses of democratization, protection of human rights and decentralization, the ghosts of the loathsome communist past etc. “This is in a way an understandable attitude, partly justifiable by the feeling of animosity towards the fellow countrymen on the enemy side in the state of war. Yet, the issue of the position of the ethnic minorities comes exclusively within the competence of the state unless the human rights of the ethnic minorities are violated, and the legitimacy of the state authorities depends, among other issues, on how they have regulated the issue of the ethnic minorities.” Basic concluded that “burdened by their past and dimmed by an indiscernible future, the Croatian authorities have given this issue a marginal and declarative importance. The result of such a national policy may be an ethnically homogeneous Croatia, but it will certainly be recorded that this unfulfilled and counter-civilisational goal of The Independent State of Croatia has been achieved by the sovereign democratic Republic of Croatia” (1996: 63-5). After the UNTAES mission was finished, many displaced Serbs, refugees as well as ethnic Serbs from Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium fled to Serbia, Republika Srpska and various other countries. One of the most generous countries seems to be Norway, a country whose population was supporting Yugoslav prisoners in Nazi concentration camps during the Second World War. In that time, the prisoners were mostly constructing roads, and now Norway needs workers for its oil production. Maybe their life can be a topic for an another study within the societal security field. On 15 October 1998 the UN mandate over Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium was replaced by the OSCE observing mission.
56 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia 3.3 Religious affiliation Differences in religious affiliation is one of the most important distinguishing characteristics for ethnic identification among the Slavs in Croatia. The differences occurred after the Avars were defeated by the Croats, and the Pope Agaton (678-81) sent priests to baptise them. As most of the Croats have belonged to the Catholic religion (see Friedman, 1996: 9), while most of the Serbs adopted another, eastern version of Christianity - Orthodoxy - the division within Christianity came to have an important role in later conflicts and mutual identity threats between the Serbs and Croats. The social situation thus created was mentioned by Max Weber to prove how a population of identical ethnic origin can become two nations simply because they adopted different religions (Weber, 1976: 334). Some authors who usually consider religion as a very important phenomenon in social life could conclude that in Croatia “the West fights with the East for predominance”, while other authors who do not consider religion as an important social phenomenon usually qualify this kind of situation as a “damnation of small differences”. It is noteworthy that an analogous process has not happened among other peoples in the Balkans who adopted two or more different religions (for example, Romanians are mostly Christian Orthodox, but there are also Roman Catholic Romanians as well as those who belong to other religions; Hungarians in Vojvodina are Roman Catholics and Calvinist Protestants etc.) (for more details see Isakovic, 1996a). In the sixteenth century the religious excitement in Europe also affected Croatia. Many Croatian and Dalmatian nobles accepted the Protestant Reformation and the Counter Reformation began in Croatia in the early seventeenth century. In 1609 only the Catholic faith was allowed in Croatia, and Franciscans, members of a Christian religious order, established some four centuries before by St Francis of Assisi, preached the Counter Reformation in Ottoman regions. One of the Croats’ reasons to feel betrayed after the unification in 1918 was the fact that Orthodoxy used to be the most influential religion within the First Yugoslavia. In the Second Yugoslavia and in many other communist states, however, no religion was influential; it seems that Tito more or less equally (mis)treated all religions and churches within the country. As it was noticed, in his time just the layout of churches (long-nave Catholic and equal-arms Orthodox) in the landscape manifested the line between predominantly Catholic and Orthodox areas, becoming one of the most important and visible everyday signs of the divisions in the Balkans.
Croatia 57 Authors who write on Yugoslavia do not agree as to the role of religious differences in past and potential conflicts. As national cleavages in Yugoslavia were deepened between 1918 and 1941, tensions between the churches clearly also increased. The conflict was intensified during the Second World War, in large part because of the support of some Catholic clergy for the forceful conversion of the Orthodox population to Catholicism under the protection of the fascist regime. Moreover, Catholic monks and priests were alleged to have taken an active part in this struggle for the ‘purity’ of the Croatian land and faith. After the Second World War Zagreb archbishop Alojzije Stepinac, who voluntarily joined the Serbian army during the final campaign of the First World War, was sentenced as a quisling, and in October 1998 he was beatified by the Pope during his visit to Croatia. In the late 1960s and early 1970s, a revival of religious activities coincided with the beginning of nationalist xenophobia or euphoria (in that time Franjo Tudjman was jailed during the suppression of the Croatian Spring). Stanovcic concluded that these developments refute the assumption that modem religious movements do not have any real significance for the social system any more (1989: 390-1). Although, generally speaking, “religious identity is not fully focused in the everyday world, and its spiritual elements can easily contradict, or not support, the political necessities of temporal existence” (Waever, 1993: 22), since 1990 catholicizing Croatia has again become an important means of national homogenization and the goal of the separatist movement. Thus an identity threat was created for the non-Catholic population - and in the first place for Serbs. One could conclude that as much as Serbian Orthodoxy used to be an identity threat for Croats within the Yugoslavia (especially the First Yugoslavia), Croatian Catholicism became the same kind of threat for Croatia’s non-Catholics as soon as Croatia got its independence and even before. In both cases, the problem is that there is a lack of tolerance and protection for some religious minority rights: those who are in a dominant or ruling position do not care about the religious affiliations of those who do not support and follow them, even in cases where it is a matter of family traditions, national identification, beliefs etc. The First and Second Yugoslavia needed to learn important lessons of democracy, and for Croatia (as well as for most of the other Yugoslav successor states) it will still take time before it can truly become what it is tending towards: part of civilized Europe, and particularly of the European Union. It seems that the importance of religious affiliation was increased in observed areas since the beginning of the wars on the territory of the
58 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Second Yugoslavia. In a well-known study by Samuel P. Huntington, addressing the idea that cultural differences will be the basic source of conflict outbreaks in the next century along the cultural fault-lines of the eight main civilizations of the modem world, he considers these differences to be more enduring than economic or political ones. He thinks the identity of civilizations will not be subject to negotiation, and his idea can help explain in part at least some on-going conflicts, considering that, for instance, the “civilizational” explanation for the systematic pro-Croatian attitude of Western powers during the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia (1993: 37) had some support in recent analyses of the main motives for German policy. Hans Maull commented that the Catholic Church obtained strong support for Croatia and Slovenia from the outset of the conflict, having some weight in the CDU, but especially the CSU (1995-6: 122-3). Franc Perko, Catholic Archbishop of Belgrade, in an interview to Ljubljana weekly Panorama, thought it was the YPA’s duty to defend the state and system but that it “went too far with brutality”. This was the main reason why the Vatican was among the first to recognize Slovenia and Croatia (Jaksic, 1996: 7). 3.4 Language and culture The major difference between the language(s) spoken by present-days Croats and Serbs is the script: while Croatian is written in the Latin alphabet, a specific version of the Cyrillic alphabet is used for writing in Serbian. Technically, both languages can be written in both alphabets. One can also notice differences in grammar, pronunciation and vocabulary. In the Croatian language in various regions and dialects there is evidence of more or less intensive use of German, Italian and Hungarian vocabulary, while Serbian is under Turkish and Russian influence. Some linguists consider both Serbian and Croatian language as a single South Slavic language - Serbo-Croatian, a member of the Indo-European group of languages assuming that Croats refer to their speech as a distinct language mostly for political reasons, i.e. in order to distinguish it from the speech of the Serbs. Other linguists consider that they are two distinct languages. Among the oldest and most important monuments of Croatian literature and literacy is Bascanska Ploca (Baska Inscription), discovered on the north Adriatic island Krk (Italian name Veglia, and Latin Curicum; it has been inhabited since the Neolithic) from about 1100. A document contained in
Croatia 59 the Inscription was written in one of the old Slav alphabets - Glagolitic alphabet, which was used along Croatian coast. Up until the nineteenth century on the island a Greco-Roman dialect was utilized as well as an archaic Romance Dalmatian language, which used to be spoken on the Dalmatian coast from Krk to Dubrovnik. In the city of Dubrovnik Ragusan Dalmatian used to be spoken, which disappeared in the seventeenth century (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In the ninth century Cyril and Methodius, scholars, theologians, and linguists, whose main task was christianizing the Danubian Slavs and influencing the religious and cultural development of all Slavic peoples, were permitted by Pope John VIII to conduct mass in the Slavonic tongue. From the eleventh century to the second half of the fifteenth century a literature was developed in Croatia which included folklore, legends, biblical and popular stories. In 1501 “the father of Croatian literature” Marko Marulic (1450-1524), who wrote in Croatian and Latin, created the epic plea for the struggle of Croats against the Turks Judita and Hanibal Lucic (around 1485-1533) wrote the first South Slav secular play Robinja {The Slave Girl). In 1551 Marin Drzic (15087-67) created the well-known comedy Dundo Maroje which has been performed continually since that time. The first Croatian Bible was not published until 1562 by Stipan Konzul and Anton Dalmatin during the period of Reformation. The Polish victory over the Turks was described by Dubrovnik Counter Reformation poet, politician and judge Ivan (Djivo) Gundulic (15897-1638) in his epic poem Osman (see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). After the Carlowitz Treaty in 1669, Hungarians made an effort to impose Hungarian language and culture, and from 1780 to 1790 the Austrian Emperor Joseph II introduced reforms ordering that German should replace Latin as the official language of the empire. At the same time, Hungarians were attempting to make their Magyar language the official language of Hungary. Croats, who feared both Germanization and Magyarization, supported the Latin language. The Austrian emperor Leopold II abandoned Germanization, and Francis I suppressed Hungarian demands for almost four decades. The Croatian-Hungarian language dispute appeared again in the 1830s, when Croatian leaders and the Illyrian movement (1835-48) started promoting the Croatian language and establishing a Slavic kingdom within the Empire. It was noticed that in 1832, for the first time in centuries, a Croatian noble addressed the Sabor in Croatian. Ljudevit Gaj, a journalist
60 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia and linguist, promoted a South Slavic literary language (the stokavski dialect and ije-kavski speech), devised a unified Latin-based script, and in 1836 established the Illyrian National Gazette, an anti-Hungarian journal, calling for Illyrian cultural and political unity as the Gaj’s campaign was based on a presumption that Croats and other South Slav peoples were the descendants of the ancient Illyrians. Another distinguished members of the movement were poet Stanko Vraz (1810-51), poet and politician Ivan Mazuranic (1814—90), whose best-known work was heroic poem Smrt Smail Age Cengica (Smail Aga Cengic’s Death), Petar Preradovic (181872), who wrote poetic dramas and patriotic songs, and poet, dramatist and interpreter Dimitrije Demeter (1817-72). Dramatist, poet, journalist, critic and creator of the Croat historical realist novel August Senoa (1838-81) was another major figure of Croatian literature in the late nineteenth century (see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). It was concluded that “Illyrianists expected a Croatian cultural reawakening to become the impetus for eventual South Slav union. Influential Serb intellectuals, however, considered Croats to be Serbs according to linguistic criteria, thus foreshadowing the Serb-Croat distinctions in self-identification that would become a major problem in twentieth-century Yugoslavia” (Friedman, 1996: 52, f. 48). Responding to the rise of the Illyrian movement, Hungarian authorities forbade even public use of the word “Illyria”. In 1843 Magyar language was ordered by the Hungarian assembly to become the official language in Hungary and Slavonia, and eventually to be used in Hungarian-Croatian relations. In return, Croats sent petitions to Vienna asking for separation of Hungary and complaining that the law violated their autonomy. In 1844, on the interference of the Austrian government, the Illyrian movement was exchanged for a renewal of the Triune Kingdom (Croatia, Slavonia and Dalmatia) independent of the Hungarian crown. Josip Juraj Strossmayer founded the South Slav Academy of Arts and Sciences in Zagreb and helped reorganize the educational system of Croatia. Finally, the Croatian language was recognized in the 1868 Hungarian-Croatian Compromise. It could be assumed that the standard Croatian literary language (emerging during the second half of the nineteenth century) was the result of two kind of efforts: first, to resist both the attempts of both Germanization and Hungarization, and, secondly, to unite South Slav peoples. Writers Evgenij Kumicic (1850-1904), Ksaver Sandor Gjalski (1854— 1935), and Silvije Strahimir Kranjcevic (1865-1908) were dealing with
Croatia 61 social topics (for more details see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). At the beginning of the twentieth century, Croatian poetry, which was the dominant class of artistic creativity, was predominantly influenced by the Aestheticism movement, whose most prominent members were Vladimir Nazor (1876-1949) and Vladimir Vidric (1875-1909). Before the First World War, in the early modernist period, the leading role was taken by Antun Gustav Matos (1873-1914). According to both of the First Yugoslavia’s constitutions (1921 and 1931), its official language was “Serbo-Croatian-Slovenian”. Among the most popular Croatian writers was avant-garde poet Augustin Tin Ujevic (1891-1955) and short-story writer Slavko Kolar (1891-1963). August Cesarec (1893-1941) and critic, dramatist and polemicist Miroslav Krleza (1893-1981) whose work has been translated worldwide were the dominant prose writers. Krleza’s work Povratak Filipa Latinovicza (The Return o f Philip Latinovicz), which is considered his best one, was published in 1932. They “both presented contemporary social problems as the result of class exploitation and deeply explored the psychology of their characters. Krleza is known not only for his imaginative writing, which spanned the century to his death in 1981, but also as an editor of literary periodicals, as an essayist, and as a critic who dominated Croatian cultural life for much of the century” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). During the Second World War, Ivan Goran Kovacic (1913-1943) created his famous poem Jama (The Pit) describing and condemning Ustasha’s atrocities, and was killed by Chetniks (for more details see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1962; Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). From the beginning of the Second Yugoslavia the official languages were Slovenian, Macedonian, and Serbo-Croat or Croatian-Serbian (after 1953). Minority languages (Hungarian and Albanian) were official languages in parts of Serbia, and Italian, Romanian, Rusinian, Romani, Bulgarian and Turkish were also used in schools (see Wiberg, 1995b: 95). When the First Yugoslavia was established in the above-mentioned circumstances, political and otherwise, for many Croats it signified “submission to an inferior, Oriental culture” (see Doder, 1993: 10). Wiberg noticed that a long-lasting problem in relation to Croatian national identity was the fact that the “Eastern” version (e-kavski stokavski) was the dialect group spoken by Serbs in Serbia, and the “Western” version (ije-kavski stokavski), spoken by most people in Croatia, was shared with
62 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Montenegrins, Serbs and Muslims or Bosniacs in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The area around the capital of Croatia, however, spoke another dialect group called kaj-kavski (1995a: 93). As the fact that, according to the constitution, Croats shared the same language with the Serbs used to be another source of great Croat frustration, in 1967 a group of leading Croat intellectuals made their “Declaration on Language”, demanding constitutional recognition for four Yugoslav languages: Croatian was supposed to join Serbian, Slovene, and Macedonian language. The Declaration induced the “Mass Movement” or “Croatian Spring” in 197071, which became a political revolt led by communist-nationalist leaders combining democratic, chauvinist, and separatist strands and orientations. The Movement frightened the Serbs because of the appearance of symbols which revived Serbian memories of the years during the Second World War. In 1972, when the Serbs in Croatia began arming themselves, Tito suppressed the Movement. The Croatian language later became one of the official languages of the Second Yugoslavia, but the venomous shrillness of both sides was hardened. Krleza signed the “Declaration on Language” and said that if Croatia separated, it would become like a Balkan saloon bar in which the light had been switched off and also claimed that the Serbian and Croatian language were one language, which Serbs called the Serbian and Croats called the Croatian language. The essayist, poet, and translator Augustin Tin Ujevic is another noteworthy and gigantic figure in Croatian literature. Vjekoslav Kaleb (1905- ), who wrote the novel Divota prasine (Glorious Dust) and Ranko Marinkovic (1913- ) were members of a new generation of Croatian literature. The next generation included prose writer Antun Soljan (1932- ) and poet Ivan Slamnig (1939- ), who both took more cosmopolitan themes for their works. Feminist writer Dubravka Ugresic and some others became even more Western and cosmopolitan oriented in their choice of themes (for more details see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Nobel prize-winner Nikola Tesla (1856-1943), inventor and researcher mostly working in the USA, discovered the rotating magnetic field, teleautomatic boat with remote control, terrestrial stationary waves, Tesla induction coil, induction motor, etc. His father was a Serbian Orthodox priest from the Knin Krajina, and he said once that he was proud of his Croatian homeland and Serbian origin. Another noteworthy figure in Croatian culture is sculptor Ivan Mestrovic (1883-1962). Croatian school of native painting gave to the world art painters Ivan Generalic (1914-92), Ivan Rabuzin (1919- ) and
Croatia 63 Ivan Lackovic-Croata (1932- ). Finally, the Second Yugoslavia became world well-known thanks to the Zagreb School of animation established by Vatroslav Mimica and Dusan Vukotic, whose animated film Surogat (The Substitute) was awarded several distinguished prizes (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In 1990, ten years after Tito’s death, the newly elected Croatian parliament introduced the normative Croatian version of Serbo-Croat with the Latin alphabet as the exclusive official language. This act, as well as various forms of discrimination against non-Croats, constituted identity threats to the Serbs (who mostly felt redefined from being a constituent nation in Yugoslavia to a minority in Croatia) and thereby contributed towards their becoming a security threat (Wiberg, 1993: 101). In that way the language(s) spoken by the two nations became both the means and victims of the political struggles. The Federal Republic of Germany after the Second World War became a haven for Croatian nationalists and right-wing emigrants, who interpreted events in Yugoslavia from 1945 strictly as the results of “Serbian communist domination”. In time, some of them entered scholarly institutions, began to gain intellectual or professional legitimacy and increase their circle of acquaintances, sometimes with very influential politicians, media people etc. (Dimitrijevic, 1996: IX). Job noticed that in Croatia much was done “to perpetuate the myth of Croats as congenitally more just, civilized, cultured, and democratic than almost any other people, especially Serbs” (1993: 62-3) as well as the myth or stereotype of Croatia’s Serbs as the least educated and often betterarmed and more violence-prone residents of the region. At the same time, among Serbs in Croatia and elsewhere much was done to preserve the myth of Serbs as congenitally more heroic, brave and freedom-loving people than almost any other people, and especially Croats, who were cowards, poltroons etc. In that way, both sides created their own ‘arguments’ and ‘counter-arguments’ often used for purposes of political ethnomobilization. “All groups see themselves as historical victims of brutal oppression, even genocide. After 1945, these feelings were suppressed in the name of national reconciliation (Brotherhood and Unity); but did not disappear and were passed on, for example, by oral family traditions. What one group sees as a genuine historical grievance is often dismissed by others as mythical or monstrously exaggerated; this exacerbates the traumatic relations, adding the extra trauma of not being heard” (Wiberg, 1993: 96-9).
64 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia When the Yugoslav crisis broke out it was noticed that the Serbs were “profoundly convinced that they are more sinned against than sinning” (Doder, 1993: 15), and more or less the same situation could be found everywhere. All sides took the pose of victims rather than offenders proclaiming that the accusations against them were exaggerated and unjust. Some of these emotions seem to fit or are at least compatible with Fromm’s description of narcissism (assigned to a person who has “a double standard of perception”, and for a group he reserved the role of “transforming the fantasy in reality”). If somebody is unjustly accused (especially for such a crime as brutal oppression or genocide), it constitutes an appropriate reason for fright, and if one tries to examine the role of “inner environment” (Fromm’s term, distinguishing, for instance, inner fright from outer threats), there are few phenomena whose roles could be detected that seem to be very significant. Many Croat intellectuals refused to face up to the genocide committed by Pavelic’s Croatia. While Serbs were called in “scientific” published tracts “the world’s most ancient people”, who always fought only for freedom, in Croatia solemn dissertations were given serious consideration on the “nine-hundred years of Croatian parliamentary life.” As Fromm expressed it, in a conflict between groups that mutually challenge their collective narcissisms, “the narcissistic image of one group is raised to its highest point, while devaluation of the opposing group sinks to the lowest. One’s own group becomes a defender of human dignity, decency, morality, and right” and, as one author expressed - under the influence of hate speech - the ‘“brothers’ had to become ‘enemies’” (see Milinkovic, 1992: 275), who only have devilish qualities. Consequently, such “inhuman creatures” do not deserve any affection and should not be called by their proper names. Job has commented that: “to question any part of the Serbian nation’s history, admitting that its people ever committed less-than-sterling deeds, is considered unacceptable, even treasonous. Such an admission is said to jeopardize the nation’s standing versus others, erode its claims to greatness, and expose it to the ever-ready enemy’s exploitation.” Analogously Job says that “on the Croatian side, it is very difficult to find any true account of the terrible abuses that the Austro-Hungarian armies, with their Croatian and Bosnian units, perpetrated against Serb civilians during the First World War, nor are accounts available of the butchery that Croatian troops, under the uncritically revered Ban Jelacic, performed in putting down the Central European revolutions of 1848. But most conspicuous is the refusal of most Croat intellectuals to face up to the genocide committed by Pavelic’s
Croatia 65 ‘Independent State of Croatia’ against Serbs, Jews, and Gypsies during the Second World War.” Croatian Faustus, a noted Croatian play by Slobodan Snajder, which explores Croatia’s war history, never has been staged in Zagreb. “What we had here is a chauvinistic culture in which the dominant objective of scholarship, education, literature, and journalism is not truth but how best to support and advance nationalist myths. That culture cannot tolerate any admission that its own people, or any part of it, committed crimes.” Job concludes that “it is an ‘intellectual’ life where ethnic identity takes precedence over scholarly integrity”. On the other hand, Job says “that is not to say that exceptions to the rule never existed. ... In books and essays after the First World War, the noted Croatian writer Miroslav Krleza honestly described the sufferings caused by marauding Croatian soldiery, scathingly attacked the vainglory of Croatian nationalism, debunked the provincialism of much of Croatian literature, and lauded Srbia’s uprising against the Ottoman Turks as supremely heroic and inspiring acts.” In addition, between the two world wars, some Croatian Marxists wrote in a critical way on Ban Jelacic’s reactionary role, and several writers “honestly wrestled with the Ustashi crimes.” On the Serbian side, popular novelist, nationalist and former president of the Third Yugoslavia, Dobrica Cosic, “in his early work confronted the issue of murderous Serbian guerrillas, called Chetniks, and their cult of the slaughtering knife. But those largely solitary attitudes faded with the passage of time, often to be abandoned by the authors themselves, as in Cosic’s case.” Job considers that “all nations have their self-serving myths, which play havoc with historical truth. But the public life in many countries permits the challenge of these myths, though not always with impunity or effect.” Those cultures which are stabler and more tolerant “leave room for the puncturing of their own egos, but in Yugoslavia, the pervasive culture of ethnocentric myths unchallenged even by intellectuals weighs down the lives of the people”. He concludes: “Yugoslav peoples have indeed been betrayed by their intelligentsias” (1993: 63-65). If one compares that “chauvinistic culture” with historical traumas (defined by the historical memories of the nations that defined latent conflicts) analysed by Wiberg, it can be noticed that they go together like two sides of the same coin: scholarship, education, literature and journalism were supporting and advancing nationalist myths creating the foundations for traumas. Several simultaneous reasons were detected for this situation. First, the calamitous history of the Balkans which was constantly subjected
66 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia to violent disruption (without enough time for recovery to allow middle and professional classes to establish themselves), and “for educational institutions and intellectual life to acquire a pride in rational, objective inquiry. In the void, chauvinistic manipulation, nationalist chicanery, paranoid fears, and the demonization of others have prevailed.” Secondly, orally communicated vengeful myths (playing a role similar to the role of Russian “samizdat”) as well as fervent folk poetry (epic and romantic, native to Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, Bosnian Muslims, and others),29 folk ditties (sometimes in a form especially favoured by peasant, semi-urban, lumpen classes, particularly in times of high nationalist emotion, often stimulated by established poets or versifiers of a viciously nationalist bent). Thirdly, it was stressed that “the endurance of the nationalist myths cannot be adequately understood without recognising the baleful role regressive provincialism played in Yugoslavia.” Fourth, “the particular tragedy of the two periods of Yugoslav history - the monarchy ... and communism ... was that industrialization, modernization, and urbanization could not transcend the vindictive mores of the palanka”, i.e. small town. What happened was the opposite. “With the great migration from the countryside, life in the cities, including the capitals of the republics and the federation, became increasingly dominated by a palanka mentality. Instead of the provinces becoming citified, the cities became countrified, in effect turning into bigger palankas in their cultural and political life.” In that way, “the computer, satellite TV, CNN, and ever freer two-way traffic with the outside world were roundly defeated by Yugoslavia’s atavistic oral tradition and its lumpen-intelligentsia” (1993: 66-7). Job concluded that in the Second Yugoslavia as well as in present-day Croatia there has been “the tyranny of local cultural establishments, and the idolatry of the national self’ as well as the authoritarianism of small towns as fertile soil for bigotry (as Radomir Konstantinovic expressed it in his book The Philosophy o f a Provincial Town, published in 1969) (1993: 66). In addition, populations of provincial towns and villages in the Second Yugoslavia used to be much more patriarchal than residents of bigger cities. These problems seem to be wider, longer lasting and also deeper. The media in Croatia, Serbia and some other parts of the second Yugoslavia were becoming increasingly biased before the conflicts started to escalate. According to some interpretations in Croatia as well as abroad, during the 1991 war in Croatia, Tudjman was attempting to “play the victim” trying to provide international sympathy and recognition, and the other YPA forces of the Serbian side - applying “the land taking strategy”30 - made it
Croatia 67 possible for him to succeed. In accordance with such an assumption, Eastern Slavonia was sacrificed for the mentioned purposes (see Hislope, 1994: 479). This image-making effort was accomplished by engaging the American public relation agency Rudder Finn Global Public Affairs (Vasic, 1996). Dimitrijevic considers that the Serb side, however, did not lose the propaganda war because it did not fight in it at all (see 1976). In these ways, step by step, an impression of impossibility of living in the same state was created, and a great majority of population on all sides under pressure of the indoctrination - became ready to fight, support war or at least to justify its aims and operations. From the beginning of war the only federal TV channel (YUTEL) was disturbed and later forbidden in Belgrade and Zagreb; its existence was ended in Sarajevo after the beginning of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In that way, the media were used for the purposes of preparation and waging of war. Having in mind the given circumstances, Milinkovic concluded that Yugoslav public opinion was exposed to the misuse of freedom of expression called “hate speech” by the state-controlled media in Serbia and Croatia, and Galtung as well as a UN human rights expert suggested establishing a Yugoslav TV station under a foreign supervision (1992). The governments of Serbia and Croatia made their populations believe that they were seriously threatened in order to mobilize their support (defensive and destructive in the same time). As it is known, the predictions of threats were fulfilled, in the first place during war operations, but today one could hardly say to what degree they were self-fulfilling. “Different nationalisms spiraled each other, political leaders in several parts eager to use and manipulate the breeding ground that had been provided by the factors above, blaming it all on crooks on the other side; in particular, the propaganda barrage in 1990-1991 between Serbian and Croatian mass media contributed heavily to the actual explosion (Malesic, 1993 and Thompson, 1994).” Then the blame game quickly spread to the world around, which is related to religious boundaries, i.e. people’s perceptions of some particular individual or group as the main victims and crooks depend on whether they live in Islamic, Catholic or Orthodox country (see Brock, 1993-94; Melino, 1993). “From Christian or Islamic (but not, e.g., Buddhist) perspectives, it is also important to pinpoint guilt at individual or collective actors in order to pass moral or legal judgement. There is a plethora of conspiracy theories about various actors, and it is likely that some of them are true; but it will take many years’ patient work by historians to tell with some certainty which of them” (Wiberg, 1995b: 98).
68 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia All of them were at least partly based on human beings’ capacity for foresight and imagination and probably enhanced the frequencies of aggressive reactions (see Fromm, 1973: 185). But one - looking at everyday life - can conclude that those capacities are not perfect and unbounded; moreover relatively often they are manifested as more or less false, and this fact can provide a space for applying the security dilemma concept originating from traditional international security theory. Namely, if one side somehow failed to interpret the intentions of other(s) correctly (that is, one side has benign intent, but the other side sees it as malign intent), such a dilemma could be seen as a fundamental cause of conflicts. Buzan has argued: “To the extent that tensions over migration, identity and territory occur between societies, we might by analogy with international politics talk about a societal security dilemma. This would imply that societies can experience processes in which perceptions of ‘the others’ develop into mutually reinforcing ‘enemy pictures’ leading to the same kind of negative dialectics as with the security dilemma between states” (1993b: 46). Following this way of reasoning, Roe has constructed the concept of the societal security dilemma and operationalized it using the cases of SerboCroat conflict in Krajina, and Hungaro-Romanian relations in Transylvania (1997a). Many Croats began to talk about differences between the two groups, not only in religious terms, but also in terms of how the Croats were “civilized Europeans” while the Serbs were more “uncivilized, Balkan-types”. Roe considers that “Croatization” was essentially a programme of homogenization, and hence constituted a serious threat to the societal security of the Serbs in Krajina. Probably the main mistake of the EC and other external actors seems to be the fact that the recognition of Croatia was given before the minority rights of ethnic Serbs were assured. When the Krajina Serbs tried to defend their identity demanding just cultural autonomy in Croatia, “the more they demanded this, the more the Croats were determined to deny them. Thus, an action-reaction process began to take place” (1997a: 16), which finally made the situation escalate into the war. It seems that, at the same time, political resistance of the Serbs to accept the dismantling of Yugoslavia and thus agree to live divided in several states was not adequately articulated nor understood within the international community. It was considered that “memories of Serb massacres perpetrated by Croat fascists in 1941 were fuelled by venomous propaganda from Belgrade. Meanwhile, Tudjman, a former general in Tito’s army, refused to disown the fascist Croatia as a travesty and instead revived its symbols in a
Croatia 69 blaze of glory.” Tudjman - rather than reassuring Serb minority in Croatia - amended the constitution in order to deny Serbs any sort of political autonomy. Serbs were fired from the police, guns were retrieved from military arsenals in Krajina; signs with words written in Cyrillic alphabet were replaced with those written in the Latin alphabet. Doder concluded that “the outcome was terribly predictable. With radicalism begetting radicalism on both sides, the Krajina Serbs voted to proclaim autonomy, then put forward their maximalist demand: union with Serbia.” Brakes capable of halting the descent into war did not exist. “Both sides engaged in ‘ethnic cleansing’. Serbs were expelled from western Slavonia, Dalmatia, and other areas where the Croats enjoyed military superiority. The Croats were expelled from much of Krajina and eastern Slavonia, which was seized by the Serbs with the help of the Yugoslav army.” Although “both sides engaged in acts of cruelty against civilians; incomplete evidence suggests the Serbs excelled at brutality, especially in Krajina and eastern Slavonia. Imbued with their messianic spirit and selfrighteousness, the Serbs saw no need to present their case to world opinion” (1993: 18-19). According to Ignatieff, the relationship between Serbs and Croats appears to be similar to what Freud called “the narcissism of minor difference” (the less there is a real difference between two groups, the more any minor difference is bound to loom in their imaginations). In addition the author concluded, “its corollary must be that enemies need each other to remind themselves of who they really are. A Croat, thus, is someone who is not a Serb. A Serb is someone who is not a Croat. Without hatred of the other, there would be no clearly defined national self to worship and adore” (1993: 14). In the Second Yugoslavia and its successor states as well as in the rest of the world politicians and their associates are mostly those people whose preoccupations include making calculations about the nature and intensity of immediate and future threats. At the same time, they are the ones who are blamed for the persuasion and brainwashing31 of the population in order to ‘see’ (i.e. to believe) even in reality the non-existing (and self-fulfilling) dangers in international as well as in intra state conflicts. Fromm, who supported Freud’s psychoanalytical theory and later criticized it, considered that “the arousal of defensive aggression by means of brainwashing can occur only in humans. In order to persuade people that they are threatened, one needs, above all, the medium of language; without this, most suggestion would be impossible.” In addition, “a social structure that
70 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia provides a social basis for brainwashing” is required. Fromm concluded that “by and large the power of suggestion exercised by a ruling group is in proportion to the group’s power over the ruled and/or capacity of the rulers to use an elaborate ideological system to reduce the faculty of critical and independent thinking” (1973: 197). The societal security problems of Croatia seem to be more serious as much as the “Croatization” was followed by identification with the Nazilinked wartime fascist Ustashi regime. Namely, since Croatian leadership started to propose the transformation of Second Yugoslavia into a confederation, and it seems especially after it got its independence that there has been a continuous rehabilitation of the fascist regime and its leader Ante Pavelic whose posters were plastered on public places, and remains were proposed by President Franjo Tudjman to be brought from Spain for burial in Croatia. Ustashi veterans have higher pensions and status than Tito’s Partisan veterans (with whom Franjo Tudjman used to participate in the Second World War) who complain that today “those who should hold their heads in shame are national heroes” (for more details see Wiberg 1993: 101; Hedges, 1997; Rosenthal, 1997). Most of the Krajina and probably other Serbs from Croatia and elsewhere would agree with the quoted qualification. Some of them would do it for the same reasons as the Croatian Partisan veterans (as the Partisans used to be a multiethnic army), and to many Serbs the symbols and behavior that resembled that Croatia were equally deadly threats to their security and identity (Wiberg, 1993: 106). In the Second Yugoslavia Partisan veterans used to be privileged (and Ustashi and Chetnici were prosecuted), and now a reconciliation in Croatia can not be achieved by privileging the Ustashi. In 1993 Job concluded that “since the Second World War, several generations of Yugoslavs have agonized over the vexing question of why friends and neighbors kill each other. The record of Ustashi, Chetnik, and Muslim atrocities in the war years is replete with harrowing stories of ethnically or religiously diverse neighbors living in mixed communities for generations, lending each other money, sharing food, and serving as godparents to each other’s children, who then, in times of stress, murder each other.” After barely 50 years, the same violent story was unfolding (1993: 68). According to a US State Department’s annual report, in 1996 the freedom of the press was regularly violated by restraining or shutting down newspapers, radio stations and television programs that criticized the government of Croatia. The criminal code was amended, making it a crime to insult high officials. In order to control political processes, the Croatian
Croatia 71 government also applied manipulation of laws, intimidation, harassment, control of the media and economic pressure. The presidency has enormous constitutional powers, one political party has the overwhelming dominance, and there is the continuing concentration of power within the central government tending “to stifle the expression of diverse views” (Moffett, 1997). On 20 October 1997, United Nations Security Council also called Croatia’s government by a statement on Eastern Slavonia to curb media attacks on ethnic groups and to remove legal and administrative barriers, thus allowing the accelerated voluntary two-way return of refugees. According to the information of a TFF32 team, problems in the region of Eastern Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium also included problems with the media. Namely, there was a strongly felt anger about the very hostile anti-Serb stories and rhetoric in broadcasts by the biased media; among the Serbs there was also a strong anger about the hostile anti-Serb stories in school textbooks. It was concluded that “such hostile stereotyping and extremely biased versions of the civil war may fuel further violence and are entirely contrary to the agreement signed by the Croatian government imposing a moratorium on teaching about the war period”. As Serb students and teachers who were Croatian citizens felt that “their identity as Serbs is not being adequately recognised and affirmed”, it was not clear how pupils and students of all the nations in Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium will not only leam lectures on war history, but also literature, geography, political and some related sciences. As a winner mentality is incompatible with reconciliation, it was required that “more Croat students all over Croatia [be] given an opportunity to experience what is conflict, what reconciliation means and how to achieve it” (“Conflicts and Reconciliation in the Schools...,” 1997). These questions seem to be, at least to some extent, related to the above-mentioned key questions within the field of societal security. The new national policy (including redefining the minority right to use their own language in administration or education) could result in threatening the identity of large parts of the population. Within the cultural and political conditions in Croatia which have been briefly presented in the preceding text, the tendency to see Serbo-Croatian or Croatian-Serbian as two increasingly different languages in the UNTAES region caused a confusion in the schools created by leading authorities on both sides (see “Conflicts and Reconciliation in the Schools...”, 1997). This seems to be
72 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia more a proof for the thesis that national identity is easily and directly related to the process of government (Wasver, 1993: 22). As far as language is one of the main objects to which people make reference when they argue who ‘we’ are: why ‘we’ belong together (Waever, 1993: 40), the refugees are often a population that thirsts for their own script, language or at least (sub-)dialect. In addition, in a similar way they are thirsting for their own landscape (and environment in general), culture, myths, customs, state and various other elements of identity. Croatia’s refugees wherever they are do not represent an exception to that rule. Local Serb leaders, who have shown little vigour or initiative in encouraging the population to take advantage of Croatian programs, have shown progress giving their approval for Serb school textbooks to be printed (see Annan, 1997). The TFF team stressed the need for the textbooks (including those in the Serb language and Cyrillic script) to be issued urgently, especially to final-year students, and for an agreement settled with Serb teachers and students about the proportions of the school curriculum devoted to Serb history, literature and language. Within the conflict circumstances that what is often seen by one side as “good” and by the opposite side as “evil”, it is in this way that white can become black etc. It is this kind of difference that could form the basis for a lot of methodological and analytical problems for the textbooks and curriculum makers who are supposed to compose and present one perception and view that consists of two often opposite perceptions and versions based on a unique, single reality. As this problem is not a new one within the general framework of political and social sciences (and especially those dealing with conflicts), the textbooks and curriculum could be a good test for their authors’ capabilities. Perhaps the authors could find some samples or at least inspirations in those textbooks and curricula dealing with the civil wars in USA, Spain, Switzerland, Greece, Great Britain and/or other countries that had or have an experience originating from ethnic and/or other conflicts. * * *
In the case of Croatia one can detect differences in the national identities as well as identity threats between the involved parties. The differences are related to myths and shared memories of Croats and Serbs about their own common origins and ancestries, although - according to an opinion which seems to be prevailing - both nations belong to the Slav group of nations. Secondly, there are also the religious differences, although both belong to
Croatia 73 the Christian religion, some linguistic and cultural differences can also be detected. The different state traditions are obvious, and have one common characteristic: the two nations have a long-standing history of resistance to foreign dominators as well as of the efforts to establish their own independent states. Even before these efforts succeeded with the establishment of the First Yugoslavia, the emerging disputes started to develop in conflicting directions. If one had to point a finger at the main culprit, then it would have to be the nationalist oriented politics and politicians who have been unable to find a solution and common language with each other. The identities are to some degree different, but in this case they did not seem to represent mutual threats as such, as long as domestic and foreign politics and politicians were not involved. They did the opposite of what they were supposed to do - instead of protecting, or at least avoiding threatening, the identities and other valuable and precious characteristics of these nations, they exposed them to the fear and catastrophe of war and turned large numbers of their inhabitants into refugees. The relative emphasis regarding the components of Croatian national identity seems to have shifted with changes in the historical situation. In the early nineteenth century, state traditions and the rights connected to them were particularly emphasized. Later, resistance to germanization and magyarization gave greater stress to language (whereas religion was shared with these groups). Religion had a more important role when the Croats shared a state with the Serbs, who had largely similar or the same language but a different religion; when religion was politically neutered after the Second World War, language gained in emphasis, until all components achieved increasing emphasis from the 1980s. In Croatian perceptions, the crucial components were primarily threatened by the rural Serbs, but also by Muslims or Bosniacs from Bosnia and Herzegovina. Serbs in Croatia and elsewhere have seen the most general essential elements of their identity in their Orthodox religion, with additional roles given to state traditions and language; Croats have been seen as constituting the most intensive societal security threats. The reconciliation in Slavonia, Baranja and Western Sirmium and the return of the Serbs to Knin Krajina and their reconciliation with their Croat and other neighbours seem to be heavily dependent on the politicians and their wills and (incapabilities to utilize as a tool in the power struggle not the existing differences of their nations’ identities but their similarities.
74 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Conflict has an important role in defining identity - the smaller differences are the more important and they are stressed.
4
Bosnia and Herzegovina
Before the 1992-95 war, Serbs, Croats and Muslims33 were mainly populated in certain specific regions, while in other regions there was no such ethnic concentration. As a rule, cities and some villages also used to contain mixed populations. The violence during the war, which started when the country obtained its independence, was mostly aimed at homogenizing the population in certain regions. Before the war, Muslims had constituted little more than two-fifths of the population, but for Serbs and Croats it was predictable that Muslims - thanks to existing demographic trends - would shortly become a majority in Bosnia and Herzegovina (see Wiberg, 1993: 104). During the 1992-95 war, around one-third of the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina - it seems particularly Muslims or Bosniacs - migrated abroad as well as to other parts of the country. Table 4.1
Ethnic composition of Bosnia and Herzegovina
Population Nation Muslims 1.906.000 Serbs 1.369.000 Croats 756.000 Yugoslavs 240.000 Montenegrins 14.000 12.000 Others 4.367.000 Total Source: 1991 census.
The territory of the present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina was traditionally divided into two portions: Bosnia covers its northern and central parts and Herzegovina the southern parts. Since the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords (November-December, 1995), both these parts have been divided between the Entities of Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Republika Srpska could be geographically divided into its eastern part (consisting of the eastern part of Herzegovina and Central and northern parts of Bosnia) and western part (parts of 75
76 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia northern and western Bosnia). The Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina is divided into eight cantons covering the western part of Herzegovina, most parts of central Bosnia and southern parts of western Bosnia. Major nations are Bosniacs, living mainly, as the Croats do, in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina; and Serbs, living mainly in Republika Srpska. 4.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry In ancient times (possible from 1800 BC) the territory of present-day Bosnia and Herzegovina was inhabited by the Illyrians, who were conquered by Rome, and their land was included in provinces of Illyricum and Pannonia. In the seventh century, after the Slavs came to the area of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Frankish King Charlemagne defeated Avars, who used to be an ally of the Slavs. The Slavic clans were organized in small autonomous or even independent districts (zupa meaning “bond” or “confederation”) each led by a zupan (the chief of the zupa), and different areas from time to time recognized the supreme power of Byzantine, Hungarian, Croat, Serbian, and Venetian rulers. 4.2 State traditions During the early Middle Ages, Bosnia and Herzegovina did not have a similar sense of internal political cohesion as other regions in the Balkans for a few principal reasons. The first reason lies in the physiognomy of its difficult terrain and hilly landscape, which mutually isolated the zupe;34 the second reason was the insecurity of the roads; and thirdly, the tribe-centred organization of the zupa. We do know that many peoples - including the Serbs, Croats, Hungarians, and Byzantines - controlled parts of the region at various times from the tenth to the twelfth century. In fact, lacking historical sources to the contrary, some Croats claimed absolute suzerainty over Bosnia and Herzegovina based on certain periods of domination,35 just as the Serbs put forward their claim based on possession of Bosnian lands during Caslav’s reign in the middle of the tenth century and control of Hum (modem Herzegovina) from the mid-twelfth century to the early fourteenth century.
It is considered that “the political fray was joined, however, by Bosnian Muslim historians who sought to demonstrate the validity of [the] contemporary Bosnian Muslim nation as the legitimate successor of an
Bosnia and Herzegovina 77 independent medieval Bosnian state”. The historians “complained that some Serbs and Croats cavalierly dismissed uniquely Bosnian manifestations of state authority as mere tribal unions” (see, for example, Klaic, 1989: 8). Secondly “they rejected Serb and Croat claims on Bosnia based on possession of the land during the Middle Ages, pointing out that sovereignty over Bosnia was passed around so frequently for a time that inhabitants felt no allegiance to any of their erstwhile suzerains”. Thirdly, “the fact that the inhabitants of the area all spoke a similar language merely obfuscated the fact that they formed a distinct national unit, albeit Slavic, like the Serbs and the Croats36” (see Friedman, 1996: 9-11). Although in some cases history - thanks to non-existent or unreliable records and proofs - can be interpreted in more or less different ways, it seems that the perception of Bosnia as “the original core of the Croat kingdom” went too far in enjoying that freedom. One could easily notice that nationalistic orientations, existing sometimes independently of political orientations in power struggles and related phenomena, often permeate scholarly discussions of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s medieval history, perhaps more than in the discussion of any other Yugoslav successor state’s history. Hungarians started to invade Bosnia and Herzegovina in the middle of the twelfth century. However, during the time of the despot Ban Kulin (1180-1204), who changed his religious affiliation from the Roman Catholic Church to the Bogomils sect, the country was becoming an important and increasingly independent actor. After his death, Hungary crusaded and crushed Bosnia and Herzegovina’s independence, which lasted from 1235 to 1241. Later, the rulers of Croatia, Hungary and Serbia frequently limited the power of the Bosnia and Herzegovina’s rulers. During the time of the King Tvrtko I, who crowned him as “king of Serbia, Bosnia, and Coastlands” in 1377, the country was considered as independent again. After his death, the kingdom disintegrated and was separated by local leaders who were patronized by the neighbouring states. From 1386 to 1463, the Ottoman Turks invaded Bosnia. They established partial or total suzerainty over the country and tried to eliminate the Bosnian dynasty. The Turkish invasion was also enabled by the fall of Constantinople, the defeat of the Serbian state as well as the defeat of the rebellion of Albanians led by Skanderbeg. During the Turkish rule the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina was partly Islamized, and some of the local non-Moslem leaders were incorporated in the political and economic system which had been imported by the Turks. The Turkish
78 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia separation from European civilization had profound effects on the development of the Balkan peoples during centuries of immensely significant development in the civilization of the remaining parts of Europe. In short, the Turkish conquest is considered as “leveling all the nationalities and preserving them all alike in a condition of torpor in a manner comparable to the action of a vast refrigerator” (Kennan, 1993: 6). It seems that at that time among the new members of Moslem community in Bosnia and Herzegovina an ambivalent national identity was established. First, there was a religiously based sense of unity with the rest of the Turks. Secondly, although the Muslims differed from Bosnian compatriots by faith, custom and lifestyle, they had a local or geographic patriotism which set them apart from the Turks, “possibly even categorizing them as an incipient - albeit not initially overt - segment of the rise of South Slav nationalism” (see Friedman, 1996: 42). It has been observed that the confusing welter of names for different persons in different situations further illustrates the complexity of the Muslim, as opposed to the Bosnian, identification of the Bosnian Muslims. The Serbo-Croatian-speaking Muslims of Bosnia called themselves B osnjaci (Bosnjaks) to emphasize their regional origins. Even the Turks in Istanbul called the Bosnian Muslims B osnjaci (Suceska, 1969: 52), although in Constantinople the word p o tu r appeared in certain documents to signify the Islamized Bosnian population, as oppose to those o f Turkish origins (Hadzijahic, 1990: 87).
The Serbo-Croatian-speaking Muslims were often called Turd by Christians and even by the Muslims themselves in order to distinguish them from Bosnian Christians (Friedman, 1996: 43). The synonymity between “Muslim” and “Turk” disappeared in Yugoslavia only in the 1950s, when they became terms for expressing national rather than religious affiliation (see Bartlett, 1980: 1). “Bosnian Muslims, however, often applied the pejorative term Turkus to Ottoman Turks to differentiate themselves from the Turks in the ethnic sense (Ceric, 1968: 120; Burg, 1983: 6)” (Friedman, 1996: 43). The fact that the Muslims and Christians in Bosnia and Herzegovina spoke the same language did not create any substantial identification between them as language was not yet used as an important criteria of group affiliation. It was concluded that “despite the fa c t... that the Bosnian Muslims seemed to have the potential for two mutually exclusive identities - Bosnjak and as part of the ruling Muslim elite - no evidence indicates that they exhibited any significant, recognized, and formal Bosnian Muslim
Bosnia and Herzegovina 79 ethnic identification during this period” (for more details see Friedman, 1996: 43). The weakening of Turkey was an additional factor that stimulated striving for the unification of South Slav peoples during the nineteenth century in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It was noted that Illyrism “even promoted tolerance of the domestic Muslims in the Ottoman Empire when Bosnia and Herzegovina was able to be liberated from Ottoman rule. Illyrians thus approached local Islamic leaders to neutralize domestic Muslim support for Ottoman rule in the Balkans” (Friedman, 1996: 40). Bosnia and Herzegovina’s liberation from Turkish rule was a long-drawnout process which developed step by step. After several wars, revolts, uprisings, rebellions, peace and armistices treaties made by local as well as by foreign actors and powers, in 1878 by the Treaty of San Stefano Bosnia and Herzegovina became autonomous. In the same year, the Congress of Berlin ceded occupation and administrative rights to Austria-Hungary, and Bosnia and Herzegovina remained under the nominal sovereignty of Turkey (for more details see Friedman, 1997: 58-9). Some three decades latter the Habsburgs annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina37 and their rule provoked a new cycle of unrest and violence culminating with the 1914 assassination in Sarajevo,38 after which Europe quickly entered the First World War. One could mention that in 1993 one author said that acute and intensified manifestations of crisis could probably trigger even international warfare between various small states. “In short, a new era of Balkan Wars may be at hand. At present, however, there appears to be little likelihood that major powers, let alone states possessed of nuclear weapons, would easily allow themselves to be drawn into such warfare, particularly on opposing sides. On the other hand, nobody actually foresaw that the First World War would result from a ‘terrorist’ throwing a bomb in the remote Balkan town of Sarajevo” (Carlton, 1993: 182). During the First World War, many Muslims supported the AustroHungarian monarchy because it was an ally of Turkey and due to beliefs that a victory of the Central Powers would bring Bosnia and Herzegovina back to the Ottoman Empire. For the same reasons Muslims perceived Serbs (and vice versa) as their enemies; many Croats also supported the same monarchy as part of that state was their mother land Croatia, and also perceived Serbs as their enemies. Numerous Muslims (and some Serbs) joined Croats in the militia established by Austrians in order to terrorize Serbs and their sympathizers, or counter-guerrilla units, which fought with irregulars from neighbouring Serbia. However, when the Austro-Hungarian
80 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia monarchy was defeated at its Balkan front, a national committee, which was established in Sarajevo (in a close relationship to the Yugoslav National Council in Zagreb), formally recognized union with the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes on 26 October 1918. A constituent assembly elected in November 1918 was composed mostly of parties with specifically ethnic constituencies. “The fundamental divergence of opinion between them concerned the choice between a unitary and a federal state. Serb experience had always revolved around the creation of a strong state, that of the Croats and Slovenes around the struggle to defend the nation against too strong a state.” The Croatian Peasant Party withdrew after the federal idea was defeated, and the Communist Party was declared illegal after a minister was assassinated by a communist in 1921. “This allowed an alliance of the principal Serb parties, together with the Muslims, to press through a highly centralized constitution, modeled on that of prewar Serbia. It was promulgated on Vidovdan, June 28, 1921” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). During the Second World War in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which was part of Croatia, Croatian Ustashi, allied with Muslims, killed many Serbs, and Serbian Chetnici, who were also operating there, killed Croats and Muslims. On 29 November 1943 the first constitution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was drafted by the provisional war parliament of the communist-led partisan movement, which was fighting against Germans, their allies and the above-mentioned nationalistic forces. This happened in Jajce, a small town in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which used to be the old capital of the Bosnian kings. After the end of the Second World War, Bosnia and Herzegovina became one of the six republics within the Yugoslav state which was developing from centralization to decentralization or even confederation. During the post-war period Bosnia and Herzegovina was receiving a good portion of economic aid from federal funds and some development programmes, but remained among the poorest republics. Originally, the Second Yugoslavia’s constitution categorized peoples into nations (peoples with primary existence in Yugoslavia: Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, Montenegrins, Macedonians), national minorities or nationalities with no right to have republics (as the people’s majority was in another state like Hungarians, Albanians, Turks, Italians, etc.) and ethnic groups (see Wiberg: 1993: 97). In the 1961 census in the Second Yugoslavia, its inhabitants were granted for the first time the right to declare themselves as members of the Moslem nation (Muslims), and not just of a religious group under the same
Bosnia and Herzegovina 81 name (censuses in the Second Yugoslavia did not take into account religious affiliation or identification at all). Furthermore, they got the constitutional confirmation of their identity by the 1974 constitution, which in that way opened up to them the prospects of an embryonic nation-state. It meant that the Bosnia and Herzegovina became a nation of its own like all the other Yugoslav republics. The largest obstacle to Tito’s plan lay between Serbia and Croatia, where a mixed population lived. That region, Bosnia, was the crucial problem of Yugoslavia, both literally and metaphorically. Conscious that both Croatia and Serbia laid historical claim to Bosnia, Tito declared even during the war that its future would be “neither Serbian nor Croatian nor Muslim but rather Serbian and Croatian and Muslim”. Bosnia was the most genuine portion of multinational socialist Yugoslavia. It was observed: The import o f those maneuvers passed virtually unnoticed at the time. Nationalism was relegated to history, according to the simplistic future envisaged by Tito’s totalitarian regime-maintained by raw power and propaganda. However, some in the artistic community objected to Tito’s rejection o f nationalist concerns. [However,] the 1974 constitution became the departure point for die Bosnian Muslim national assertiveness that in the postTito period provoked an adverse reaction among the Bosnian Serbs. Their loss of ethnic domination coupled with political liberalization marked a decline in the Serbs’ share of political and economic power in Bosnia-Herzegovina (Doder, 1973: 11-12, 13).
One author argued that the Muslims’ recognition as one of the Yugoslav nations “made them vulnerable to Serb and Croat pressures, because neither group would accept the Bosnian Muslims as anything more than a religious entity - certainly not as a national entity” (Friedman, 1996: 1). Another author concluded that “Tito’s intended safety valves themselves became foci of contention, and as such generators of social and political disintegration” (Job, 1993: 57). The Second Yugoslavia had almost two million interethnic marriages, and in Bosnia and Herzegovina their percentage was between 30 and 40 (Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 4); Muslims, Serbs and Croats and members of many other nations were living together normally and, seemingly, happily in Sarajevo and many other cities. Job put a logical question: “Did that not prove that Yugoslavs could work together, and even be cosmopolitan? However, after Tito’s death in 1980 and the beginning of economic crisis in
82 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia the Second Yugoslavia, the ‘bom again’ nationalists39 among the communist leaders (except Alija Izetbegovic) as well as in the academies, the universities, and the media in Croatia, Serbia and Slovenia declared that their people were threatened in societal, state and even biological regard.” The same author observed: until recently, whoever went to Bosnia and inquired about relations between Croats, Muslims and Serbs generally was told there were no real problems. It was acknowledged that occasional isolated incidents took place when some besotted fool or manic chauvinist got out of hand. But those exceptions, it was said, did not upset the relations among three ethnic communities.
Yet years ago, Job thought he sensed “something amiss in Bosnia” and considered that the visible evidence of undisturbed ethnically mixed life was real. [However,] something seemed to hide behind the facade, a kind of second reality. Undercurrents of intolerance could be spotted in unguarded, chance remarks of hateful envy: snide comments about “those” Croats, Muslims and Serbs “always sticking together”; occasional displays of rage over pork-barrel monies “always benefiting them”; and furtive glances at Muslims going to the mosque in a largely Christian village, or at Christians going to their churches in predominantly Muslim towns.
One was told in confidence of widespread mutual mistrust in certain areas and sometimes even in Sarajevo. However, no one foresaw deluge. It was assumed that, “with full immersion in the local cultures, and after earning the full confidence of the population, an observer might have perceived the undercurrents both in Bosnia and Croatia. Yes, could anyone have also resisted the disposition to dismiss them and wave away warnings of the mistrust?” Even more sobering was that “large segments of a population proved themselves willing and able to hide their true feelings over an extended period of time” (Job, 1993: 68-9). The peoples of Bosnia and Herzegovina have had two national traumas. The first trauma between Serbs and Croats is presented within the text devoted to Croatia. The second trauma has been between Serbs and Moslems in Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as in Sandzak Novi Pazar in Serbia. “Through many Serbian eyes, Moslems were willingly used against them by Turks, Austrians and Ustase. Moslem eyes see racist Serbian behavior, including expulsions to Turkey, culminating in genocide in Bosnia-Herzegovina by Cetnici” (Wiberg, 1993: 98).
Bosnia and Herzegovina 83 It seems that for many people in Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as in other Yugoslav republics, to become aggressive it was not enough to have experienced more or less passive feelings of trauma. In addition, they needed to perceive the group to which they belonged as being “the most wonderful”, “the most cultured”,’’the most powerful”, “the most peaceloving” etc. Both the trauma and narcissism40 coincidentally made them feel a major sense of bitterness and to react with rage and aggressiveness to any actual or future or even perceived danger, wound and injustice. They reacted along the lines of: “they” were doing such nasty things to “us”, who are so good, and now “they” are threatening “us” again. The resulting response was dry, sharp and clear: “Enough is enough!” When such a predisposition is once established, people(s) may become an “easy catch” for an environment that generates aggressiveness even with little outside stimulation. The presence of all three of the above-mentioned elements (the traumas, the narcissism and the stimulation) made the ethnonational mobilization “successful” in spite of its disastrous political, economic, cultural, societal and other partly mentioned results (for more details see Isakovic, 1997a: 47-8). In 1990 the first multiparty elections after the fall of East European regimes came at the worst moment for all the republics. Nationalist hardliners41 won everywhere, accelerating the conflicts and attacking the remaining Yugoslav institutions (LCY, YPA and federal government) thus making the Serbian fears grow as well as radicalizing actions inspired by the fears (see Wiberg, 1993: 100). Being aware that secession of Slovenia would eventually drive them into war with each other, initially the leaderships of the three main ethnic parties were trying to persuade Slovenia not to secede (Wiberg, 1994a: 244-5). Bosnia and Herzegovina succeeded in keeping relative peace during the wars in Slovenia and Croatia, but at the same time it was polarized on an ethnic basis. The Serbian and Croatian side established own paramilitary formations, requesting the territorial division of Bosnia and Herzegovina or at least its transformation on a confederal basis through the creation of ethnic cantons. This was opposed by Alija Izetbegovic’s Party, which tried to constitute Bosnia and Herzegovina as a Unitarian “civil republic”. In turn, suspicion was bom, particularly on the Serbian side, that the plan was in fact to establish an “Islamic fundamentalist republic” because of the predominance of the Moslem population. Within the EC the standpoint of Germany started to prevail - Germany supported the right of Yugoslav republics to self-determination - while
84 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia within the CSCE a similar position was advocated by Austria and some other Central European countries. According to one author, the German recognition of Croatia and Slovenia raised the possibility of the war spreading to Bosnia and Herzegovina by forcing the Croats and Muslims in Bosnia to apply for recognition too. The Serb leaders in Bosnia and Herzegovina immediately said that if the republic were recognized they would form their own state. The Muslims warned in return that such a step would lead to “tragedy” (Glenny, 1992: 34). Alija Izetbegovic also warned the EC that his republic would be the victim by giving in to pressure from Bonn for recognition of Croatia and Slovenia by the 15 January 1992 deadline, and called for UN assistance to prevent rising violence in response to the republic’s declaration of sovereignty and subsequent demand for constitutional independence by the Serbs’ parliament (see Andrejevich, 1992). Once the secession of Croatia and Slovenia was a fact, preferences started to differ strongly. “The Serbs wanted Bosnia-Herzegovina to remain in Yugoslavia (with Serb independence as fall-back position), the Croats wanted it confederated with Croatia (with Croat independence as fall-back position) and the Muslims wanted an independent and unitary state (with a Muslim state as fall-back position in absolutely worst case).” Discussions on a series of proposals on how to balance formulas for relations with Yugoslavia and for its internal constitution took several months. “The closer the relations to Yugoslavia, the less important would virtual independence inside Bosnia-Herzegovina be for the Serbs - and the more important it would be for the Croats. Both groups had conflicting perceptions of the Second World War as well as of who was doing what to whom in the ongoing war in the north” (Wiberg, 1994a: 245). Recognition of Bosnia and Herzegovina by the EC and the US probably followed prior experience, since recognition of Croatia had contributed to a quick ending of conflicts. However, the Muslims were no longer willing to negotiate, while the Serbs, faced with the fact that the West has no understanding for their demands, concluded that the only way they could achieve them was by force. Invited by the EC, Bosnia and Herzegovina (and Macedonia) applied for recognition of their independence, although President Izetbegovic unsuccessfully appealed to the EC for more time to settle the political problems related to the application within the Republic. On 13 January 1992 the Badinter Commission recommended recognizing Slovenia and Macedonia, but not Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, where the Commission called for a referendum. One author concluded that, in addition,
Bosnia and Herzegovina 85 we now know that notwithstanding the Bush administration official policy of let the Europeans clean up their own backyard, Washington played a direct role in aborting the February 1992 Lisbon agreement for an ethnic division of Bosnia and Herzegovina that would have given Bosnian Muslims 44% of the territory and control over all but 18% of Muslim population (Remington, 1994:
20).42
Violence was rising before the 1 March 1991 referendum on independence in Croat- and Moslem-dominated areas (as a Serb referendum had already proclaimed them independent, they boycotted this referendum), but the EC, Moslem and Croat leaderships ignored veiy strong Serb warnings. Sponsored by Portuguese ambassador to Yugoslavia Cutillero (in the first half of 1992 Portugal presided in the EC) the conference of the three ethnic communities, convened in Sarajevo and on 18 March 1992, determined the Principles for New Constitutional Organisation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The core of this document was the standpoint that this former Yugoslav republic should become “the state consisting of three constituent units” within “unchanged borders” with “sovereignty of citizens - Muslims, Serbs and Croats and other nations and ethnic groups”. The agreement was supposed to be followed by negotiations on the territorial division, but on 6 April the recognition was agreed by the EC foreign ministers (see Wiberg, 1994a: 245). The conflict in Croatia was perceived by EC as being between Serbia and Croatia, and not between Serbs and Croats, and those in Bosnia and Herzegovina were reduced to one conflict between Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. “Recognition o f states therefore became a central issue; the German tradition of making this a political weapon, not a matter of fact, prevailed.” As Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina were in danger of losing their nation status and becoming a minority, they saw the recognition as a threat to their societal security, and saw the recognition “as an extremely threatening signal rather than just ascribing it to ignorance and incompetence.” ... “hi addition, every Yugoslav schoolchild knew 6 April as the anniversary of Hitler’s attack on Yugoslavia in 1941; Serbs would therefore read the date as an extremely threatening signal rather than just ascribing it to ignorance and incompetence” (Wiberg, 1993: 103, 107-8). In the conditions of extremely strained interethnic relations, this decision probably triggered armed conflict, which in spite of the resistance of the antiwar movement in Sarajevo, broke out violently during April 1992. One could conclude that security problems and dilemmas defined the identity problems and dilemmas, and both kinds of problems and dilemmas interacted in a negative way.
86 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia After managing to achieve agreements between the three parties on the principles for further negotiations (including cantonization) the EC attempted to step up its role as that of arbitrator by the recognition of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the conflict situation that had been growing for a few weeks immediately escalated into war. A few weeks later the Croat-Moslem alliance was dissolved by the recognition, which eliminated the common interests of both sides. The UN had stepped up its humanitarian and monitoring role from being a mediator to an adjudicator (see Wiberg, 1994a: 242, 246), and for the UNPROFOR it was hardly possible to maintain the humanitarian mission and to keep peace Bosnia and Herzegovina at the same time. “Here, as elsewhere, the intended effects that are proclaimed are one thing, the actual effects of actions a different and more difficult matter.” The most careful formulation was that the UN activities had not been able to prevent a situation in which everybody has been fighting everybody. Serbs have been fighting Serbs (eastern Bosnia, 1992), Croats Croats (the government army HVO versus the ultranationalist militia HOS in Herzegovina in 1992) and Moslems Moslems (Sarajevo in autumn 1993, the Bihac area since October 1993). Serbs have been fighting Croats (mainly in Herzegovina in 1992), Croats Moslems (mainly in central Bosnia from 1992 through March 1994) and Moslems Serbs (in large parts o f Bosnia); and by late summer 1993, neighbouring villages in central Bosnia saw Serbs/Croats fighting Moslems, Serbs/Moslems fighting Croats and Croats/Moslems fighting Serbs, respectively (Wiberg, 1994a: 242-3).
In addition, in June 1994 the Moslem-Moslem war (between the Sarajevo Izetbegovic’s government that claimed sovereignty over the entire Bosnia and Herzegovina and the local Bihac Abdic’s government) - which started in January 1994 - was intensified (see Wiberg, 1995b: 104). Wiberg later created a theoretical model of fighting on at least some occasion in Bosnia and Herzegovina, in which X, Y, Z stand for armed forces dominated by ethnic group X, Y or Z: 1) any X against any Y; 2) any X + Y against any Z: 3) for any X, different forces belonging to X. The Croat Republic of Herceg-Bosna differed from the Serb Republic by its political ambiguity and double role as independent entity and nominally loyal part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Its goals were parallel to those of the Serb leadership: preferably joining independent Croatia (more threatened by a unitary Bosnia and Herzegovina than by die Serbs) in as large and purely Croatian(ized) canton(s) as possible (as fall-back position). Its official armed forces (HVO) were primarily cooperating and competing with HOS (loyal to HPR in Zagreb). Croats dominated parts of the Territorial Defence units; there
Bosnia and Herzegovina 87 were also local Croat militias, and Izetbegovic was forced to recognize both as legitimate. Serb and Croat leaderships in Bosnia and Herzegovina had some conflicting interests (in the first place about the division of territory in some areas where they were main competitors), and common interests in blocking a unitary state by cantonization. President Karadzic hailed the proclamation of the Croat Republic Herceg-Bosna in May 1992 as a reasonable exercise of Croatian national self-determination, asking President Izetbegovic to state Moslem claims and join negotiations on territorial division. Eventual Western invasion, which would have been necessary to end Serb independence, would have equally ended Croat independence. Both leaderships knew that pure demography will shortly give the Muslims absolute majority in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The radical cantonization, which was the only acceptable solution to Serbs and Croats, was seen as threatening by the Moslem leadership. In that case the Bosnian’ cantons would have been located in the northwest, around Sarajevo and in the southeast; they would have become isolated enclaves in Serb and Croat cantons if the Muslims could not conquer corridors through central Bosnia by cutting Serbian areas off from each other. In 1993 it seemed that the Serb and Croat leaderships might make their areas completely independent states, presumably later to join Yugoslavia and Croatia; or nominally preserving Bosnia and Herzegovina as a state with one Serb and one Croat canton, with constitutionally guaranteed full religious freedom to Muslims. They met to discuss principles for division, reportedly agreeing on 65% to the Serbs and 36% to the Croats; Milosevic and Tudjman also discussed “swapping lands”.43 The Moslem leadership therefore sought an external military protector. The major Western invasion indispensable for its major ambitions (forcing Serb and Croat republics to join a unitary state) was unlikely, unless Serbs (or Croats) were to make extremely provocative moves. Turkey was rhetorically willing, but pragmatically cautious; since Turkish military intervention could mean war with Greece, NATO had strong motives for discouraging it (see Wiberg, 1993: 103-4). Moslem problems included both security and identity to an extreme degree. Armed forces of Bosnian Serbs and Croats defined the security problem: occupation, expulsion and massacres, with minority status in chauvinist Serb and Croat states as a worse case. For Muslim identity it was not possible to be anchored in language (as there is a poor relation between religion and dialect). One author described Moslems as a largest minority in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which did not exist in the medieval Bosnian kingdom and has long been secularized rather than being zealots. “One
88 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia solution, in former Yugoslavia, was having ‘Moslem’ recognised as a national identity, on a par with Serb or Croat; but Yugoslavia is no more. Another solution is to be a state-carrying nation in independent BosniaHerzegovina together with Serbs and Croats - who will only have that on terms Moslems see as threatening their security.” Later two new solutions seemed to emerge: “revitalization of religion as centre of identity and identification as Bosnians. They are likely to create problems with Serbs and Croats: both will fear the creation of an Islamic state once suggested by Izetbegovic, neither will let the Moslems monopolise being Bosnians - or relinquish their Serb and Croat identities in favour of a Bosnian one” (Wiberg, 1993: 106-7). The perspectives of Bosnia and Herzegovina were uncertain because of the mixed ethnic composition of its population which suggested that even after armed conflicts ended there were likely to be long-lasting political shocks. It was easy to imagine that both Croatia and the Third Yugoslavia had strong political interests in, and strongpoints on, the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which would further complicate its internal political relations. It was to a much greater extent than the other republics dependent on the Yugoslav economic area (including food supplies) both with respect to exports and imports. It was concluded that this situation was going to be further aggravated because of interrupted traffic communications and longterm crisis areas on the territory and in the neighbourhood, relative traffic isolation from the world, lack of its own exclusive coast, etc. Continuation of war activities, the growing number of refugees, an inherited economic structure (a large part of the strong military industry of the ex-Yugoslavia was located on the territory of this republic) and various other conditions were also preventing the establishment of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a sovereign state (for more details see Simic, 1993: 220-1). A war such as the one in Bosnia and Herzegovina generated lot of threats to the engaged and affected populations, including several major security and identity threats. There are many acts that are considered as unusual or even forbidden in peacetime, which constitute a customary, allowed or even compulsory way of behaving during wartime and vice versa. Among others, during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina the Croats were called Ustashi, the Serbs were called Chetnici, and the Muslims or Bosniacs were called Turks (all names connoting a pejorative meaning, at least for people who were not taking part in the war). In the same war, as well as in the war in Croatia, the conquering of historic territories was practised or at least attempted by all sides (and thanks to previous wars and migrations many territories were going from hand to hand during the
Bosnia and Herzegovina 89 history); killing, raping, robbing and terrorizing civilians and other persons protected by international humanitarian or war laws were an extended practice. YPA - having learned the lesson in Slovenia and Croatia - tried first not to get involved, but conflicts between the Moslem and Croatian military formations and the federal army soon broke out. Following the tactic from Slovenia and Croatia, the Moslem and Croatian forces have surrounded and attacked YPA garrisons, resulting in armed combats throughout the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In late May 1992, the UN Security Council qualified the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina and other parts of the former Yugoslavia as a threat to international peace and security. The Council condemned authorities of the Third Yugoslavia for failing to undertake effective measures to cease every form of interference in Bosnia and Herzegovina, to respect its territorial integrity and withdraw, disband and disarm YPA units in Bosnia and Herzegovina or place them under the control of the local government. In May-June 1992, the YPA was officially withdrawn from Bosnia and Herzegovina, but without most of its armament. In fact a minority of soldiers (mostly citizens of Serbia and Montenegro) was withdrawn, and the great majority stayed in several armies and militias (who were also fighting for the enormous amounts of arms, bases and military factories that were left by the YPA).44 Some citizens of Serbia and Montenegro also stayed in Serb armies or militias in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and some came from Serbia and Montenegro. On 30 May 1992 the UN Security Council started to set the economic, political and other sanctions towards the Third Yugoslavia for supporting the Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina (see Resolution 757 of 30 May 1992). The newly established AY continued to maintain close communication and other relations with the Republika Srpska Army even after the Belgrade government stopped its military aid to the latter in autumn 1994, and officially or unofficially, (para)military forces of Croatia were in Bosnia and Herzegovina since the beginning of the war to its end. As it was concluded, political resistance of the Serbs to accept the dismantling of Yugoslavia and thus agree to live divided in several states was not adequately articulated nor understood in the international community (see Simic, 1993: 211). When the war started, and “after reports of ethnic cleansing and massacres in Bosnia, the Serbs were no longer in a position to present their case: Nobody wanted to listen” (Doder, 1993: 18). It seems that the Croats and Muslims carried out their diplomatic and propaganda war tasks much more successfully in terms of making the
90 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia world understand and accept their cases, even while they were fighting each other. According to the Vance-Owen Peace Plan, proposed in 1993, the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina was supposed to be divided in proportion 43 (Serbs): 32 (Bosniacs) 25 (Croats); the Owen-Stoltenberg Peace plan, made later in the same year, offered the proportion 52:30:18; and the 1994 Contact Group Peace Plan, proposed 49% to the Serbs and 51% to Bosniacs and Croats. As the plans as well as few other proposals were not accepted, in 1995, after some three years of war, the Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina controlled more than 70% of the territory of the country, and accepted a reduction of their share of the territory to 49% (as was decided by the leadership of the Serbia and Third Yugoslavia in July 1994 and later formally settled in Dayton), but it seemed that they were hesitating too long to realize the promise. The bombardment of the territory controlled by the Serbs45 was needed from an international community point of view (the purpose was to force the Serbs to realize the promise), and in a way also from the Republika Srpska government point of view (the purpose was to find a reason or argument which would be good enough for the withdrawal of the Serbs from the territory not perceiving that act as a cowardly act). At the same time, the forced withdrawal fitted the Serbs’ paranoia politics (“everybody is against the Serbs”), the Croat Realpolitik and the Muslims’ or Bosniacs’ illusion politics (see Wiberg, 1993: 108) as well as the international community’s mainly opportunistic and pragmatic politics. The war was ended by the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords. According to Annex 2 of the Accords, the territory of Bosnia and Herzegovina was divided between the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republika Srpska by a ratio of 51: 49. However, the central conflict power keg still exists consisting of the Serbs, Croats and Bosniacs in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and it seems that it was even “enriched” by a new conflict between the Croats and Bosniacs. The Dayton-Paris Peace Accords consisted of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 11 Annexes (including those on military aspects of the peace settlement and regional stabilization, inter-Entity boundary, elections, Constitution of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, arbitration, human rights, refugees and displaced persons, preservation of national monuments, public corporations, civilian implementation and IPTF), the Agreement of Initialling the General Framework Agreement, side-letters, concluding statement and map of territorial division. Civilian elements implementing the Dayton-Paris Peace
Bosnia and Herzegovina 91 Accords are to be coordinated between the local parties and the High Representative named by the UN Security Council. The High Representative, while attending the meetings of the Joint Military Commission, had no authority over the IFOR, SFOR or eventual later peacekeeping mission. The role of the High Representative is limited to convene and chair the Joint Civilian Commission, to establish, if necessary, similar local subordinate commissions, cooperate with the Joint Military Commission and peacekeeping military missions, to report to the UN Security Council, military missions, EU etc., who may then take an action as lies within the mandate and they see fit. According to the text of the Annex 10, the High Representative’s implementation power depends to a wide extent on the cooperation of various political authorities and police forces, but his actual political significance could be higher. This assessment was confirmed at least partly in early March 1999, when the Representative sacked President of Republika Srpska Nikola Poplasen for obstructing the peace process. According to the Constitution, the institutions of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina (in the first place the Parliament, the President, the Supreme Court and the Central Bank) are responsible for foreign policy, foreign trade, customs, monetary policy, finances of the institutions and for the international obligations, immigration, refugee, and asylum policy, international and inter-entity criminal law enforcement, common and international communications facilities, inter-Entity transportation etc. (Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Article IH/1 and 5). The Republic, which consists of the two Entities,46 could be described as “a union of two self-governing political ‘entities’”, but authors consider it as “the fiction of a single state” or “nominal Bosnian state” (see Craft, 1996: 14). Its “sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence” (Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Preamble, paragraph 6) can be considered as fictional or at least divided between the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Entities. However, as one author considers, what all peace plans “sought to create was a sovereign Bosnia which would not fracture into smaller, ethnic states nor be absorbed into Serbia and Croatia” (Craft, 1996). It seems that the main problems in the implementation of the DaytonParis Peace Accords are in disputes over respective competence between the Entities’ and republic’ governments47 as well as over positions and adopted political solutions respected and pursued by members of political/national parties’ and/or cantons’ leaderships within the Entities.
92 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia The second major open question is related to the nature of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (created in Washington in May 1994, under international pressure and despite irreconcilable differences between the two sides). Namely, the inner instability of the Federation could be perceived as a problem, which is so serious that it can even lead to a conclusion regarding its fictional nature. After a few years of the Federation’s existence chiefly on paper, and after the Agreement on the Implementation of the Federation Bosnia-Herzegovina was reached during preparations for the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords, it was concluded that the Federation does not work. The main reason can be generally described as irreconcilable differences in many regards. First of all, the two sides do not agree on the internal structure of their federal state. The Bosnian side sees the federation as a community of Bosniacs and Croats, and the Croatian side sees it as a “union of two politico-administrative entities (of the two communities of Muslims and Croats)”. Although Herceg-Bosna - in conformity to agreements between the two sides - should cease to exist, the Croatian side has established its own administrative bodies and organs that act as a parallel state and look like a state within the state (the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina). The Herceg-Bosna has firm links with neighbouring Croatia using the same currency and flag and coat of arms like Croatia’s. The fact that Croatian kuna is in circulation as a legal tender in HercegBosna has some negative repercussions on the economic situation in the Federation. Namely, as the Croatian currency is much stronger than the Bosnian money a substantial economic dependence on Croatia has been developed. What is more, the authorities of Herceg-Bosna control the border crossings to Croatia and levy “customs duties” and “taxes” on “imported goods” supplied to the federation. Major problems exist, therefore, with regard to the creation of a single economic area (Calic, 1996: 133).
It was also possible to expect struggles for redistribution of the Croatpopulated regions’ economic potentials which are bigger that the Bosniacspopulated ones’, i.e. Bosniacs’ attempts to share the Croatian economic power. Among the crucial disputed questions is the dilemma of whether institutions should be built on the basis of the 1991 census or according to the current ethnic composition. The gravity of these problems, open questions and disputes can be fully understood if one takes into consideration existing fears of nationalism. It seems that for this reason, the
Bosnia and Herzegovina 93 supposed reintegrations of Sarajevo and Mostar were among the major problems to the implementation of the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords. In both cases, pre-war tolerance was replaced by ethnic hatred created before and during the war and nationalisms predominated resulting in sharp ethnic divisions. For instance, during the war Mostar city as well as city institutions were divided into Bosnian or Moslem and Croat segments. Although the city should be reunified according to the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords, it remained divided. For this reason, numerous people have been afraid to live in the multiethnic communities again. Reportedly, on 9 March 1999, Croats in Mostar were demanding establishing a third, Croatian, entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina using the slogan “Without entity - there is no identity.” As it was noticed, “nationalism, understood in an exclusive sense, has gained acceptance at many levels within the Bosnian-Muslim government party SDA which has had a particularly pronounced impact on local politics. The Bosnian government’s de facto loss of power is a result of the creation of the federation has intensified the directional dispute within the SDA between the advocates of a (more or less homogeneous) BosnianMuslim nation-state and the supporters of a multicultural state entity” (Calic, 1996: 133). Within the Republika Srpska there was a split between the Momcilo Kijisnik orientation, on the one hand, and Biljana Plavsic’s orientation, on the other. Plavsic’s position could be at least to some extent compared with the position of Fikret Abdic in Bihac during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina.48 Geopolitical positions of their regions seem to be rather similar: air distance between Banja Luka and Bihac is some 102 km; Abdic’s Autonomous Province of Western Bosnia was surrounded by the Serbs and later also Croats,49 and the western part of Republika Srpska is practically surrounded by the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s and Croatia’s territory. As long as the Posavina corridor is there, however, there is a land connection between the two parts of the Republika Srspska, but SFOR has perhaps been playing a similar role as protector to Plavsic as the Serbs did for Abdic.50 Although Abdic is a Muslim, and Plavsic is a Serb, they had similar orientations in terms of trying to develop cooperation with the neighbours generating in that way political disputes with the mainstream national political leaders. Furthermore, it was only the population and armed forces in the northern parts of the Bihac enclave that clearly backed Abdic, while Izetbegovic had support in the southern parts. Plavsic also seems to have
94 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia considerably less support west of Banja Luka than in the Banja Luka area itself, and this division opens up the possibilities for a clash inside Western part of the Republika Srpska. The similarities between Abdic’s and Plavsic’s political orientations seem to have little to do with the national identity issue as well as the differences which used to exist between Abdic’s and Izetbegovic’s orientations or exist between Plavsic’s and Krajisnik’s orientations, except in one regard. Namely, Abdic did not compete with Izetbegovic about being “most Moslem”, whereas Plavsic was seen as having competed with Krajisnik about being “most Serb”, e.g. by being more opposed to Milosevic for his “selling out” of the Republika Srpska. However, the differences between political orientations of Plavsic and Krajisnik as well as the power struggle or competing bosses factor should not be underestimated. The differences between Abdic’s and Izetbegovic’s orientations and the power struggle between them were probably among the main causes of the Muslim-Muslim or Bosnian-Bosnian long and bloody war; Abdic/Plavsic refused to accept Izetbegovic/Krajisnik as the boss according to his/her rhetoric - not wanting to follow him into suicide. To conclude, Croat and part of Serb political leaderships in Bosnia and Herzegovina are threatened by Bosniacs’ intentions to establish the Federation/Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a real federation/single state; Bosniacs’ leadership is, in return, threatened by Serbs’/Croats’ intentions to join as much as it is possible neighbouring Third Yugoslavia/Croatia etc. (for more details see Isakovic, 1997a: 49). The war in Bosnia and Herzegovina is known as a very strong generator of refugee flows. Such a large migration of millions of people has not happened in Europe since the Second World War. One author has concluded that the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords’ provisions on the right of general freedom of movement in the entire state territory and the right of all refugees to return to their homes (Annex 7) would be hard to implement (Calic, 1996: 132). The complete law enforcement is in the hands of the Entities, i.e. local police forces, who were often noticed as the principal offenders when it comes to discrimination against minorities and abuse of human rights in general.51 The Agreement on Human Rights (Annex 6 of the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords) includes the right to life, to freedom from torture or other degrading or inhuman treatment, to a fair hearing in civil and criminal courts, to freedom of expression and a free press, to freedom of peaceful assembly and association, and to freedom of movement. The same Annex includes a list of international conventions in this field, and provides for the Ombudsman (who is not supposed to be from the Yugoslav
Bosnia and Herzegovina 95 successor states) to raise matters of violation and the Human Rights Chamber to make decisions on them. The Chamber has eight alien members, four from the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and two from the Republika Srpska. One could presume that individuals and group members could hardly feel secure if local nationalist leaders as well as those in Zagreb and Belgrade harbour indicted war criminals (who ran several police stations) (for more details see Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 1 and 8). Article IX of the General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina obliges the Parties to cooperate in the investigation and prosecution of war crimes and other violations of international humanitarian law. One author considers that, however, in the Entities in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the War Tribunal is more likely to have a Waldheim effect52 for Serbs and Croats (and perhaps later also Moslems) than to reduce nationalism. The parties are (in)directly forbidden to control changes of existing ethnic composition and are obliged to provide “a safe and secure environment for all persons in their respective jurisdictions ... in accordance with internationally recognised standards and with respect for internationally recognised human rights and fundamental freedoms” (Annex 11). However, as the return of refugees would influence the ethnic composition of local administration, in many areas houses were destroyed in purpose to prevent the return. “No side is willing to share power among the peoples” (Calic, 1996: 134). It seems that the provisions on rights of refugees and displaced persons freely to return to their homes of origin as well as some other provisions were made under a rather unrealistic presumption that local police and some other public servants will treat people regardless of their nationality, and act - if it is necessary - even against some vital interests of own nations’ members.53 It was concluded that local nationalist leaders (who were elected and legitimized on the elections) as well as the leaders in Belgrade and Zagreb continued to block repatriation of minority groups and freedom of movement54 (see Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 1). Man can hardly feel protected of identity and other threats if he had to flee from his national landscape (not only from the physical appearance of a territory, but also its climate, ecology and resource-base), from “the past, and not least to a unique people with its specific customs, dances and stories, its songs and traditions” (see Wsver, 1993: 29; Buzan, 1993b: 55). Man can hardly feel secure if an authority denies his right to access to his property, which is often a precondition to obtaining citizenship,55 to meet
96 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia his relatives, friends, to see landscape etc. Even if there are no borderlines and checkpoints between and inside the Entities, at least local people know where the borders are and cross them more or less unwillingly, with a suspicion and cautiously. The Dayton-Paris Peace Accords’ provisions enable absentee votes to be counted in the municipality a person has fled from, but the voter may be able to have it counted elsewhere. If a refugee votes outside Bosnia and Herzegovina, it would be interpreted as an expression of intent to return to the country. However, as a great majority of refugees left Bosnia and Herzegovina under intimidation and various war pressures, one could hardly assume that voting outside Bosnia and Herzegovina could be correctly taken as an expression of will, intent or readiness to return there. This kind of will, intent or readiness could be expected when peacetime intimidation and pressures disappear in the place to which refugees would return. Finally, man is not a toy which can be moved from one place to another, according to the politicians’ or anybody else’s will. More than two years after the end of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina as well in other war-affected areas of the Second Yugoslavia people live under control of the “feared warlords” and “nationalist Mafia chieftains”,56 who control people belonging to their own and other nations without having any democratic basis; where policemen do not prevent bombing churches and torching houses, but take part in street “maltreatment” of fleeing pilgrims. Individuals and group members can also hardly feel secure if they are exposed to terrorist attacks and robberies (regardless of motives (political or otherwise), nationalities and/or origins of those who committed the crimes). It does not help much (on the contrary) if leaders condone police brutality in Bosnia and Herzegovina (see Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 1). It seems that the number of committed criminal acts (as well as the number of suicides, particularly among refugees and displaced persons) is high, but law and order do not become better if they are established by brutalities. Annexes 1-A, 1-B and 2 of the Dayton-Paris Accords regulate military measures (in the first place the mandate of IFOR, redeployment and withdrawals of the Republika Srpska’s and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s troops, but not the Bosniacs’ and Croats’ troops from their mutual front lines) and territorial division. All foreign forces (except IFOR) were supposed to leave Bosnia and Herzegovina’s territory by mid-January 1996, but an expert considered that many of the foreign forces - despite of the Accords’ ban - are likely to be given appropriate passports and uniforms by the Federation or the Republika Srpska.
Bosnia and Herzegovina 97 According to some provisions of the Annex 1-A, the Republika Srpska and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina forces were supposed to clear those areas which were to be transferred to each other of landmines in advance, which seems to be difficult to implement. Clearing landmines will probably last for decades and will be very costly. Even if people are allowed to return to their homes and property or visit friends and relatives, how can they do it if fields are planted with mines, and how can one feel “at home in nature” if it becomes dangerous? One author noticed that “in many parts of the country the warring factions have been pursuing a scorched earth policy, one motive being to prevent expellees from returning at a later date; houses were being deliberately destroyed to prevent the return of refugees. Refugees from elsewhere have long since been moved into the towns, villages or just individual houses where they remain still standing.” One should remove most of these newcomers in order to enable expellees to settle again in their places of origin. “Furthermore, very few refugees are willing to return to their native territory if the latter is now controlled by the other side. The fear of exposure to renewed persecution is too deeply rooted” (Calic, 1996: 132-3). Open questions related to the general freedom of movement as well as to the right of refugees to return home seem to be linked to the election processes in Bosnia and Herzegovina as a whole. Despite the Accords’ assumption that “by Election Day, the return of refugees should already be underway, thus allowing many to participate in person in elections” (Annex 3, Article 4), the ex-warring parties from Bosnia and Herzegovina try to keep the ethnic compositions of the populations under their own control in order to gain or maintain their own legitimacy. This seems to be the main or one of the main war aims, which also remained very important after the war (during the democratization period). For these reasons, it seems that the above-mentioned Dayton-Paris Peace Accords’ provisions would be hard to implement. Basic considers: At this moment, the Constitution of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which is no more than an amendment-complemented copy o f the Constitution o f the Federal Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina, looks awkward and we can rightly ask who is obliged by its provisions, who applies it and how the Constitution and the Legislation are safeguarded. Only a consensus of the three entities on the life in a common state, the establishment of the basic value principals of the community, the organisation of the state apparatus, a gradual
98 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia acceptance o f democracy and many other prerequisites will provide grounds for the discussion on the protection of the minorities in these parts (Basic, 1996:
66).
It seems that it will also be hard to have restored to the people of Bosnia and Herzegovina property of which they were deprived in the course of hostilities as well as - within the existing economic circumstances or without foreign aid57 - to use the right to be compensated for any such property that cannot be restored (as it was regulated by Annex 7). The UN arms embargo for the successor states of the second Yugoslavia was not efficient. As weapons were coming in from some neighbouring and other European and non-European countries, the importing of death was flourishing there. According to the Vienna Agreement on Sub-Regional Arms Control, the parties are supposed to limit and, as necessary, reduce their armaments relatively quickly, so that the holdings of any party do not exceed certain ceilings (see Kotej, 1996: 39). The Agreement roughly determined the numbers of armaments relations in the following way: 5 (Third Yugoslavia) : 2 (the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina) : 2 (Croatia). Secondly, the determined relations within the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina itself are 2 (the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina) : 1 (the Republika Srpska). In 1996, After the signing of the Vienna-Florence Agreement on Sub-Regional Arms Control representatives of the involved sides issued statements on voluntary limitations of military manpower. The relations between numbers of soldiers established in that way approximately correspond to the relations between the determined numbers of armaments. In short, a party that attempts to get some advantage in this system of military balance should either try to get better armaments or better training for its soldiers. This is a result of the fact that the agreement and statements did not include qualitative limits, but quantitative limits only. In addition, according to the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords parties have a duty to exchange complete information that presupposes the establishing of a mutual trust. However, as the war in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina lasted for years, this does not seem to be something that will soon happen. It seems that there are two main groups of conditions for the DaytonParis Peace Accords’ implementation success. The first condition is a greater inflow of foreign aid. Fulfilment of this condition could influence the economic disintegration of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as its Entities, and could also help to eliminate some constitutional disagreements. In addition, the aid could - at least to some degree - reduce
Bosnia and Herzegovina 99 the lack of political legitimacy in the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina and its Entities. However, many of the above-mentioned effects will depend on the degree to which the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords are actually implemented as written. It seems that the second condition for the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords’ successful implementation is within military peacekeeping field. Most of the Dayton-Paris military provisions were implemented in time and without greater difficulties. The IFOR had been limited to its military role (see Calie, 1996: 130-1), and the SFOR has had some kind of deterrent role, but - as the time has been passing by - needs have been appearing for a kind of police or quasi-police engagement. To the extent that the Dayton-Paris Accords’ provisions will not express the significant interests of the political leadership of the three main ethnic groups, the only choice will be the politics of the stick and carrot. It will be very important how the mission’s mandate will be formulated and - if it is formulated as narrowly as the IFOR’s mandate - to what extent the mission will be ready to go beyond its mandate. It seems that these questions will remain open as long as the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords do not include a provision that will enable establishing a longer lasting peacekeeping mission in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Dayton-Paris Peace Accords mainly oblige some of the Yugoslav successor states and their bodies, in the first place those in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Obligations of other actors depend on resolutions and agreements passed by intergovernmental bodies like the UN Security Council, OSCE, EU, Council of Europe, NATO, the World Bank, etc. Predictions about their behaviour must depend on how significant member states (in the first place, USA, the major powers of EU and Russia) and in some cases also the bodies themselves define and try to realize their interests. Being the responsibility of the most powerful world powers and actors, Bosnia and Herzegovina will at least partly share their future and the future of their mutual and other relations and positions and vice versa. It is considered that “in many places, the complicated and sophisticated system of peace agreement implementation is praised as the beginning of a new architecture of security. In Bosnia-Herzegovina, NATO is testing its new peacekeeping concept, including the command and control structures created to this end, for the first time.” There were “high hopes that the ‘partnership for peace’ will prove its worth here vis-à-vis Russia, which is linked with the NATO implementation force via a complicated mechanism. Furthermore, the impression is being gained that events in Bosnia-
100 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Herzegovina will decide whether the USA can sustain its leading role in Europe, how the relations between NATO and the EU/WEU will develop, and which role will be assigned in future to the OSCE” (Calic, 1996: 1345). 4.3 Religious affiliation Despite of relatively low participation in church and mosque services after the Second World War, religious affiliation appeared as an important element of national identities in Bosnia and Herzegovina after the end of the Cold War. Some authors consider that the major difference between Bosniacs or Muslims, Croats and Serbs in Bosnia and Herzegovina are their religious affiliations: Bosniacs mostly belong to Islamic religion, Serbs belong to the Orthodox religion and Croats to the Catholic religion. The early Slavs used to follow an animistic type of religion, believing that benevolent or hostile invisible spirits surrounded them, worshipping the Supreme Being and supporting priests and medicine men. After the division of the Christian Church, the line of bifurcation passed through Bosnia and Herzegovina. Thus the Serbs’ ancestors became members of the Eastern Church, and those of the Croats belonged to the Catholic Church. It was stressed that “reflecting the eastern versus western split in the empire, the acceptance of different religious rituals exacerbated the differentiation of the Serbs from the Croats that geographical and historical factors had already initiated” (Friedman, 1996: 9). The same author considers that nationalist orientation generates the scholarly debate of religion in medieval Bosnia and Herzegovina. The debate is focused on the question of medieval religious affiliations as a central issue in the identity claims made by various nationalists affecting the political and national status of the Muslims or Bosniacs. In that way, scholars created controversies not only on the medieval religious affiliations of large segments of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s population, but also on the origins of their national identities. Many Yugoslav and British scholars pledged that Bogomils existed as an “imported” religious movement in medieval Bosnia and Herzegovina where they used to elect their own bishops and elders and hold services in private homes. As they denied the ultimate sovereignty of God (more details on this religion are presented within the chapter devoted to Macedonia), the Bogomils’ religion was condemned as heretical by the Roman Catholic as well as the Orthodox Church. According to some sources, the Bogomils were exterminated by
Bosnia and Herzegovina 101 the Serbian King Nemanja (who ruled 1169-96) and the above-mentioned Tvrtko I, although today it is hard to find reliable proofs of the actions and their results. It is considered that “the attractiveness of the Bogomils as forebears of today’s Bosnian Muslims lies in the desire of Bosnian Muslim nationalists to demonstrate a separate and distinct origin through the unique character of religion in that area. This would indicate that their direct ancestors were originally separate from either the Orthodox or the Catholic inhabitants and would obviate equally vehement Croat and Serb claims on Bosnian lands based on their respective cultural legacies” (Friedman, 1996: 12-13). A second group of authors considers that the Bogomil religion did not have any significant influence in Bosnia and Herzegovina. They hold that the Bogomil religion was wrongly confused with the dissident Bosnian Church (Bosanska crkva) which separated from the Catholic Church on ritualistic grounds by the end of the twelfth century. According to one author, Bogomils were not among the ancestors of the present-day Muslims or Bosniacs who were later converted to Islam along with members of other existing churches, but they were Bosnian Church members (for more details see Friedman, 1996: 11-13). The existence of the above-mentioned schismatic religions and movements motivated the papacy to send a legate to execute a religious purge in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1221. Although at that time Bosnia and Herzegovina was not fully integrated either in the Catholic nor Orthodox Church, a group of the Dominican order members was sent to establish religious compliance along with the Hungarian crusade forces. However, the attempt to secure religious conformity partly failed as well as similar attempts made by Orthodox and Islamic powers against the heretics, and the heterogeneous religious structure was an additional reason for the above-mentioned early medieval lack of the sense of internal political cohesion and the fundamental weakness of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The rulers of the country left the Bosnian Church and became members of the Catholic Church, but religious heterogeneity endured as one of its important characteristics. It was held that some historians have posited that the members of the Bosnian Church or the Bogomils - whichever view of the schism one accepts - aided the Ottoman advance into Bosnia to deflect further Hungarian attacks (Ceric, 1968: 66) or that they did so out of rage over the conversion of King Stjepan Tomasevic from Bogomilism to Catholicism (Lavrin, 1929: 281). There is more evidence, however, that aid from Bosnian inhabitants may have come because they believed they could
102 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia continue to possess their lands under Turkish aegis or that the indigenous schismatic Christians saw in the Islamic Turks a lesser evil than the intolerant Roman Catholics (Franzius, 1967: 131). One author concluded, “early Islam appeared to be more tolerant with more equitable laws than Christianity” (Franzius, 1967: 131). In addition, it is considered “there may also have been a feeling of kinship - that is, the Muslims allowed reverence of Jesus, even as they acknowledged him in their religion, whereas the pope considered both the schismatics and the Muslims to be enemies” (Aldis, 1966: 108). On the other hand, some authors, however, contradicted the attitude that the Muslim conquerors significantly aided the Bosnian Church as there was the absence of such concerns in letters by important personages involved in the defence of Bosnia at the time (Fine, 1975: 341; for more details see Friedman, 1996: 17). The first Turkish raids were mostly aimed at plundering and taking slaves, and not at religious conversion of the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina, which started after the country was conquered. The conversion was relatively rarely achieved by force (except in some cases, when domestic rebels were spared if they were or became Muslims), but people were motivated to become Muslims by acquiring political, economic and social privileges and payoffs. In addition, the process of Islamization was eased by the fact that a strong religious organization did not exist before the Turks came to Bosnia and Herzegovina; and by religious heterogeneity, the lack of a sense of internal political cohesion, ignorance about religion etc. (for more details see Friedman, 1996: 16-19). The conversion was more rapid and widespread in cities than in villages, and among schismatics than among members of other religions, but not all conversions were to Islam. As the Christian religions advanced too, and backsliders from Islam were punished by death, the schismatics almost disappeared. It was concluded, however, that Islamization probably did not significantly differentiate the Muslims from the Christian community either communally (i.e. as Bosniacs) or even socially (Friedman, 1976: 43). Today, there are several versions of the origin of the main nations in Bosnia and Herzegovina based on the religious developments and events which have been summarized above. Some authors consider that presentday Muslims are descendants of the Bogomils. “Bosnian Muslim nationalists believe their unique historical and social development has differentiated them from the other inhabitants of Bosnia and Herzegovina and made them legitimate claimants to control of that land, on a par with today’s Serbs and Croats” (see Friedman, 1996: 21-2). One part of the
Bosnia and Herzegovina 103 Bosniacs’ political leadership wants to emphasize Islam as a part of national identity (as there is little else to define a difference from Serbs and Croats), and another part wants to deemphasize it in order to make possible a common Bosnian identity anchored in territory, history etc. (Wiberg, 1995b: 105). However, some Croat authors are attempting to link Bosniacs with Croats stating that the Bogomils used to be, in fact, “a group of ethnic Roman Catholics who embraced Manichaeism and then, under persecution from the Roman Catholics and the Orthodox, converted to Islam”. In that case, the Bosnian Muslims - who are in fact ethnic Croats - would have been “the direct successors of the old Croatian kingdom”. The next step is a demand for Muslims’ territory, which is, according to this view, Croatian heritage (see Friedman, 1996: 20-1). On the other hand, a few Serbian authors state that Bogomils have never existed in Bulgaria, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia or anywhere else in the Balkans; and before the Turks came, Orthodox and Catholic religion used to be the only religions in the Balkans. The Muslims were in fact people who were converted from Orthodoxy to Islam when the Turks conquered Bosnia and Herzegovina. According to that view, the Bogomils emerged out of those whom popes and Latin priests called the Orthodox inhabitants of Bosnia and Herzegovina: Patarenes and Manichees, although they were Christians (see Glusac, 1945: 266-70). Miljkovic (1995) stressed that “the idea of the Bogomil origin should have provided the Bosnian Muslims with that that they did not have - national identity and historical continuity”. In her opinion, the creation of the Bosnian nation was artificial and politically motivated, “as well as distortion in order to provide the purported Bosnians with historical continuity, met with different response in South-Slavic publications and historiography.” It is considered that the claim on Bosnian Muslims’ Bogomil origin “was made without a serious thought; no facts supporting it have been presented. ... According to available historical sources, there are only proofs refuting this thesis, and there is not a single fact in favour of it” (see Miljkovic, 1995: 294-5). The religious origin of the Muslims is just one of the disputed questions. In addition, there is a hypothesis that “contemporary Orthodox inhabitants of Bosnia were considered ‘descendants of migrants who came to Bosnia under Turkish rule, or of Catholics who embraced Orthodoxy under the influence of the well-organized Orthodox Church’”. On the other hand, Catholics in Bosnia and Herzegovina originate from Orthodox immigrants who were converted to Catholicism during the sixteenth and seventeenth
104 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia centuries, and rulers of the country once were Serbian kings’ vassals etc. (see Friedman, 1996: 21). It seems that, in these cases all sides present data and attitudes which support their hypothesis on the origins and identities of their own and/or other nations. It could be a matter of discussion whether the hypothesis could be considered as an identity threats or in some other way. If they are presented in a tolerant discussion characterized by sober rethinking and calm behaviour of participants, the claims could be qualified in one way. However, if they are expressed in a social environment in which media disseminate ethnic hatred or “just” ethnic intolerance, terrorist, or (para)military actions (including attempts to apply the scorched earth policy) with a certain ethnic background happen from time to time, the claims could easily be seen, understood and qualified as the identity and at the same time security threats. This could be the case especially when peoples are burdened by historical and recent sources of traumas and narcissisms, as Croats, Bosniacs or Muslims and Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina are. As a result, for example, although I can not assess this accurately, according to popular beliefs among the Croats, present-day Bosniacs are descendants of Islamized Catholics. According to popular beliefs among most of the Serbs, present-day Bosniacs are descendants of the Islamized Orthodox population. According to popular beliefs among the Bosniacs themselves, they are descendants of Islamized Bogomils. During the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina many priests and believers of all religions escaped from their villages and cities and many churches and other places used for the purpose of worship were poorly attended, unattended or destroyed (reportedly, on the territory of Republika Srpska a single undamaged mosque does not exist any more) etc. At the same time, there is an impression that all three churches were supporting more or less silently or loudly the political sides, expecting ecumenical or similar war benefits for themselves. 4.4 Language and culture The Yugoslav novelist who received the Nobel Prize for literature in 1961 Ivo Andric (1892-1975), in his novel Na Drini cuprija, 1945 (The Bridge on the Drina, 1959) and many other works deals with the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina. In a segment of the story elaborated in Na Drini cuprija, which was happening in 1913 during a rebellion in Bosnia, he describes the promise of a new national state with Serbia playing the pivotal unifying
Bosnia and Herzegovina 105 role. Toma Galus, bom in a Serbo-Croat marriage, is talking to his Muslim friend Fehim Bahtijarevic. “You’ll see,” Toma says passionately. “We shall create a state which will make the most precious contribution to the progress of humanity, in which every effort will be blessed, every sacrifice holy, every thought original and expressed in his own words, and every deed marked with the stamp of our name... We will build... a state, bom in freedom and founded on justice, like a part o f God’s thought realized here on earth.”
Fehim, however, remains quiet and his silence is “like an impassable wall in the darkness which by the very weight of its existence resolutely rejected all that the other had said, and expressed its dumb, clear and unalterable opinion”. In addition, “the microcosm of Bosnia is completed by two Serb youths in the same scene whose talk about revolution quickly deteriorates into a personal quarrel” (Doder, 1993: 8). One author notes that Moslem nationalists have advanced a thesis that present-day Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina originate culturally from the Bogomils. “This unique ancestry made the Bosnian Muslims a product of a distinctive Bosnian Slav culture wedded to the ensuing Islamic culture to create an original and exclusive Bosnian Muslim group” (Friedman, 1996: 21). Before the 1992-95 war, although there were some differences (for example, before the war Muslim-populated regions often had higher rates of illiteracy because of the low rate of school attendance for girls), in a cultural regard and according to mentality, Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina seemed to be more similar to local Serbs and Muslims than to Croats from Croatia; Serbs used to be more similar to local Croats and Muslims than to Serbs from Serbia; and Muslims were more similar to local Serbs and Croats than to Turks or any other Moslem nation in the world. During the time of the First and Second Yugoslavia, the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina developed a complex culture characterized by simultaneously visible expressions of Western European, Islamic, Mediterranean and other influences. In cultural life there were elements of traditional (often associated with rural) and modem (mostly affiliated to urban) culture. Bosnia and Herzegovina’s society used to keep a tradition of relatively strong patriarchal family relations, and neighbourhood and camaraderie relations and affiliations.
106 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Before the 1992-95 war the most popular writer of Bosnia and Herzegovina was Mesa Selimovic (1910- ), who wrote the novel Dervis i smrt (Death and the Dervish). It is considered that, although this story took place in the eighteenth century in Sarajevo occupied by Turks, it conveyed a universal truth about the dilemma of humankind during times of crisis. Another important Selimovic’s roman was Tvrdjava {Fortress). During the 1970s, when the capital Sarajevo was the centre of the most popular school of pop and rock music within the Second Yugoslavia, the best-known band was Bijelo Dugme {White Button). Emir Kusturica, a youngster from the same city, became probably the most successful Yugoslav film creator in the world. He received the Golden Lion at the Venice Film Festival in 1981 and the Golden Palm award at the Cannes Film Festival in 1996 for the movie Podzemlje {Underground) devoted to the Yugoslav crisis and the war. Another of his previously internationally distributed films was Sjecas li se Dolly Bell? {Do You Remember Dolly Bell?), which received the Golden Lion at the 1981 Venice Film Festival. Theatre life was developed in several urban centres including Sarajevo, Banja Luka, Zenica, Tuzla, Mostar etc. A winter Olympic games were held in Sarajevo, and football, basketball and some other sports were widely popular (see Encyclopaedia Britannica 1995). Before the war the official language of Bosnia and Herzegovina was constitutionally referred as “Serbian, or Croatian or Serbo-Croat/- CroatSerbian, as it is spoken in Bosnia and Herzegovina”. It was concluded that “since the dialect groups cut across the pattern of religious groups, this represents a very careful compromise” (Wiberg, 1992: 53n38). The sharp division of the language(s) was established during the war when each side determined a name for own language: Serbs adopted the name Serbian, Croats adopted Croatian, and Muslims - whose nation changed its name to Bosniacs - named their language Bosnian. People from Bosnia and Herzegovina - regardless of which side or nation they belong to - understand each other, but most of their political leaders and establishments make intensive efforts to make them use own language. In 1995 it was concluded that changes in the majority cultures in most of the Yugoslav successor states are accompanied by similar changes in the minority cultures. As a result, “most of these states have inherited the problems of Yugoslavia in even worse forms, notwithstanding their official proclamations to please the West”. It was concluded that “their political systems then get working at them, with discrimination and forced assimilation as the mildest instruments, hard repression, mass expulsion and mass murder being further steps on an ascending scale” (Wiberg, 1995b: 105).
Bosnia and Herzegovina 107 In fact, although some minor regional differences exist (in the first place in pronunciation and vocabulary), versions of the language(s) used in Bosnia and Herzegovina are mutually more similar than they are to the language(s) mostly used in Serbia and Croatia. Before the war the Latin and Cyrillic alphabet were used, but since the conflicts started to escalate Serbs have begun to use almost exclusively Cyrillic, and Croats and Muslims the Latin alphabet, while the Bosniacs did not change the alphabet during their war with Croats. In addition, authorities of Republika Srpska prescribed that schools should use the exclusively Eastern version (e-kavski) of their language instead of the Western ije-kavski (previously mostly shared with the other two major nations of Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as with Serbs from the Western parts of Serbia and Montenegrins). Of course, the fact that peoples in Bosnia and Herzegovina (used to) share their language(s) has been disputed by many authors as well as the peoples’ origins and various other elements of their national identities. Within the field of culture there are claims which seem to be versions of the above-mentioned religious claims or combined with them. For example, one author considered that Muslims are “Islamicized Croats who, through conversion, acquired a new locus of cultural identification that entailed the loss of Croat national consciousness” (Pilar, 1918 and several other authors; quoted after Friedman, 1996: 20). It seems that it is believed that the more and the greater differences one can find the bigger are the possibilities of protecting one’s own nation’s identity regardless of the fact that in that way one makes threats against another nation’s identity and also its security. During the war, some traditional and current habits and cultural and religious characteristics were important to a degree that can save or end somebody’s life. In 1992 two authors noted, “not only are the media and the economy tightly controlled, especially in war zones, but now people are punished just for who they are. It used to be that anyone who questioned communist ideology or the absolute power of the one-party state risked losing his or her citizenship. This happens now to people who merely belong to the ‘wrong’ nation” (Licht and Kaldor, 1992b: 142). During the same war many schools, universities and other educational institutions used to work irregularly or not at all; many teachers and professors as well as pupils and students were mobilized or escaped from war-affected regions to other parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina, states or continents; an unknown number of schools and other buildings used for educational purposes were damaged, destroyed or their purpose was changed. This means that the process of socialization - as far as it depends
108 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia on educational institutions - was probably significantly changed or, better, damaged in comparison with the previous period. As a result of the political and armed “socialization” which was going on during the war, the languages spoken in Bosnia and Herzegovina after the war have been Bosnian, Serbian and Croatian. Almost all participants of a meeting of Bosnian and Croatian journalists58 agreed on self-constraints and taboo topics in their reporting on warfare, and particularly on war crimes committed by their side and the role of their church in condemning the warfare. Journalists in Croatia and the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina concluded that “each side in the recent conflict tried to monopolize the flow of information on its territory and the participants asserted that nationalistic political forces were still trying to maintain their monopolies. ... ‘Censorship by the gun’ is still a reality, at least in some parts of Bosnia,” although “paper and words can and do cause deadly conflicts”. A national identity can hardly not be threatened when, since 1990, media on all sides have continuously been fanning the flames of ethnic hatred, and local nationalist leaders in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and the Third Yugoslavia continue to close down independent media outlets and curb freedom of expression (see Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 1). A participant from Bosnia noted that in Bosnia there were more than 100 new media organizations, all of which are dependent on foreign support for survival. The participant concluded, “almost everything seems to be under Western control: the courts and the police as well as the media. In addition, many journalists from Bosnia have left the country and settled in the West, while the most talented among those who stayed behind have been recruited by Western employers.” This journalist asserted, “Bosnia has become a kind of Western protectorate” (Project on Ethnic Relations, 1996: 8). A participant of the meeting described an episode at the beginning of the war: Someone had painted graffiti on the walls of a post office in Sarajevo declaring, “This is Serbia!” The next morning a retort appeared, “Idiot, this is a post office!” Thus, said the participant, the war was between those who saw only Serbia (or Croatia or Bosnia) and those who saw simply an institution that was supposed to send and receive letters and telegrams and provide telephone service. [It was concluded,] the picture in Bosnia is still the same. People are arguing about whom the post office belongs to instead of how it should function. He expressed sadness that there were many journalists among such people. If after four years of war the people of Bosnia have learned nothing, he
Bosnia and Herzegovina 109 added, there is no viable future for the free media in that country (Project on Ethnic Relations, 1996:6). The Bosnia and Herzegovina’s separation of the Second Yugoslavia as well as the division of Bosnia and Herzegovina itself was imposed not only by the recognition and military actions, but also by take-overs of many TV and radio transmitters (so that certain regions could (not) receive programmes broadcast from certain sources), and the destruction of many national monuments (like the famous medieval bridge over the Neretva river, the Library and some other monuments in Sarajevo and elsewhere).59 Among the first acts of violence that happened before the war broke out was the destruction of a monument devoted to Ivo Andric, placed in Visegrad close to the bridge from his quoted novel. * * *
In Bosnia and Herzegovina the pattern in Croatia described above (see Chapter 3) was basically repeated. On the one hand, Serbs were keeping the Yugoslav status quo as long as it was possible or as long as it seemed to them to be possible. On the other, Muslims and Croats were criticizing the status quo and challenging the legitimacy of the Second Yugoslavia as long as Bosnia and Herzegovina was recognized as an independent country. Afterwards the roles were shifted (exchanged), with exemptions of the Croat fights with Muslims or Bosniacs and internal fights on all sides: those who were making Yugoslavia legitimate started to challenge Bosnia and Herzegovina; those who were challenging the Yugoslav legitimacy started to make Bosnia and Herzegovina legitimate. For the above-mentioned reasons, political, economic and some other important social relations seem to be disturbed (most drastically in waraffected areas), and the identities of all nations threatened by the other nations’ efforts aimed to protect their own identity and/or improve their security. In these regards all sides seem to be losers (some of them perhaps more, and some less) or at least there is no genuine winner. However, despite the fact that the security, as well as the identity of Croats, Serbs and Muslims, has been tom to shreds, unless politicians and policymakers in the country as well as those abroad learn from the tragic experiences, they may be condemned to repeat it. Violence has turned what might have been the Second Yugoslavia’s road to democracy and to Europe into a dead-end. The first (misused) multiparty elections were the furthest (formally) reached point
110 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia within the process of transition, and further political, economic, and cultural development was stopped by civil wars. Having the role of the major difference between the major nations of Bosnia and Herzegovina, the three main religions also experienced their “victories” which can be qualified as Pyrrhic. Approximately as much as the Muslims’ identity was perceived as threatened by the actual and even more predicted or expected Serbian domination in Yugoslavia without Croatia and Sloveni, the Croatian identity is perceived as threatened by the actual and expected or predicted Bosniacs’ domination in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina; and the Serbian identity is perceived as threatened by actual and expected attempts aimed at eventual federalization of the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina. On the other hand, Bosnia’s identity and security is mostly perceived as threatened by the actual and expected separation of Croats from the fictional Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and also to some degree by the Serbs’ separation from the fictional or nominal Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina. During the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina the traumas between Serbs and Croats, and Serbs and Moslems, were further nourished, and probably a new (Croat-Moslem) trauma was created. Since the two nations’ narcissisms seem to be very developed, they consider themselves as “innocent victims”, and the “most peaceful and innocent people in the world”. The Hague War Crimes Tribunal is utilized by each side’s propaganda against the another side as well as the international community (if and when it uses the stick too much, rather than the carrot). Again, members of “our” nation/army are all brave and innocent, and members of “their” nations/armies are all cowards and criminals. The Dayton-Paris Peace Accords stopped the war, but it seems that did not eliminate the actors, conditions and causes that started it. On the contrary, the economic crisis is not just still in existence, but is much deeper than in 1990. It seems that a genuine reconstruction of the waraffected areas in Bosnia and Herzegovina can be expected and achieved from foreign sources only. Since all sides in Bosnia and Herzegovina probably see the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords as a diktat, one could suppose that they are going to implement just the parts that they see as not being in collision with their interests. On the other hand, it seems that the international community - besides the military force whose wider utilization can bring war back again - has at its disposal the economic means (the stick and carrot policy) to deal with nationalist oriented forces on all sides. However, using the economic stick,
Bosnia and Herzegovina 111 the international community is, in fact, preventing economic reconstruction, and offering a carrot without a stick does not seem to make much sense. For that reason, reconstruction will largely have to be local, and very little is likely to come from the international community. Economic differences between the former republics will probably also continue to grow, and the creation of an “economic Yugoslavia” is also unlikely, in the first place because some of the Second Yugoslavia’s successor states would not want it. The Cold War used to be a stimulus for internal cohesion in the Second Yugoslavia. However, since Bosnia and Herzegovina became some sort of “small Yugoslavia”, it is hard to find out some similar potential threat that could unite the main nations. By the Washington Agreement and DaytonParis Accords, Bosniacs and Croats are supposed to be allies, but in practice the Croats and Serbs can also become allies opposing Moslem centralizing tendencies. The latter alliance would exist as long as Croats and Serbs have to live within the Federation and the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina i.e. cannot unite with their mother states. A next step could be a conflict between a Greater Croatia and a Greater Serbia for division of the whole Bosnia and Herzegovina’s territory. As the peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina looks more enforced than desired by the local sides, it will probably last as long as sufficient enforcement lasts, and there is a great uncertainty about what will happen afterwards. Basic has concluded that the beast of nationalism showed its darkest side in Bosnia and Herzegovina: The severest pogrom devastated the complete state organisation and according to some authors,... the clash between Islamic and Christian cultures has deeper origins and there is a supposition that in the future it may start anew comprising a wider region. The efforts made by the International Community to settle these problems, for which they are partly responsible, will probably result in some adequate solutions regarding the status of different nationalities and confessions
(1996: 66).
5
Yugoslavia
Since 1992, the FRY has had ambitions to be the third South Slav (Yugoslav) state consisting of the two remaining republics of the Second Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro). Serbia includes the so-called “proper”, “nuclear” or “narrow” Serbia and provinces of Vojvodina and Kosovo (“Field of Blackbirds”).60 Serbs form the biggest population within Serbia proper, Vojvodina and FRY. Albanians are the second biggest population in the country and the highest population in Kosovo.61 Montenegrins are third biggest population in the country and also the most numerous in Montenegro. Most Yugoslavs live in the northern parts of the country,62 while Hungarians live mostly in Vojvodina; Muslims in the southwest of Serbia proper; Croats and Bunjevci in Vojvodina; and Macedonians in Serbia proper. There are around twenty smaller ethnic groups such as the Bulgarians, Romanians, Slovenes, Croats, Jews, Slovakians, Ruthenians, Gypsies, Tzintzars, Vlachs etc. Table 5.1
Ethnic composition of Third Yugoslavia
Nuclear Serbia Serbs 5.082.000 Albanians 76.000 Montenegrins 75.000 Yugoslavs 146.000 Muslims 174.000 Croats 27.000 Macedonians 31.000 Others 130.000 Total 5.824.000 Source: 1991 Census.
Vojvodina
Kosovo
Montenegro
1.151.000
195.000 1.608.000 20.000
57.000 41.000 380.000 26.000 90.000
-
44.000 169.000 -
74.000 17.000 511.000 2.013.000
112
-
57.000 -
-
-
-
53.000 1.955.000
-
615.000
Total 6.485.000 1.725.000 519.000 341.000 321.000 101.000 48.000 694.000 10.407.000
Yugoslavia 113 5.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry According to historical facts and myths, in prehistoric times, beside Illyrians, tribes of the Indo-European Thracians and Dacians populated the Balkans. According to one theory, Albanians63 are descended from the Illyrians, who had populated the western parts of the Balkan Peninsula from at least 1000 BC (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). However, some authors are not sure whether Albanians are of Illyrian or ThracianDacian origin (for more details see Stanovcic, 1988: 24). In any case, they are considered to be an indigenous people of the Balkans. Knowledge of South Slav history in general is very uncertain until the sixth century. According to mainstream theories, Slavs came to parts of Eastern Europe from Asia in the third or second millennium BC. In the fifth and sixth centuries AD the great migration of the Slavs ended along the upper Dnieper river, into the territory between the Elbe-Saale and the Oder line and Moravia, Bohemia, Hungary and the Balkans (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In the modem German language, Serben means “any member of a Slavic minority living in eastern Germany”. Some 75,000 Sorbs64 live mostly in the valley of Spree river and in the areas of Cottubs and Bautzen (Budysin), which have been parts of the region of Lusatia centred on the upper Spree and Neisse rivers, in eastern Germany. Serbs,65 as a Slav tribe name, appeared in the land along the Elbe belonging to the European westernmost Slavs which was later situated in Germany, Greater Poland and in Pomorje (see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974: 922; Ivic, 1981: 133-8). The Slavs were plundering Thrace in 545 and threatening Dyrrhachium in 548. A Slavic people Sclaveni approached Constantinople in 550, invading it in 559, when they - along with the Kutrigur Bulgars - crossed the Danube river (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). The Serbs’ history becomes more accurate only after their arrival to the Balkans from 610 to 641 (see Jankovic, 1972: 3). They originated from the unbaptized White Serbs living in the north (see Cirkovic, 1981: 144-5; Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1967: 505). Hungarians or Magyars, living primarily in Hungary, have minorities in Romania (Szeklers, meaning Frontier Guards), Croatia, Vojvodina, Slovakia and Ukraine. The old Hungarians were a mixture of Turkish and Ugric peoples from western Siberia wandering over the Turkish empire by the early fifth century. By 830 AD, they reached the banks of the Don
114 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia River; and by the end of the century they conquered the Slavs and Huns (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). It is not certain whether the Bunjevci - the ethnic group living mostly in the north of Backa (Vojvodina), Lika, Slavonija etc. - are an extension of the Croats or Serbs, although Bunjevci consider themselves as a distinct people originating from the Dinara mountain and north of Svilaja before the Turkish invasions. Their name is similar to the name of a small Herzegovina river Buna, which has its origin in “bunja” (a round field house) (for more details see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1956: 304; Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974). Another extension is that of the Goranci people, who live in the municipality of Dragas, the Gora region, in the southernmost part of Kosovo, considered by many Serbs as their own friends (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1958: 491), and by some authors as an extension of the Muslims. 5.2 State traditions In the third century BC, the Romans took a part of Illyrians’ territory, and in 168 BC the remaining part of their state Dardania66 (in present-day Albania) was destroyed by the Romans who conquered the Balkan peninsula by the first century AD. Tribe groups and clans which used to be the basis of north Albanians’ (Ghegs’) social and family life were widely present among Albanians, Serbs and others in Kosovo and Macedonia. Southern Albanians (Tosks) were more exposed to foreign influences thanks to the easier accessibility of the territory (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). When Byzantine emperor Heraclius I - allied with various upcoming Serbian tribes - pushed out the Avars and Bulgars, Serbs were allowed to settle between the Sava river and Din aric mountains (see Cirkovic, 1981: 145). The Balkan mountains enabled peoples to take refuge in them, thus preserving (see Fine, 1983: 2) and simultaneously changing their identities. The Serbian peasant and patriarchal zadruga traditions grew during Turkish rule and remained during the Communist era. Job nepotism was a result of family loyalties originally established within the zadruga system. In the ninth century a “veliki zupan” (the most important among the zupani) Vlastimir created the first state (to which Serbs trace a political identity) centred in Raska, extending over the valleys of a few rivers roughly between the Kopaonik and Durmitor mountains. In 955 the Magyars were defeated by Otto I. Geza organized Hungary into an independent and strong state, the main one of East-central Europe in
Yugoslavia 115 the twefth century. In 1241 Mongols killed approximately half of population; the state was ruled mostly by foreigners after the Arpad dynasty died out in 1301 (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In the tenth century Serbian zupan Ceslav unified several Serbian tribes establishing rule over Ibar and the Sava river. The ruler of Zeta (close to Kotor Bay in modem Montenegro) Michael received the title of king from Pope Gregory VII in 1077; ecclesiastical allegiance to Constantinople was later confirmed (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). Nemanjic dynasty was established by Stefan I Nemanja (ruled 1159-96), who enlarged the country by taking Zeta, Hum and Travunija. Stefan II Nemanja Prvovencani (the “First-Crowned”) (1196-1228) was also granted the title of king by Pope Honorius III, recognizing the Orthodox religious centre in Constantinople. His brother Rastko (canonized Sava) Nemanjic (1175-1236) served as a minister of foreign affairs. Stefan Dusan Powerful (1331-55) took control over territory from Belgrade to modem southern Greece, including Thessaly, Epirus, Macedonia, Albania,67 Montenegro and a part of Eastern Bosnia. He was crowned in Skopje; besides his political and economic achievements, he legislated and published his code of laws Dusanov zakonik. The Kosovo battle has had a long and crucial significance for Serbia and the Serbs’ identity (see Petrov, 1991). Serbs talk about their sufferings during Turkish rule and the world wars as though they themselves had taken part in them. “They do not see the logic of the proposition that if Serbia demands minority rights for Serbs in Croatia, then Serbia is obligated to grant those same rights to Albanians in Kosovo.” They only see enemies hating and plotting against them, maligning them in the media and killing their children. It is unimportant whether that judgement is real or not; it is important that the Serbs believe it. Doder stressed “the genius of Milosevic is his ability to mould a medieval myth of Serb identity to his political purposes today”. For centuries the Kosovo myth has been “the touchstone of the Serb national character”. The myth of Kosovo - transmitted by the generations - is devoted to Prince Lazar’s pre-battle choice of a heavenly or earthly empire. Allegedly, his choice (or the Serbs’ rationalization) was the empire of heaven as it is everlasting. The battle has been seen as “the cataclysmic event that led Serbs into captivity”. Serbs in Serbia and elsewhere in the former Yugoslavia “are obsessed with the myth, which calls on them to avenge the injustice of Kosovo” regardless of the sacrifice. Milosevic has been the most popular
116 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia post-Second World War leader of Serbia since he promised half a million people in Kosovo that “nobody will beat you again” on the 600th anniversary of the battle. He also said, “the Serbs ‘throughout their history never conquered or exploited anybody else’”. Serbs and Greeks have inherited the notion of threatening and being threatened by hostile neighbours. As Doder (1993) concluded, “however medievally morbid, there can be no understanding of the Serbs without fathoming those sentiments. And unless the West understands the Serbs and their interests, there can be no lasting peace on the territory of the former Yugoslavia” (Doder, 1993: 15-17). For many Serbs the meaning and significance of the 1999 NATO intervention in favour of KLA could be compared with the Kosovo battle. The Croats and particularly the Serbs believe that they themselves were the last protection of the civilized West against the barbarian East. Were die winners of the Kosovo battle Serbs, who lost Lazar and whose army (also composed of Albanians and Hungarians) was destroyed, or Turks, who withdrew after Murad was killed - and if so why? Why did the Turks wait for decades to conquer Serbia, Bosnia and try to go further? Is this the way in which Serbia finally came to be perceived as “East” to the West and “West” to the East? The Kosovo battle may be compared with the 480 BC Thermopylae battle, in which the king of Sparta Leonidas (489?-480) died with 300 Spartans, a contingent of their serfs and slaves and 1,100 Boeotians. The Persians “won” the battle with great losses; he and his soldiers were buying time to enable most of the Greek troops to rejoin their main forces. In 1916 the Montenegrin army fought the Austro-Hungarian army in the Mojkovac battle, preventing it from attacking the Serbian army and in that way enabling it to withdraw towards the Adriatic Sea and Albania (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1965: 150-1). During the rule of Djuradj the Black (1490-96), Zeta became known as Montenegro,68 which was successfully warring with the Ottomans using the advantages of its wild territory and diplomacy. During the occupation, the Turks did not extend their rule over the whole territory of Albania as well. Parts of Serbia’s, Montenegro’s and Albania’s populations were converted to Islam (motivated by political, economic and social privileges and payoffs, and avoiding violence). Those who did not do it were exempt from military service, but every five years 10-20 year old Christians were conscripted and converted by force. Serbs considered the converted who joined the Janissaries corps as the most ruthless soldiers. Christians from Serbia fled to Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sumadija, Montenegro, Dalmatia,
Yugoslavia 117 Croatia, Hungary or to the mountains of Serbia. After the defeat of Turks near Vienna in 1683, Serbs supported Austrian offensive troops; in 1691 fearing revenge after the Austrian withdrawal, some 30,000-40,000 Serb families, led by Archbishop Arsenije III Cmojevic, fled from Old Serbia to Bosnia and Herzegovina and southern Hungary (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1971: 520-1). In these areas, they had religious freedoms and the right to choose their duke and military governor. According to a Serbian version, after they left their homes, Albanian tribes populated parts of the territory; an Albanian version says that Albanians populated Kosovo before the Serbs came. These versions have provided one of the sources of tensions that have lasted to the present day. As the sides have similar experiences from different periods of their histories, the experiences became a base upon which - with the help of politicians, churches, media and others - societal security threats can easily be constructed. The Turks occupation of Albania, which started in 1388, needed more than forty years to be completed. However, relatively soon after that Gjergj Kastrioti Skanderbeg69 (1405-68) liberated the country (reoccupied by the Turks by 1506). His struggle for retaining Albania’s freedom strengthened the cohesion and solidarity of Albanians, “made them more conscious o f their national identity, and served later as a great source of inspiration in their struggle for national unity, freedom, and independence” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995, my italics). About 25% of Albania’s population fled to southern Italy, Sicily and Dalmatia. Islamization aggravated the religious fragmentation of Albanians, from the Middle Ages “and later used by Constantinople and Albania’s neighbours in attempts to divide and denationalize them. Hence leaders of the Albanian national movement in the 19th century used the rallying cry ‘The religion of Albanians is Albanianism’ in order to overcome religious divisions and foster national unity” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). As Turkey was getting weaker and Russia more involved in European and Turkish affairs (allying with Montenegrins and Serbs from Serbia), at the end of the eighteenth century the Serbs established an autonomy. Montenegro enlarged its territory; under Prince Petar I Njegos (1782-1830) Muslims were repeatedly massacred; the sultan accepted the independence of Montenegro in 1799. The isolation has left a deep trace in the Montenegrins’ national psyche, “where past and present merge in an often boastful and self congratulatory melange of fact and mythology” (Simic, 1997: 114).
118 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia In the early 1800s, the non-Magyar nationalities in Hungary (60% of the population) “resented the strongly pro-Magyar content of the new laws”. After Hungary declared independence in 1949, the Austrians with Russians established the Austria-Hungary monarchy, in which Hungary had autonomy, and whose defeat in the First World War resulted in several states receiving parts of Hungary (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In the eighteenth century, power in Albania was transferred to local pashas and bajraktars (tribal heads). After the first Serbian uprising against the Turks, Serbia received autonomy in 1806. Milos Obrenovic (1817-39) led the second uprising in 1815, after the plundering of Serbia by Turks, Albanians and soldiers from Bosnia. In 1878, the Albanian League was established in the Kosovo town Prizren, attempting to unify Albanian territories and to improve education and culture; it was suppressed by Turks in 1881 (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). Serbia was recognized by the treaties of San Stefano and Berlin in 1878. The Serbs and Croats in southern Hungary were exposed to attempts at Hungarization; Austria-Hungary annexed Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1908. Serbian Prince Milan Obrenovic signed agreements with Habsburgs without informing his government (see Jankovic, 1988: 91-2) virtually renouncing Serbia’s claims to Bosnia and Herzegovina “to permit no Serbian intrigues against the Dual monarchy”; “in return, Austria-Hungary pledged to support the Obrenovic dynasty and Prince Milan’s proclamation of his kingship in Serbia” (see Friedman, 1996: 57-8, 80-1 n. 2). In 1910, Albanians started an uprising ending in some autonomy and reforms. The Young Turks’ failed reforms gave more rights to different peoples; Turkish nationalists clashed with other nationalists in the state. The rebellion (1909-12) by Hasan Bey Prishtina originated in Kosovo; the Great Powers did not allow its incorporation into the state that it was intended to create. Serbia, Greece, Montenegro and Bulgaria were “explicitly encouraged to start a war against the Ottomans, which they did in 1912-1913” (Kovacevic, 1998: 16). Serbia and Montenegro’s reasons for entering the First Balkan War (1912-13) was the fact that Macedonia, Kosovo and some other regions were partly populated by Serbs and Montenegrins; as a result, Turkish rule in Macedonia and Albania was eliminated by the armies of the neighbouring states previously creating plans for division of the region. A group of Albanian leaders, encouraged by Austria-Hungary, proclaimed the formation and independence of Albania in Vlore November 1912. The Albanian borders were decided by the Great Powers (in London 1913) whose major concern was to protect their interests rather than to
Yugoslavia 119 allow Albanians to live in their own common state. Russia accepted the decision after guaranteeing the interests of Serbia and Montenegro were taken into account. The British Foreign Secretary Sir Edward Grey said: “The primary ... was to preserve the agreement between the Great Powers themselves” (quoted after Zavalani, 1969: 71), even if the borders of the Albanian nation and Albania “emerged seriously mismatched”; the state left out almost a half of the Albanians (Danopoulos and Chopani, 1997: 171; Kovacevic, 1998: 15-17). Albania was internationally recognized in 1921 only (more Isakovic, 1987: SO; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). The London Treaty allowed Serbia and Montenegro territorial gains in Kosovo, on the Albanian border; by dividing the old Turkish Sandzak of Novi Pazar a common border was created, but the First World War halted discussions about the unification. Greece go to the greater part of (^ameria; some 35,000 Greeks and unknown number of Serbs and Montenegrins were left in Albania. However, Greece counted all Orthodox Albanians (20% of the population) as Greeks, claiming the number of ethnic Greeks was much larger. Since that time, Kosovo Albanians and the Greeks in Albania remained as problems to Albania in its relations with the two neighbouring states (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). Italy and AustriaHungary proposed an independent Albanian state opposed by France and Russia supporting Greek and Serbian claims; and Albania was established as an independent and neutral state protected by the powers (see Bogdan, 1989: 145). Serbia and Montenegro were forced by Austrians to secede parts of the controlled territory in order to form a newly established Albania. As the Serbs were thus denied the sea exit, and the Austrians demonstrated that the existence of a powerful Serbia was an obstacle to their “Drang nach Osten policy”, Serbian hostility towards Austria was strengthened. As Stanovcic (1988) concluded, “a year before the Second Balkan War’s impact’s on plans for Greater Bulgaria, the First Balkan War affected pretensions to Greater Albania. European Powers at the same time prevented Serbia, Montenegro, and Greece from realizing their own plans to divide Albania” (see Stanovcic, 1988: 24, 39). A prince appointed by the powers in 1914 soon left Albania. The First World War pushed the country into a new crisis without political authority. At the Paris Peace Conference, the extinction of Albania was averted largely through the efforts of President Woodrow Wilson, who vetoed a plan by Britain, France and Italy to partition Albania among its neighbours (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995).
120 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia In the Second Balkan War Macedonia was divided by the three neighbours according to the Bucharest Peace Contract of 1913 (see Roskin, 1991: 33-4; Zametica, 1992: 32) and the northern and central parts of Macedonia were was given to Serbia territories in the south. After the beginning of the First World War, a number of South Slav politicians and intellectuals from Austria-Hungary established a Yugoslav Committee in London supported by the government of Serbia (see Friedman, 1996: 79). In July 1917, representatives of the Committee and the Serbian exile government signed the Corfu Declaration proposing a single constitutional monarchy (with two alphabets, three national names, flags and religions) not mentioning whether it was supposed to be a federal or unitary state. In November 1918, the Montenegro Assembly deposed the king and announced the union of the Serbian and Montenegrin states; Montenegro was taken into the new Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. Serbia had lost a significant part of its population in the Balkan Wars (see Mitrovic, 1981; Doder, 1993: 9). Of all the constituent parts of this state, Montenegro had conspicuously suffered the greatest proportionate loss of life during the First World War, and Serbia’s loss could be ranked as the second highest, although estimates differ. The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was as multinational as the Hapsburg empire; the international community assumed “the Yugoslavs were tribes of a single people and, if united, would forge a common national existence”. Yugoslav nationalists ignored historical, religious and other differences (see Doder, 1993: 7). The First Yugoslavia was created in 1918 as the state of the three nations among which Serbs and Croats could not establish separate national states because of the very complex ethnic picture of the South Slavic area, and only within a common state could most members of their nations be included. Ruled by Serbia’s royal dynasty, it was a problematic country from the very beginning. Over 12% of its citizens used non-Slavonic tongues (principally Albanian, Hungarian and German), but the essence of the problem was the fact that Serbs wanted Yugoslavia to be centralized Yugoslavia while Croats wanted it decentralized. It seems that in these circumstances a compromise could be found in the federal organization of the country, but King Alexander saw a solution to the problem in a unitary nation-state concept. After the assassination of the three Croat deputies by a King’s agentdeputy in central Parliament in 1928, the 1929 monarchist coup and the assassination of King Alexander in Marseilles by Croat nationalists in 1934,
Yugoslavia 121 Yugoslav politics also degenerated into tribalism, with political parties concentrated around ethnic blocs. Administrative units (banovine) were named by the King after major rivers; and some boundaries differed from the historical or ethnic distribution of the populations. Croat politicians discussed plans to break up Yugoslavia with foreign leaders, and in 1941 Prince Paul, the regent of Yugoslavia, joined the Tripartite Pact two days before his government was overthrown in a military-populist coup. Germany then attacked and dismembered Yugoslavia, dividing it between Italy, Bulgaria and Hungary; a puppet regime was established in Serbia. Before the Second World War political life in present-day Albania used to be dominated by the most numerous group, the Ghegs, who were known to be capable warriors. Their ruler Ahmed Bey Zogu was forced to flee to Yugoslavia for a while, but soon returned supported by the same neighbouring state. Many people migrated from the poor country before Italy occupied it in 1939 (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). The First Yugoslavia and the Second World War created for Serbs in Serbia the national traumas between Serbs and Albanians and Serbs and Muslims. The Albanians perception is of ruthless Serbian occupation ever since the Berlin Congress, 1878, of increasing Albanian areas, Serbian colonization of Kosovo, racist attempts at Serbianization, expulsion of Albanians to Turkey, repeated Serbian massacres etc. A widespread Serbian version remembers Turks expelling Serbs from Kosovo - their historical heartland encompassing Kosovo Polje and Serb cultural monuments implanting Moslemized Albanians there. Job (1993) concluded that “the myths have almost no limit. Serbs say they always fought only for freedom. They say Kosovo was and always will be sacred Serbian land” (Job, 1993: 63). During the Second World War, the Albanian fascist Balli Kombetar collaborated with the occupiers, expelling many Serbs from Kosovo and facing a sort of police rule afterwards and so on. The idea of Greater Albania was temporarily realized under Italian and German protection (see Stanovcic, 1988: 24), i.e. during the occupation of Albania, Kosovo and some other parts of Serbia and Montenegro in the Second World War. Within the Second Yugoslavia, “most of these perceptions, originating in family traditions or political propaganda, have some historical background, sometimes much; they disagree on how many were killed, to what extent different peoples took part, and whether events were typical or exceptional" (seeWiberg, 1993:96-8).
122 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia At the end of the Second World War, the Yugoslav idea seemed to be gone. Some authors point out that, in fact, President Franklin Roosevelt entertained the idea of dismembering Yugoslavia, but Winston Churchill and Joseph V. Stalin did not accept it. In 1945 Tito and his Communists and partisans, who were leading a guerrilla uprising against the fascist coalition, restored Yugoslavia. After the war victory, Tito mled Yugoslavia for 35 years without any break, proclaiming the principle of “brotherhood and unity” of the South Slav and other peoples living in Yugoslavia. However, the heavy war heritage, the victory of the Communist partisan movement and international circumstances contributed to the fact that the Second Yugoslavia from the outset was a sort of authoritarian and centralized state. At the conference held on 9-20 October 1944 in Moscow, Churchill and Stalin agreed on division of the zones of influences in South-eastern Europe. The Western powers’ influence was to be predominant in Greece, Soviet influence would prevail in Romania and Bulgaria, while in Hungary and Yugoslavia it was to be divided 50:50. However, Soviet influence became predominant in Hungary after the 1956 intervention, and the Yugoslav regime switched from being Stalinist to non-Stalinist, in fact using Stalinist methods against him. Later central organs in Yugoslavia became guardians of interests of republics and their centres. After civil war and liberation in 1944, Communists led by Enver Hoxha - supported by Tosks - took power in Albania, which became an ally of Yugoslavia (1944-48), the Soviet Union (1948-61) and China (1961-78), and later a self-isolated country whose citizens were forbidden to travel abroad except for official business purposes (for more details see Isakovic, 1988: 81-90). According to the memoirs of a Yugoslav diplomat, Tito had the idea of including Albania in the Yugoslav federation and after that of including Kosovo within Albania. According to Djilas, the Albanian and Yugoslav governments “agreed in principle that Albania ought to unite with Yugoslavia, which would have solved the question of the Albanian minority in Yugoslavia”. During Djilas’ visit to Moscow, Stalin and Molotov told him that Yugoslavia “ought to swallow Albania - the sooner the better” (see Djilas, 1962: 121,130). After the defeat of Hungary in the Second World War, a Soviet occupation force continued to be present implementing a treaty which reaffirmed Hungary’s 1920 borders. A pro-Soviet provisional government was established by local Communists in 1945; and in 1949 the Hungarian People’s Republic was formed. The Stalinist regime was sharply opposed by rebellion in 1956, which was militarily suppressed by the Soviet Union. During the rule of Janos Kadar (1956-88), economic and cultural policy
Yugoslavia 123 was more liberal; Hungary was the most tolerant country in the Soviet bloc in eastern Europe (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). During Tito’s conflict with Stalin (1948-53) additional authoritarianism and centralization were imposed; it seems that the short-lived stay on the Western side of the “Iron Curtain” (see Bebler, 1990) has marked the history of the Second Yugoslavia decisively. In spite of some ups and downs, the process of opening gained momentum by the late 1950s and early 1960s with market-oriented reform. Serbia and Montenegro used to be two of the six republics within the Second Yugoslavia; Serbia itself had approximately one-third of its population, territory and resources. However, it seems that Tito believed that balance was crucial to keep Yugoslavia together and to make his rule easier and safer. Decentralization in Yugoslavia as well as other socialist countries was a result of the fact that it was impossible to maintain economic growth by means of the command economy. On the other hand, functional decentralization offered the chance to strengthen technocracy, and territorial decentralization - a chance to strengthen the position of separatist forces. As technocracy and separatists challenged the Communist monopoly (see Lazic, 1994 ), it seems that the Communist system in Yugoslavia and most of the other European Communist countries had ceased to be effective by the late 1960s; it was to take another two decades before it finally collapsed as these countries had their own accumulated reserves in terms of both political and economic resources. The “Yugoslav road to socialism” included samoupravljanje (selfmanagement) on a municipal and enterprise level although the system was never self-managed, except rhetorically (see Schierup, 1990: 77-9; Sekelj, 1993: 31-143). It was stressed that “the communist political system in Central Europe and the East European Balkans, like that in the former Soviet Union itself, operated according to a de facto social contract: political acquiescence for economic security. On a country-specific basis this deal was reinforced by varying combinations of propaganda and repression. It was a relationship in which the Marxist myth of future utopian society had considerably less drawing power than a job virtually impossible to lose, subsidized food, an apartment, medicine and education” (Remington, 1994: 68-9). The ideas of the “new left” gained great influence among intellectuals in Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia and other republics as an embryo for the most important philosophic orientation in the history of the Second Yugoslavia developed by the Praxis group of philosophers (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995).
124 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia The Yugoslav federation was characterized by the fact that, in spite of rather broadly legally defined rights of ethnic groups and federal units, the main levers of power belonged to the centralized Communist party that thus represented the main integrating factor of the state. Schierup (1990) stressed that following Lenin’s thesis that “in multinational states the most dangerous is nationalism of the largest nations, while nationalism of small nations is progressive”, Yugoslav Communists were particularly rigorous towards Croatian and Serbian nationalism, while they supported the development of national awareness among smaller nations. In addition, the economic reforms brought increased political and administrative decentralization in the country (Schierup, 1990: 76,244). From 1949 to 1989 Hungary was governed by the HSWP which dominated the country’s politics, economics, culture and other areas. However, in the late 1980s fundamental changes in Soviet-like political system were encouraged by the relaxation of Soviet dominance over eastern Europe (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In order to make political elements of the country’s federal structure more proportional and balanced and to make it easier and safer to govern and manage, Tito sought to weaken Serbia: in addition to the three constituent nations of King Alexander’s Yugoslavia (Serbs, Croats and Slovenes) he turned “Southern Serbia” into the Republic of Macedonia; established Montenegro as one of Yugoslav republics, thus turning the Montenegrins into a nation in their own right, and created two political units within Serbia itself. The unitarist approach was gradually replaced by the concept of a Yugoslav commonwealth in which ethnic groups were given home rule and the right to national and cultural affirmation and in that way they were at least theoretically granted the important elements of protection of their identities. However, after 1964 federal units were becoming more and more national states, and less and less units in which all ethnic groups enjoyed equal rights. By the Second Yugoslav a constitution of nations had been created consisting of peoples whose primary existence was in Yugoslavia: Slovenes, Croats, Serbs, Montenegrins, Macedonians and also Muslims after 1974. Those peoples whose majorities lived in another state (Hungarians, Albanians, Turks, Italians etc.) were national minorities with no claim to having their own republics within Yugoslavia. The constitution had engraved the principle of self-determination (including secession) for constituent Yugoslav peoples and republics (if other republics agreed). Serbs in Croatia were not granted autonomy, but in Croatian and most other republics’ constitutions they were recognized as one of the constituent nations. Bosnia and Herzegovina was granted status as the state of
Yugoslavia 125 Muslims, Serbs and Croats. Borderlines between Yugoslav republics were drawn according to various criteria; administrative borders were not considered to be an important issue. However, when the independence of the states was recognized, the borders of republics suddenly divided nations, families, citizens, armies and soldiers creating official enemies and friends, determining international relationships and were decisive for the creation of a new state identity (see Fleiner-Gerster, 1994: 80). It was believed that the stability of the federation was reinforced by the country’s successful break-up with Stalin, by its opening to the Western and the Third World, by relative liberalization, and by the raising of living standards. It seemed that most causes of national conflicts within the First Yugoslavia were removed, and for years the new federal state enjoyed its reputation as a country that had successfully solved the national issue. Chronologically, the first signs of liberalization led to a réanimation of Croat nationalism in 1967, which revived Serbian memories of the Second World War years; Tito’ s suppression of the Movement in 1971 further nourished Croat frustrations. In addition, during 1968, the regime faced student demonstrations and the first demonstrations of ethnic Albanians in Kosovo (whose demands for their own republic were suppressed), “liberalism” (numerous managers of leading Serbian and other firms, intellectuals from the Praxis group, numerous journalists, experts) etc. The 1974 constitution was preceded by a series of constitutional amendments and until 1972 by political conflicts between supporters of various political and economic orientations etc. (see Sekelj, 179-87). From time to time it seemed that Tito was losing control over the LCY and the Yugoslav state, but observers sometimes explained it as signs of democratization. Tito was granted a lifetime presidency; and the leadership was to pass to the collective presidency composed of one representative from each of the republics and autonomous provinces, having a new chairman selected each year. By the constitution, the territories of both autonomous provinces within Serbia were parts of the territory of Serbia, and at the same time they were directly represented on the federal state level. These provinces were quasi-federal units without distinctive territories; and Serbia was a federal unit, which itself was not a federation, whose territory was composed of three parts. Serbia was supposed to be in control of its own territory but did not have complete legal and authorized means to do so as power was divided into three centres. The series of constitutional amendments incited Serbs to begin to show signs of discontent, blaming these amendments for the “protectorate of
126 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia provinces over the republic” and the “historic injustice towards the Serbian nation” (for instance, although provincial representatives were elected to the republican parliament, republican laws had limited effect on the territory of provinces). The construction seemed to be a compromise, which had been made as an attempt to satisfy both sides, with Albanians demanding their own republic and Serbs trying to keep Serbia in one piece. It was only after Tito’s death that politicians, media and others on both sides made it evidently clear that none of them was satisfied with the construction. One year after Tito’s death, the first serious challenge to the political balance of the second Yugoslavia came from Albanians in Kosovo staging mass demonstrations (which were, however, repressed) demanding the status of one of the Yugoslav republics in April 1981. Initial signs of profound disagreements also occurred between Belgrade, on the one hand, and Zagreb and the Ljubljana government, on the other; the acts of oppression had a significantly disturbing effect on relations within the Yugoslav federation. However, political elites and bureaucracies imposed their political will and used ethnic tensions to postpone demands for democratization. “Overall tensions and conflicts between ethnic groups in Yugoslavia certainly strengthen the positions of republic and provincial leaders who have pretended to be representatives of their respective ethnic groups” (see Stanovcic and Remington, 1991: 204). In Croatia, Serbia and Slovenia, the “bom again” nationalists among the Communist leaders as well as in the academies, universities and media all routinely declared that their people were threatened with extermination, not just culturally and in terms of their identity but even biologically. Sekelj (1993) concluded that “the decisive fact is that institutions designed to function after Tito’s death could only have functioned in his lifetime, or under the assumption of Tito-like charismatic personality” (1993: 187). On the other hand, Serbs stressed that during that time, Albanians in Kosovo - owing to the parity principle in employment dominated within society. In addition, republican organs had no direct competencies in Kosovo, while the Province was proportionally represented in republican and federal organs. During the 1980s, one ethnic Albanian was leader of the Yugoslav Presidency. Stanovcic (1995) concluded that Kosovo belongs to a group of very complex cases and described it in the following way: “For instance, an ethnic minority in a country inhabits a territory ... where it becomes the overwhelming majority. Then, using its autonomous position, i.e. regional power, this minority (majority in that region) oppresses other ethnic minorities which
Yugoslavia 127 would otherwise have become the majority in the country as a whole.” As minority and majority are relative terms, a lot depends on the level of the counting (Stanovcic, 1995: 15). The Scandinavian author Eriksen observed: “the nation-state may be accused of injustice both if it promotes equality and if it promotes difference. If the state stresses equal rights and duties, minority members may feel that their cultural distinctiveness is not being respected. ... If, on the other hand, the state stresses cultural differences, minority members may feel discriminated against” (Eriksen, 1991: 222). There is no universal “formula” for resolving problems in majority-minority relations. Most governments as well as minorities in the region are faced with, and take part in at the same time, a kind of vicious circle: from one point of view, the more disloyal a minority is to the state in which it has been living, presumably the more repression is used by the state; but from the other point of view, the more repression is used the less the minority is likely either to be loyal or to become loyal and to perceive the legal authority as legitimate, but instead perceives it as “plain domination” (see Duverger, 1972: 18). The inability of the federal leadership to find a longer-term political solution to this problem, bad treatment of Serbs in Kosovo by local Albanian authorities and discontent with the overall situation in the country were the reasons for the Serbs’ growing disappointment by the mid-1980s becoming increasingly visible among Serbian intellectuals. Nationalist narrow-mindedness and stereotyping emerged. Perverse, pseudo-scholarly papers ranting and raving about the pervasive existence of conspiracies began appearing in Serbian academic institutions. The cracks in Yugoslavia’s facade were becoming more noticeable, despite Tito’s ritualistic incantation: “Keep your brotherhood and unity like the apple of your eye” (see Job, 1993: 60), and after Tito’s death the frequently repeated pathetic slogan could still be heard: “After Tito - also Tito”. With an adequate basis provided by economic crisis, Albanian nationalism was further strengthened by being oppressed by revitalizing Serbian nationalism. Serbian journalist eroded the long existing taboo on nationalism, covering Kosovo Serb complaints about Albanian persecution,70 thus preparing the ground for the Serbian Communist Party to establish a nationalist platform. Tito’s history lesson did not work out as expected. Subsequent revisionists were exposing the monstrous crimes of the Second World War through high-profile trials, special exhibitions, and widespread dissemination of the record. Exhuming mass graves and the reburial of
128 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia remains were supposed to have a symbolic role in defining the borders of a state (“our” borders are where “our” graves are). As all sides declared that accusations against them were unjust or at least exaggerated, and those against the other side(s) were just but often minimized, one could conclude that the narcissisms and traumas of the sides were awakening. All republics agreed that republics, and not autonomous provinces, could constitutionally secede, but there existed a danger that an Albanian republic might therefore secede. “The clinching constitutional argument was that only nations qualified for republics.” The Soviet invasion of Afghanistan had also created nervousness in Belgrade. Demonstrations were ruthlessly suppressed and - as a result of strengthened Albanian nationalism - Serbian nationalism also emerged. At the same time, a draft memorandum to the SASA was prepared by a working group; it was never officially presented, and excerpts or copies were leaked, creating rumours. As Wiberg (1993) explains, “Its main points appear to have been: (1) preserve and democratize Yugoslavia with equal rights for all peoples; (2) if Yugoslavia disintegrated, Serbs should live together, hence administrative boundaries should be revised; (3) proposals for revisions and implementation were presented.” Wiberg concludes, “to Serbs it would appear innocuous, just stating the obvious in terms of identity and security. If it was intended to dissuade secession, it was extremely counterproductive: other peoples ignored (1), seeing (2) and (3) as immediate plans.” Autonomy of the provinces was first limited, and in 1988, when the Albanians elected their own parliament and declared an independent state (recognized only by Albania), it was sharply reduced in a constitutionally dubious way, with protests being suppressed. After a more Serbian government was established by mass demonstrations in Vojvodina, fears of Serbian nationalism and Yugoslav centralism grew. Open Croatian nationalism reappeared; in 1991 Slovenia became secessionist for the first time (see Wiberg, 1993: 99-100). Slovenia and Croatia demanded “a status as subjects under international law with at most a loose confederation with the rest of Yugoslavia”, while Serbia and Montenegro called for a centralist revision of the Yugoslav constitution. The memorandum supplied the basis for Serbs’ growing preoccupation with the past, which provided a political force of its own when manipulated by politicians. The sense of victimization could also partially explain the absence of a simultaneous and strong public reaction to violence committed by Serb forces fighting in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and later Kosovo. Serbs talked about their nation’s suffering under Turkish rule and
Yugoslavia 129 sacrifices in the two world wars as if they themselves had taken part in them. A traditionalist believes in a myth as the truth. Job has described this symmetry stressing that the Serbian king, army, government and parliament left their country before the onslaught of the German and Austro-Hungarian armies in 1915 to cross the snowbound Albanian mountains and fight another day. It was “certainly a glorious page in Serbian history. But in the popular culture the idea of viciously hostile Albanians killing exhausted Serbian soldiers and civilians is carefully and persistently nurtured, with scarcely any mention of the mayhem that Serbian soldiers inflicted in return” (Job, 1993: 62). The case of Dimitrije Tucovic, the leader of the Serbian Social Democratic Party before the First World War, who severely criticized Serbia’s attitude towards Albanians (see Tucovic, 1914), was among the exceptions on the Serbian side. In such circumstances, a new generation of the Serbian Communist nomenclature saw a chance to promote and strengthen their position by starting to act from openly nationalist positions. Skilfully using the media, they soon attracted most of the public, intelligentsia and Orthodox Church to their side and finally took over power in Serbia and Montenegro through populist so-called “antibureaucratic revolution” (Job, 1993: 63). Now, in addition to one vote originating from Serbia proper in the Presidency of Yugoslavia, Serbian leadership took control over votes of the Serbian autonomous provinces Vojvodina and Kosovo, and of Montenegro. The republics of Croatia and Slovenia and various others became dissatisfied with the fact that they only had control of their own votes; it was perceived as an additional potential instrument of the hegemony discrediting the federal project and allowing Tudjman and HDU to remain at the top. The concurrence of the imaginary “we” with territorial borders is a condition for the functioning of democracy and political community. This “we” has to prevail over the atomizing and centrifugal forces of conflicting personal and group interests and to establish a distance from others as well (see Obradovic, 1991: 36). In multinational states, the “we” identity can be established mainly via two concepts: the ethno-national and civil concept giving birth to ethno-national and/or civil loyalty to a state. Considering civil loyalty Basic (1996) has stressed “activities and intentions of the state must be in the direction of attracting citizens for a loyal attitude to the values and institutions of the society. Loyalty is not a transcendental construction that a state grants by its origin. It is, instead, a set of pragmatic
130 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia and for citizens useful, activities by which the state acquires legitimity”. If the state “fails to meet the minimum requirements in terms of establishment of identification values, it is hard to believe that any state could count with a stable social development.” The cases of the states that established their identity on the civil concept justify the view that “respect for the principles of the rule of law, legally governed states, civil society, tolerant and consensus based resolution of conflicting interests, represent the framework adequate for transition of post-communist, multi-ethnic societies”. If the civil principle is a basic social value, it becomes a guard against any ethnonationalistic particularism (Basic, 1996: 54). Yugoslav national identification did not become an intensive process even after the First Yugoslavia was renamed “Kingdom of Yugoslavia” in 1929. The Tito regime first counteracted national cleavages by encouraging people to identify themselves as “Yugoslavs”, rather than Croats, Serbs etc. “Those attempts towards a Yugoslav identity changed character after 1964, now limited to making it superordinate to ethnonational ones, not a substitute for them” (Wiberg, 1995b: 94). Yugoslavs were relatively numerous in mixed areas (Vojvodina and parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina), and quite rare in more homogeneous ones; most self-declared Yugoslavs were from ethnically mixed families rather than “ideological” Yugoslavs. “Many more combined identifying themselves ethnonationally with a political identification as Yugoslav citizens, even taking some pride in self-management and non-alignment as particular Yugoslav features. This combination, however, was very vulnerable to possible perceptions of contradiction between the elements” (Wiberg, 1995b: 94-5). The sources of the lack of the Yugoslav national identification and loyalty were in the relative economic poverty of the society as well as in a lack of readiness of the royal, Communist and, understandably, national rulers and decision-makers to share a bigger portion of the existing capital and other necessary elements of political and social power with intellectuals, who could be expected to create and disseminate substantial elements of such an ideology. A rational way to explain the lack would be to mention a combination of self-interest as well as the above-mentioned secondary aims, which were present at the beginning of the First Yugoslav state, and maybe to some degree and in some cases at the start of the Second Yugoslavia. Communist leaders had an additional reason: the egalitarianism that characterized Communism in Yugoslavia (although not as much as in most other Communist states).
Yugoslavia 131 However, the Second Yugoslavia was one of the rare European states in which there was no “official language” of “official nation”. It seemed necessary that Yugoslavia should disintegrate while undergoing democratic transformation owing to its failure to solve the national question. Effectiveness is by no means identical with justice, and overly complex solutions - however well-intentioned - can scarcely work. The metanational idea of Yugoslavism carries the seed of dissension within itself from its very inception, since it is motivated to a great extent by concerns for the preservation of national identities. “Just” solutions of the national question are founded upon the establishment of balance of power; this aim was pursued ever since the First Yugoslavia was established. It was possible that some people who defined themselves as Serbs, Croats, Macedonians, etc., felt themselves to be Yugoslavs at the same time. The key question is, however, which of these identifications is the dominant one, which will prevail in a crisis situation in which they at least partly exclude each other. It seems logical to assume that Yugoslav identification was weaker (if it existed at all) in those citizens who did not explicitly define themselves as Yugoslavs. The category of Yugoslavs, which corresponds to the decrease of ethnic heterogeneity and particular cultural differences, was first introduced only in the census of 1961 and, perhaps, many “Yugoslavs at heart” defined themselves as members of different nations by inertia, simply according to the facts of their ethnic origin. As statistics seem to be nevertheless the best indicator that there were very few Yugoslavs in the Second Yugoslavia, an almost insignificant percentage of the citizens was deprived of their homeland in disintegration of Yugoslavia, while the remainder in all probability felt completely “patriotic” in new states. Anyway, in the carving up of the country the fear of remaining outside the territory of “one’s” home republic - that is, of the desired sovereign nation state - was most evident. The total number of Yugoslavs was so hopelessly insufficient that they were unable to preserve the common state by their political will. In 1981 there were almost no Yugoslavs in the “peripheral” republics: Macedonia, Slovenia, as well as in the province of Kosovo. The language barrier could explain the fact, by the high degree of ethnic homogeneity in these territories, and probably by the effect of the educational system as well. Although the number of those who have identified themselves as Yugoslavs has increased there as well in relation to the censuses of 1961 and 1971, that increase was far from the increase which was characteristic
132 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia of the Serbo-Croatian speaking areas (for more details see Obradovic, 1991: 38-40). A common media and information system (television above all), increased mobility through tourism and other kinds of migrations, and the experience of urban life all contributed to this change in the number of inhabitants. Despite the countrification of the cities, they remained important educational and civilizational centres, which in some cases were capable of making people accept in advance an identity which was in accordance with the one they expected to find there. That migrations - at least partly - were “responsible” for the emergence of Yugoslavs, may perhaps best be seen from the results of the census of 1971 since their number was smallest then - only 1.3%. From the 273,077 persons who identified themselves as Yugoslavs then, some 42.5% had moved from other areas - which is the greatest percentage of migrants in an ethnic group, more than double the Yugoslav average that amounted to 19% (Demografska kretanja..., 1978: 73). Table 5.2
Yugoslavs in the capitals of Yugoslav republics and provinces (1971)
Capital Yugoslavs (%) Novi Sad 4.9 Sarajevo 4.4 Belgrade 4.3 Zagreb 2.5 Titograd 1.9 Average for the country 1.3 Ljubljana 0.8 Skopje 0.6 Pristina 0.2 Source: D em ografska kretanja.. ., 1978: 89-90.
It was concluded that the existence of Yugoslav identification seemed to be indispensable for the preservation of the Second Yugoslavia as a federation through which fundamental psychological agreement of its citizens exists with the democratic procedure and institutions of the federal system (Obradovic, 1991: 41). At the beginning of the 1990s the most popular question became: “Why should we be a minority in your state, when you can be a minority in our state?” But that thought understates the ferocious nationalism of “ethnic
Yugoslavia 133 cleansing”, whose main message is “No minorities at all in my ethnically homogeneous state” (see Job, 1993: 52-3). Internal security problems of the Second Yugoslavia primarily concerned the idea of the state. Yugoslavia was questioned more internally than internationally: creating a Yugoslav identity overshadowing ethno-national identities had failed. The ideology of Yugoslavism - except perhaps that originated by mixed marriages - had been too strongly tied to MarxistLeninist roots to allow liberal versions of it to gain strength quickly enough to compete successfully with all the rampant nationalisms (cf. Wiberg, 1993: 230). An alternative but unacceptable solution was to avoid competition between identities by successive decentralization in constitutional compromises. As Obradovic (1991: 41) stressed, however, it was not as transparent that die citizens’ consent for the confederal arrangement was also related to some kind of Yugoslav patriotism. After the end of the Cold War the external security problems of Yugoslavia stemmed from its location. In the previous period solutions included non-alignment and strong defensive force (YPA), but future secessionist republics saw it as the problem, calling for drastic cuts while planning or even creating their own national guards; attacking one of the few remaining symbols of Yugoslav identity: Yugoslavist ideology harmonized with YPA interests and with government interests in preventing secessionism (cf. Wiberg: 1991:105). Tito’s system had chosen a deadly combination: capital was imported mostly from the West, while the “rules of the (economic and political) game” came mostly from the East or were at least mixed. Petro-dollars, cheaply and easily borrowed in 1975-81, were squandered on consumption rather than productive investment, catching Yugoslavia in a debt trap as the dollar and real interest rates soared, and petro-dollars disappeared from international market. At the beginning of 1980s foreign debt was more than $20 billion (with interest, the total was more than $40 billion), politicians from various republics and nations started quarrelling about this issue, blaming each other instead of attempting to find a solution and prevent similar problems in the future. Some observers stressed that during the 1980s accelerating inflation and unemployment - and several aborted cures - decreased average real income sharply. It would have been surprising if political radicalism had not emerged; the only question was what kind of radicalism would be predominant (Wiberg, 1993 : 94-5). The leaderships of Croatia and Slovenia maybe wanted to improve their own economic and political situations by getting
134 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia rid of the rest of Yugoslavia and getting closer to the EC (Croats taking away the territory populated by Serbs). The leaderships of Serbia and Montenegro perhaps tried to gain centralization of the Yugoslav state (using the total numbers of their populations in such a “modem federation” as a political advantage) or, if this did not succeed, to support the Serbs from Croatia (and later those from Bosnia and Herzegovina) seeking to remain in same state as Serbia etc. When in 1981 military rule was established in Kosovo, the LCY interpreted the rebellion as “counterrevolution” and not as ethnic conflict. This was at least partly contributed to by the fact that various Albanian organizations themselves used Marxist-Leninist rhetoric in their documents. The Serbian leadership was accused of exploiting the symbolic meaning of Kosovo and Serbian nationalism in the power struggle within the federation over Serbia’s constitutional status as well as for “political terror” over Albanians. The Albanian side was blamed for expulsion (“silent ethnic cleansing”) of Kosovo ethnic Serbs by crimes and intimidation by the rapes, murders, desecration of graves etc. The Serbian interpretation of the problem’s cause was mostly “genocide” over Serbs, and the Croatian and Slovene interpretations were based on poor economic and other social conditions in Kosovo, which had been one of the poorest parts of the Second Yugoslavia as well as the FRY. As Pesic (1996) concluded: Kosovo demonstrated that ethnic conflicts could be invented and exacerbated through media propaganda. This effective tool became the principal mechanism for intensifying ethnic conflicts in Yugoslavia. In essence, the media dramatically staged reality for millions of Serbs and turned whatever potential existed in Serbia for ethnic hatred into a self-fulfilling prophesy (Pesic, 1996: 17).
The Yugoslav model had “an extreme radiation power”, especially for East European countries, which became evident at the beginning of the crisis in Poland (see Reuter, 1991: 115). In the US, as in most other Western countries, until the early 1980s Yugoslavia enjoyed a respect that exceeded its real size. It seems that the first indicator of a changing US policy towards Yugoslavia was in the change of attitude towards the problem of Kosovo (see Nikolis, 1992). Influential US diplomats continued to show affinity for the policy of new Serbian authorities led by Slobodan Milosevic, as many of them saw in him one of the new East European leaders who resolutely fought with Communist heritage. The turning point occurred in 1989, after changes in the position of Kosovo, and, in particular, after the celebration of the 600th
Yugoslavia 135 anniversary of the Battle of Kosovo, when estimates that the policy of the Serbian leadership led to armed conflict in Yugoslavia started to prevail in American analyses. A short break during the first half of 1990 was brought about by the reforms of the Yugoslav federal government, whose Prime Minister Ante Markovic, then enjoyed political (but unfortunately not economic) support from American political and economic circles. In October 1989, Hungarian Communists avoided the manifestations of popular unrest (which had been a feature of political life in Romania and Czechoslovakia) by abandoning their monopoly on power voluntarily; Hungary’s 1949 constitution was amended in order to create possibilities for the country to move towards democratization. In 1990, after the first multiparty elections were won by the Hungarian Democratic Forum and its allies, the shift began towards a free-market economy. The comprehensive and costly Communist system of social-welfare was reformed by expanding private health care in the 1990s. In 1994, Hungarians, dissatisfied with rising unemployment and inflation, voted the Socialist Party into power (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). However, in Hungary as well as in many other ex-Communist states autonomous policymaking has not been possible (see Laux, 2000: 264). Ramiz Alia, who was Enver Hoxha’s successor in Albania, opened the country to the world and established a multiparty system (in March 1992 Democratic and other non-Communist parties won the first multiparty elections) and introduced a more marketized economic system, but Albania remained in deep economic crisis and poverty. As a result of the almost permanent political, economic and social crisis, several governments fell and state control over society weakened. Sali Berisha, leader of Democratic Party and Alia’s successor in 1992, had created within only four years what was called “a one-party state based on fear and corruption”. After his draft constitution was rejected in a referendum, in the next elections he was taking every move needed to secure his victory, including an organized re-election landslide, widely seen as fraudulent. It was considered that although Albania possessed the institutions of a Western democracy, it increasingly resembled “the interwar dictatorships of Eastern Europe” (Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1997a: 8). Aggravation of the political situation in Yugoslavia in the second half of 1990 gave rise to actions of the Albanian lobby, which submitted to the US Congress the draft amendment that abolished assistance to Yugoslavia because of violation of human rights of Albanians in Kosovo. The NicklesBentley Amendment, after a six-month period of grace, came into effect in
136 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia May 1990. In this way the US for the first time became indirectly involved in the Yugoslav crisis. At the beginning of June 1991, the Administration determined a policy towards Yugoslavia that included the following goals: 1. democracy (meaning that “all citizens of Yugoslavia should enjoy democratic rights and civil liberties and be able to represent themselves through free and fair elections”); 2. dialogue (“we mean that disputes between republics, ethnic groups, or individuals should be resolved only through peaceful means. We would be strongly opposed to any use of force or intimidation to settle political differences, change external or internal borders, block democratic change, or impose a non-democratic unity”); 3. human rights (“we mean the standards of behavior laid down in international commitments to which Yugoslavia is a party, including the Helsinki Final Act and subsequent ... CSCE ... documents. We attach particular importance to the provisions relating to the treatment of members of minorities”); 4. market reform (“we mean that we support Yugoslavia’ s transition to a full market economy, open to private ownership and investment”); 5. unity (which the US defined as “we mean the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia within its present borders. We believe that the ethnic heterogeneity of most Yugoslav republics means that any dissolution of Yugoslavia is likely to exacerbate rather than resolve ethnic tensions”) (“US Policy Towards Yugoslavia”, 1991: 395-6). In addition, it was underlined that “to be preserved, [Yugoslavia] must be put on a new, democratic, mutually agreed basis. This can only be achieved through dialogue and the furtherance of democratic processes”, and “the United States will not encourage or reward secession; it will respect any framework, federal, confederal, or other, on which the people of Yugoslavia peacefully and democratically decide. We firmly believe that Yugoslavia’s external or internal borders should not be changed unless by peaceful consensual means” (“US Policy Towards Yugoslavia”, 1991: 395). This declaration came when several hostile actions had already been undertaken by the rebel Albanians, Serbia and the two first secessionist republics, and when unity had thus not already been built on democratic and mutually agreed foundations, and it was hardly possible to achieve new such foundations, hi fact, they were not possible to achieve for many internal as
Yugoslavia 137 well as external reasons, constituting a complex body of actors, causes, conditions and influences that were to contribute to the country’s disintegration. Already in 1989 most of the politicians outside Serbia began to argue for the constitutional changes, claiming that the federal system created by Tito no longer functioned adequately. The Serbs perceived the move suspiciously, as another step in the long-running plot against them. According to Pesic, there were additional key themes of Serbian resentment: Yugoslavia was a Serbian delusion, Serbia was exploited; “Serbs are the losers, because they are the only ones who do not have a state proper. They win at war, but lose in peace” ; Serbs were exposed to hatred and genocide. In conclusion, it was proposed that a national state of all Serbs (excluding those who hated them and eradicating Serbophobia and national problems) could be a solution (see 1996, 18-20). At first an attempt was made to establish a hegemonic position via the central organs of the Communist Party (where the Serbian delegation had a majority) and by the application of the principle of democratic centralism. The LCY disintegrated thanks to the struggle concerning the issue of whether it should become an alliance of independent national parties. Political majorization was attempted within the federal parliament too (see Pecujlic and Nakarada, 1994: 36). Federal prime minister Ante Markovic, relying on EC and US support, tried to carry out his programme of economic and, to a lesser extent, political reforms, which had some success in the first half of 1990 - inflation was reduced from over 2,500% in December 1989 to 0% in March 1990; the country’s hard currency grew; liberalization of imports increased supply and eliminated the monopoly of domestic enterprises; during 1990 some 50,000 private enterprises were established; and foreign investments reached a record high level etc. Markovic’s government and federal parliament made a turn toward European integration (see Roskin, 1991: 180). Although it seemed at one point that Markovic was just a step away from success, and “Yugoslavia just half a pace from Europe”, his reforms did not have a strong political anchor in the country, while the West was unwilling to provide an adequate financial and political support (which was probably the last chance to preserve the country’s integrity). One may say that the main reason why Markovic failed was that he did not notice early enough that after disintegration of the LCY it was necessary to organize free multiparty federal elections (strongly opposed by Slovenia) for the Yugoslav parliament and other state organs as soon as possible. In this way, the growing conflict
138 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia between republican leaderships would be reduced to federal parliament and government, and it would provide the necessary legitimacy. Thus, this option practically failed, in spite of the fact that the Prime Minister until his resignation by the end of 1991 (at the peak of armed conflict in Croatia) unsuccessfully tried to mediate between the conflicting parties and to some extent preserve the initial results of the reform. The long-lasting conflict between “Serbian-Montenegrin” and “Slovenian-Croatian block” within the LCY culminated in February 1990, during its failed 14th Congress. The split had great significance for the future of the country. As Roskin emphasized, the tragedy was that the LCY was the only institution, which cut across republic lines. For many decades, all the leaders in republics used to be ex-Partisans. It was concluded, “this gave them a bonding that overshadowed ethnic differences”. When they retired, the bond disappeared (1991: 178). After the end of the Cold War policies of the Yugoslav republics (except Serbia and Montenegro), Albania, Hungary as well as other countries in the region became generally Western oriented. The first steps these countries intended to make were to enter the EU and NATO although at least the second step entailed various disadvantages (for more details see Isakovic, 1998). The meetings of Yugoslav republican leaderships have shown that the main purpose of multiparty elections and plebiscites held in individual republics was not the democratic transformation of Yugoslav society, but to obtain legitimacy for the platforms of republican leaderships regarding the future organization of the state. All actors in this political game could thus claim that they advocated a particular idea regarding the Yugoslav community just because that was what citizens in their respective republics largely wanted. The federal state was fully blocked, while intolerance between Yugoslav national elites escalated after the failure of interrepublican negotiations, rising mutual distrust between national leaders, intensive armament of the population on a national basis and creation of paramilitary formations. Nationalism and ethnic conflicts became the main instruments of “destructive domination technique” in the post-Communist period. Licht and Kaldor concluded, “the new (or perhaps merely revived) anti-Communist nationalism is much the same as Communist nationalism: both are fundamentally antidemocratic. There may be some progressive for ms of nationalism, but the new nationalism in the Balkans has sustained authoritarian structures and squeezed the diversity and pluralism required for real democracy” (1992: 7).
Yugoslavia 139 Wiberg considers that there was a basic dialectic within the process. “To many Serbs, Yugoslavia was never pro-Serbian and increasingly threatened Serbian interests, but it provided two basic guarantees.” The fact that all Serbs used to live in the same state protected Serb identity; though with some shortcomings the Serbs’ physical security, and hence that of the Serbian nation was protected in Yugoslavia. The more these Yugoslav guarantees were deflated (by secessions or further confederalization), the stronger became the pressure on the governments in Serbia and Montenegro to provide their own guarantees. The Yugoslavia
p ro je c t an d the G reater Serbia p ro je c t w ere thus com plem entary to each other.
(By the same logic, little Serbias in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina then became complementary to Greater Serbia.)
There is another aspect of this dialectic: the more the Serbs insisted on living together if Yugoslavia disintegrated, the more the northern republics wanted to secede; the more secessions, the more Serbian the remaining Yugoslavia became, spurring further secessions. Slovenia and Croatia having seceded, Macedonia and Bosnia-Herzegovina moved from mediation to secession (Wiberg, 1993: 100-1).
The Yugoslav crisis caught the EC in a delicate moment of transformation towards political union, putting to the top of agenda the issue of European political cooperation, and in particular common foreign and security policy (see Salmon, 1992). However, initial expectations that the EC would be able to resolve the Yugoslav problem quickly by offering “good offices”,71 i.e. political means, and thus assert itself as the dominant international factor in post-Cold War Europe, were not realized. The EC had never before engaged in solving a complex international political problem nor had it developed foreign-policy and security instruments (see Simic: 1992). Failure of fire earlier EC efforts to safeguard Yugoslavia’s constitutional order and organize negotiations between the confronting parties led to tightening of the EC’s standpoint towards the Yugoslav crisis and threats that financial assistance would be cancelled. The Council of Ministers of the EC was the first mediator in early 1991; no other actor made any sustained attempt at mediation except Gorbachev. After 1991, the role was increasingly shared with the UN. Wiberg concluded: “it is of particular interest to look at the resources of expertise available to the EC, its chairman states and its great powers”, which was
140 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia very rare in Western Europe. The level of cognitive competence of the EC was too low for a successful role of mediator, leading it to misjudge the likely consequences of several actions (see 1994a: 233-5). In 1993 Wiberg concluded that the Second Yugoslavia had three major interlocking triangles or “powder kegs”, based principally on national traumas. The first in Croatia, and the second in Bosnia and Herzegovina; the third was the Serbian-Albanian-Macedonian complex of relations (see 1993: 101,106). As Serbian identity is as tied to nation as the Croatian identity is to the state, and the Serbian nation covers a much wider territory than territory of the Serbia, Serbia used to be primarily threatened by the fragmentation of the Second Yugoslavia and FRY making it small, landlocked and surrounded by hostile neighbours. Thus, Serbs became a common element in all three triangles. Doder stressed that “deprived of Soviet backing after the USSR’s collapse, Milosevic made some disastrous diplomatic miscalculations. Instead of courting visiting American politicians, Milosevic snubbed them” by refusing to meet with seven American visiting senators including Bob Dole in 1990. “Instead of making his case to foreign journalists, his government imposed local taxes on them. Rather than levelling with Serbia’s traditional foreign allies, his aides involved them in a labyrinth of deception.” Serbian politicians incited Serbs to rebellion (spreading rumours that Muslims and Croats were planning new massacres against Serbs in Krajina and Bosnia and Herzegovina) instead of calming them. “By the time the war in Croatia began..., Milosevic’s popularity in the West was lower than that of ... Saddam Hussein. Milosevic was in a diplomatic vacuum” (Doder, 1993: 17). Trying to mediate between Yugoslav leaderships, Secretary of State James Baker, who came to Belgrade by the end of June, firmly opposed Croatian and, in particular, Slovenian separatism, pointing out that the US would not recognize the independence of these Yugoslav republics. In March 1994, in an interview given to TV net C-SPAN, he confessed that Slovenia and Croatia by their one-sided declarations of independence usurped the Yugoslav boundary, which was an act of violence and a violation of the Helsinki Chapter (Tanjug, 1994: 2). Such an attitude was the target of severe criticism in the US and West European countries, being understood as an encouragement to the Yugoslav federal state to use military means. Although the State Department renounced such accusations, prevailing estimates among analysts are that by mid-1991 the US was ready to accept a short and restricted military action, but the YPA
Yugoslavia 141 failed in quickly breaking the resistance of the Slovenian territorial defence (see Isakovic, forthcoming). The refugee problem also used to be a serious factor particularly in Germany with the liberal asylum tradition, and the strong stand for Croatia, which prevented Germany from simply throwing Croatian refugees out. The recognition of Croatia seemed to be a way to alleviate the refugee problem, although in that way it was made rather worse (Wiberg, 1994a: 238). Glenny has stressed that Croatian officials say that this is not a nationalist war but a struggle between a Bolshevik administration in Belgrade and their own tree-market democracy - a claim as misleading and contemptible as Serbian view of the conflict as a war o f liberation against a revived fascist state. Tudjman and his elected government, like Milosevic’s government, still have many connections with the old Communist bureaucracy, and they have acted harshly and provocatively toward Serbs; but they have not revived a fascist state
However, it was democracy vs. communism and ... this definition of the situation tilted the sympathy of a significant part of West-European, and especially German public opinion towards the Croats and Slovenes, pressuring West-European governments towards a change of policy. This naturally stimulated the stubbornness o f the “break-away” republics, especially Croatia. ... As the conflict parties perceived how important it was for their relative power position vis a vis their opponents to have the EC on their side they embarked on a media offensive directed at public opinion in Western Europe (Glenny, 1992: 32).
In that way, “they tried to influence the West-European definition of the situation. The Serbs played the tune of the German-Austrian conspiracy, using the remembrance of the atrocities of the Second World War to rally the non-German West-Europeans behind their flag”. As exemplified by the cover story, which was published under the title “Volkergefiignis Jugoslawien. Terror der Serben” in Der Spiegel, 8 July 1991, the German press provided the “counterpoint of this melody” (Koch, 1992: 197-8). In fact, both sides tried to exploit their allies’ stereotypes of their own nation’s identity existing in the minds of other nations, whose existence was assumed by Tudjman’s and Milosevic’s propaganda experts. However, a generally present practical problem was that the experts have their own stereotypes of their messages’ recipients, which disturbed the experts in
142 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia reaching their goals. Using the argument that if Serbs could not work well, at least they know how to fight (see Pesic, 1996: 20), Milosevic’ s intention was probably to promote the stereotype of Serbs as good warriors and he expected that not just Serbs but also their allies from the Second World War would be mobilized by these words. However, he engaged a British public relations firm (Lowe Bell Financial) in 1996 (Vasic et al., 1996). At the same time, Tudjman was far more successfully trying to develop and exploit the stereotype of Croats as Western-minded people, whose mentality is close to Germans, Austrians and other nations of the ex-Austro-Hungarian Empire. Croatia’s and Slovenia’s propaganda success in Germany was described by Wiberg as “unequivocal”, and it was probably one of the reasons for the conclusion that the more vulnerable the third party to domestic or external political pressures concerning the conflicts is, the more it invites the parties to a propaganda war on its own area. This may damage the convergence of expectations (by the parties over-anticipating in their fear of the outcome); and if one party clearly wins, it also damages the possibility of the third party’s remaining accepted as such and functioning effectively. A vulnerable third party is also more likely to engage in role escalation and to let the timing of its initiatives be decided by political pressures rather than by the conflict itself (Wiberg, 1994a: 235,250). The influence of modem media presentation abroad successfully created in the West a picture of the war as the consequence of the “brutal Serbianbolshevik aggression against peace-loving, democratic and Western-minded republics”. For the Western public, pictures of T-55 tanks with red fivepointed stars on Yugoslav battlefields was a recognisable reminder of clashes in Prague in 1968 or Beijing’s Tian an Men Square. Consequently, getting YPA involved in conflicts and provoking mass violence for the purpose of media exploitation in the familiar framework of “communism vs. democracy”, “resistance to aggression” and “protection of human rights” became an unavoidable part of the strategy of all separatist forces in Yugoslavia - from Slovenia to Kosovo - and this is likely to be the case in the future. Such public pressure influenced even the governments that opposed disintegration of Yugoslavia, as the thesis that “insisting on preservation of the territorial integrity of Yugoslavia works in favour of expansion of violence and pro-Communist forces in the country” increasingly prevailed (see Simic, 1993: 224). Some authors considered that the media, particularly German, tended more to harm than help, failing to present the complexity of the web of conflicts’, i.e. trying to compress it into a scheme of “goodies” versus “baddies”. This ‘normal’ media behaviour was strengthened by the Croatian propaganda
Yugoslavia 143 victory based on a television monopoly, political networks and Catholicism. Even further simplification was created by the media’s attempts to push politicians into doing something. However, as multiparty conflicts have a logic that is different from two-party conflicts (i.e. shifting alliances etc.), public debate was taking place on a misleading basis. In October 1991 the collective state Presidency fell victim to a de facto or “creeping” coup d ’état, and in December 1991 Markovic resigned in protest at a federal budget that gave 80% of available resources to keep the now essentially Serbian army fighting (see Remington, 1994a: 76-8). A flare-up of conflicts in Yugoslavia and non-observance of the Brioni Agreement have taken away the credibility of negotiators. The EC therefore took the stand that those who are “responsible for unprecedented violence in Yugoslavia, with increasing loss of human life should be held responsible for their conduct on the basis of international law”. This attitude was the basis for EC economic sanctions and its reversal towards a policy of force to achieve peaceful solution. The dilemma concerning the nature of the crisis was resolved by the conclusion that SFRY was “the country in the process of disintegration” (“Opinion of the Arbitration Committee”, 1993: 13), equalizing the rights of republics toward their former state, rejecting the thesis about secession, with attempts to preserve Yugoslavia deemed unnecessary if not counterproductive. Republics that wish to “may create new associations”. The two separated republics accepted this opinion, while Serbia asked “whether the Serbian population in Bosnia and Herzegovina has the right to selfdetermination”. The answer of the Arbitration Committee was that “the international law does not stipulate all consequences of the right to selfdetermination”, that “whatever the circumstances, the right to selfdetermination may not lead to change of borders existing at the time of gaining of independence (uti possidetis iuris)” and also that “if within one state there is one or more constituent groups ... these groups have ... right to recognition of their identity”. The Committee referred to the standpoint of the International Court of Justice on account of the conflict between Burkina Fasso and Republic Mali. Although that principle was first referred to in the case of Spanish America, that is not the rule that exclusively refers to a specific system of international law. That is the general principle, logically related to the phenomenon of independence acquisition, wherever it occurs. Its obvious goal is to prevent violation of independence and the stability of new states due to civil war. The fact that new African states respected the territorial
144 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia status quo existing at a time when they gained independence must be therefore observed not only as mere practice, but as an application of a general rule firmly embedded in the matter of decolonization. If the principle uti possidetis retained its place among the main legal principles, that is because of the purposeful choice of African states (see Dimitrijevic, 1992a). It is controversial among many experts whether the uti possidetis principle became a part of positive international law, while some even claim that it is more of a political principle. Simic stressed that what seemed most controversial was the application of this principle introduced in the process of decolonization to the contemporary distinguishing of nations in the European area and also in the case of countries which were not the result of colonial conquests but of Wilson’s “ 14 points”, i.e. application of the right to selfdetermination principle after the First World War (see Simic, 1993: 231-2). Moreover, the Committee reduced the “constituent group” to the status of a national, religious or language minority, not mentioning its right to selfdetermination. Finally, if one can assume that the principle is a part of positive international public law, it could be related to independent states. In the observed Yugoslav case, the states were not yet independent and boundaries were one of the questions in the package. On 16-17 December 1991, EC foreign ministers adopted the Guidelines for recognition of new states in Eastern Europe and USSR, which demands from candidates to (a) observe the provisions of the UN Charter, Helsinki Final Act and Paris Charter, particularly those which refer to the rule of law, democracy and human rights; (b) guarantee rights to ethnic and national groups and minorities in conformity with CSCE determinations; (c) respect inviolability of borders that may be changed only peacefully and through mutual agreement; (d) accept all relevant obligations referring to disarmament and prevention of nuclear proliferation, security and regional stability; and (e) undertake to solve all issues pertaining to the succession of state and regional conflicts through agreement, including where necessary the help of arbitration. “The Community and its member states will not recognize entities created as the consequence of aggression” (Bulletin o f the European Communities, 1991: 119). They also adopted the Common Stand on Recognition of Yugoslav Republics, underlining willingness for recognition of the independence of all republics that fulfil set requirements about which the decision will be made around 15 January 1992. All republics were invited to declare by 23 December 1991 whether they: (a) wish to be recognized as independent states; (b) accept principles contained in the Guidelines for Recognition of New
Yugoslavia 145 States in Eastern Europe and the USSR; (c) accept provisions of the Draft Convention on Yugoslavia - particularly those on human rights of national and ethnic groups - which were to be considered within the conference on Yugoslavia; (d) support efforts of the UN Secretary General and Security Council and continuation of the Conference on Yugoslavia. Applications shall be given to the Arbitration Committee for consideration (see Bulletin o f the European Communities, 1991: 119). As Wiberg concluded, the above-mentioned EC behaviour could be explained by “a strong emphasis on common behaviour”, whose “contents would depend more on internal EC bargaining, and thereby indirectly on domestic politics in Germany and elsewhere, than on Yugoslav circumstances”. The form of the behaviour was probably “affected by the pressures for demonstrating leadership and actor capability”. Whether this would lead to conflict resolution depends on what opinion one has about its relationship to high-power external intervention (1994a: 238). Yugoslav republics, except Serbia and Montenegro, answered the EC invitation. Without waiting for the opinion of the Arbitration Committee, Germany recognized Slovenia and Croatia on 23 December 1991. Remington considered “one does not have to agree with the whole cloth of these accusations of German and Austrian expansionism to accept the reality of the consequences of Bonn’s strategy. What in fairness, German Chancellor Helmut Kohl may have seen as a policy of deterrence only shifted the violence into high gear” (1994a: 76). On 11 January 1992 the Arbitration Committee stated that Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia did not fulfil all criteria for recognition, while Slovenia and Macedonia did. It was stressed that the EC, UN and US allowed the former Yugoslavia to fall apart without assuring minority rights of the Serbs in Croatia. On 15 January, under German pressure, the EC recognized Slovenia and Croatia before the Zagreb government had met the protection of minority rights conditions and despite the warnings of UN troubleshooter Cyrus Vance and even Alija Izetbegovic (Remington, 1993: K-5). The US recognition led to further internationalization and to escalation of the crisis. Wiberg concluded that, according to theoretical postures, the prospects of conflict resolution depend on conflict itself, conflict parties and the status and behaviour of the third party and time. “The point is not only that third party intervention may be ineffective if attempted when time is not ripe (too early or too late), but that it may be outright counterproductive, exacerbating the conflict it aims at easing.” There is also the question will a third party act most wisely by waiting for its time? Should such a party “try to accelerate such a
146 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia convergence by his own actions, even if this will mean stepping up the degree of intrusiveness and thereby making it more difficult to be accepted as a mediator?” It was unknown to what extent the UN, or the EC, systematically considered the above-mentioned problems. Given the time pressure that both organisations were under to do som ething and to do it quickly, as well as the lack of ready-made procedures due to the relatively unique character of the conflict, it is unlikely that they were given much time to consider anything. In the north, the EC gradually tried to make expectations converge around its own proposals or principles. (Wiberg, 1994a: 244)
The attempt largely failed since they called for the solution, which was least acceptable for the Serbs from the beginning. According to Wiberg “to succeed in that situation, the EC would have had to convince all parties that the EC proposals were inescapable” {ibid.). The UN was more successful as Vance “opted for a lower degree of intrusiveness, hence put less at immediate stake for the parties” {ibid.). Another reason was that several months of fighting had convinced the sides “that they could only count, within a near future, with marginal gains at high costs ” {ibid.). The recognition of Bosnia and Herzegovina was followed by hard Western pressure for withdrawal of the YPA (completed in May 1992). However, a minority of YPA soldiers were citizens of Serbia and Montenegro and went back there. As a great majority of the soldiers were Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina, they shifted flags, taking over most arms and armament factories. Then they were split up between several local armies, militias and paramilitary groups, that were both cooperating and competing with the Serb Republic forces. Yugoslav census figures reflected fluctuations between a Montenegrin and Serb identity. In 1981, for instance, 68.5% of the citizens of Montenegro declared themselves as Montenegrins, and 3.3% as Serbs. In 1991, the situation had changed into 61.8% and 9.3%. The largest minorities were Muslims (in the Montenegro northern mountains) and Albanians (along the Adriatic coast) (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). Fluidity of the division between Montenegrins and Serbs ceased 200 years ago. Some people from Montenegro who consider themselves as Serbs, say that they are “proper Serbs” and call those from Serbia “Srbijanci”. Another distinction was present during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, when many ethnic Serbs were calling Serbs from Serbia “soft” or even “sick” Serbs as they were not so enthusiastic to fight in the
Yugoslavia 147 war. As the “softness” or “sickness” was taken as a cause of the possible disappearance of Serbia, Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina were stating on Belgrade media that Republika Srpska would be the future core land of Serbs and they would be the core group. In addition, many Serbs from Serbia see Serbs from Vojvodina as “soft”. A similar division between “soft” and “hard” is present among Croats from Zagreb, Zagoije and other parts of Croatia, on the one hand, and from Bosnia and particularly Herzegovina, on the other. Many Serbs from Serbia did not know/mention the existence of the Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina and all other inhabitants were considered as Bosnians before the Yugoslav crisis started to escalate. As the US and EC took the stand that FRY, i.e. Serbia and Montenegro, were the main culprits for conflicts and aggression on Bosnia and Herzegovina, a few days after the FRY government announced that the YPA troops were withdrawn UN Security Council adopted the sanctions or measures which did not call for the use of armed force under the Security Council’s jurisdiction on the grounds of provisions contained in Chapter VII of the UN Charter. The Security Council condemned the country’s authorities for failing to undertake effective measures to cease interference in Bosnia and Herzegovina, respect its territorial integrity and withdraw, disband, disarm or place YPA units under the control of the Sarajevo government. As the newly established AY, after the withdrawal of YPA soldiers without most of its armament, has continued to provide support and maintain close relations with the Army of Republika Srpska, and, reportedly, Serbia’s leadership refused a request to stop the flow of irregulars from the FRY, the sanctions (in the wake of the 27 May 1992 mortar fire carnage) also rested on an assessment that Serbia was particularly responsible for the violence. The sanctions against the FRY were based on the Security Council’s conclusion the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina and other parts of the Second Yugoslavia represented a threat to international peace and security and set measures which UN members had to apply. Resolution 757 included cessation of trade except for food and medications, a ban on international air traffic, financial transactions and official scientific, technological and cultural exchange, participation of Yugoslav sportsmen in international competitions, and the reduction of staff in diplomatic and consular missions in the FRY. Resolutions 787 (16 November 1992) and 820 (17 April 1993) banned transport of all goods across FRY territory and commercial maritime passage through Yugoslav territorial waters, imposed
148 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia strict control at the Adriatic Sea and the Danube, froze Yugoslav funds abroad, impounded stock outside Yugoslav borders etc. Resolution 941 condemned the violation of humanitarian law, especially ethnic cleansing in Bosnia and Herzegovina; 942 included a series of measures to isolate “the Bosnian Serb leadership until it accepts the proposed peace accord”; the measures were relaxed by Resolution 943 (23 September 1994) and 1022 (22 November 1995) suspending a majority of the economic bans. Dimitrijevic and Pejic consider that at the time the sanctions were passed, their formal target was the FRY and the declared goal was forcing the country to stop supporting Bosnian Serbs and halting the war, while the goal to topple Slobodan Milosevic was not officially proclaimed. The coercion was levelled against the federal government, the Montenegrin leadership (willing to adjust and find an internationally acceptable solution to the crisis) and Serbia’s leadership openly supporting the Serb authorities and opposing concessions in the other Yugoslav republics (1996: 251). After the measures were stepped up, it appeared that the FRY was punished because it failed to persuade the Bosnian Serbs to accept the Vance-Owen peace agreement. After Resolution 820 was adopted, it appeared that the Belgrade government had started yielding to foreign demands for a peaceful resolution and that the West had began tacitly accepting the status quo in Bosnia (which partitioned the country along ethnic lines), after it had become conceivable that Belgrade did not indeed control the Bosnian Serbs. On this issue Remington concluded: whether or not the nature of that control can be disputed, Belgrade undeniably has been the supplier and patron of such forces. Yet it is also hard not to agree with those who argue that by recognizing Bosnia-Herzegovina’s independence before the three national parties, which had won the parliamentary elections, managed to agree on the internal political structure, “the E C has virtually given the g o ah ead f o r the outbreak o f the w ar ” (1994a: 80, italics in original).
During the next few months, the sanctions’ primary goal grew increasingly obscure; the apparent desire was to force the Republika Srpska’s leadership to give up parts of its territory held by its army. This became the West’s open policy in November 1993, built in a plan for “an exchange of territories in return for lifting the sanctions”, along with their gradual relaxing. FRY tried unsuccessfully to pressure the Republika Srpska leadership to accept the plan; and later imposed its own embargo on goods not related to humanitarian assistance and agreed to the embargo’s implementation of international monitoring.
Yugoslavia 149 From then on, the measures could no longer be linked to the primary goals, along with toppling Milosevic. By Resolution 871 (5 October 1993), the Security Council asked FRY to co-operate in the full implementation of the UN peace plan and emphasized that lack of co-operation would be taken into account when normalization was discussed. The lifting of sanctions along with later their “outer wall” was occasionally stipulated by other conditions (settlement of the Kosovo issue, the FRY’s cooperation with The Hague Tribunal, The International Monetary Fund, some other international organizations etc.). Instead of presenting the real reasons for the Security Council sanctions, the Yugoslav government used the media, state propaganda and progovernment intellectuals to propagate the idea that Serbs were punished because they were an authentic nation, which rebelled against injustice and the imposed models of state behaviour or US interests and its “new world order”, as well as against the rules the US tried to impose and its human rights concept or against its role as the world key factor. The sanctions were imposed because FRY supported the people’s right to selfdetermination (selectively granted to some nations and refused to the Serbs) and opposed violent secession etc. After the elections in December 1992, the growth of national radicalism in FRY became evident and continued despite major economic hardships in 1993 caused by the sanctions (Dimitrijevic and Pejic, 1996: 256). During two years of war, the confusing messages deformed the political life, and, after everyday living of FRY, citizens became a sheer struggle for survival, political questions and relations dropped low on the agenda of citizens. Table 5.3
The highest inflation rates per month in history
Country__________________ Month___________________Inflation (% per month) Hungary April 1946 42.000.000.000.000.000 Yugoslavia January 1994 313.000.000 Greece November 1944 86.000.000 Germany_________________ October 1923____________________________ 32.400
As most war expenditures have been financed from money issue, first six zeros have been cut away from the currency in 1992. As the level of inflation by January 1994 reached about 3,960,000,000% per year, seven zeros have been cut away; the second new or “super dinar”, introduced in January 1994, was exchanged for Deutsche Marks at a rate of 1:1 (for more
150 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia details see Wiberg, 1995b: 102; Encyclopedia Britannica, 1998) equalling 13,000,000,000,000,000,000,000 previous dinars. Mass media, which supported the embattled government and convinced the population of FRY “that its foreign policy is correct and that the international community is groundlessly rejecting it”, had a decisive role in shaping the perceptions of the reasons for imposing and lifting sanctions. Media manipulation was the authorities’ crucial lever used to mobilize national solidarity to retain their grip on power. Among the FRY population xenophobia grew; feelings towards other countries and international organizations were expressly negative, except for those described by official media as friendly (e.g. Russia, Greece, Romania, China). This was even more evident after the 11 weeks’ bombardment which started on 24 March 1999; this time feelings were oriented particularly against NATO and its members. It is believed that economic deterioration alone should not be the main goal of sanctions, but that they must result in political changes in keeping with the demands of the addresser. The FRY economy was in bad shape even before sanctions, and it was hit more by the disintegration of economic ties among Yugoslav republics than by the sanctions as the volume of trade inside SFRY was larger than foreign trade by any of them alone. In addition, it was concluded, the relative causal weight of sanctions, economic mismanagement and military efforts was a matter of dispute (Wiberg, 1995b: 100-1). The FRY hosted several hundreds of thousands of refugees from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina (of 537,937 registered in 1996, there were over 230,000 from Bosnia and Herzegovina and some 290,000 from Croatia) and later Kosovo. Numerous refugees and displaced persons did not register fearing deportation or other consequences. According to a statement by the Serbian Prime Minister, in the first two years alone the sanctions cost the FRY $30 billion, which apparently contributed to the rapid impoverishment of the population. According to more recent estimations, total direct cost of sanctions was even $57-60 billion and the indirect cost was $150 billion (see Teokarevic, 1998: 11). Annual per capita income decreased from its pre-war $3,000 in the former Yugoslavia to $600. However, economic poverty did not produce the expected political reaction. National ardour, inflamed by the war and sustained by the incessant barrage of defiant media messages, has taken its toll. In addition, the inclination of citizens to draw conclusions from the circumstances they were living in were reduced as the sanctions’ economic effects were cushioned by reserves of foreign currency possessed by the population.
Yugoslavia 151 Several private banks promised prompt return of deposits and enormously high monthly interest rates initially partly meeting the population’s needs. The majority of the population lived in villages and little urban communities in which the search for food was not as difficult as in the cities. Smuggled goods were available to those with capital. The government tried to pay out wages and pensions regularly (although these were meagre). Most of the industry was owned by the state, but small private manufacturing and trading firms were allowed to work, alleviating the burden of sanctions with their imagination, initiative and flexibility. The regime had preserved the old trade union as the transmission of the ruling party (Dimitrijevic and Pejic, 1996: 269-71; Vayrynen, 1998: 28-9). The sanctions did not fulfil the expectations of their authors, since the war did not end during the worst economic crisis; the largest part of Serb territorial conquests followed the imposition of sanctions was achieved with Yugoslavia’s help. Here, winning or losing territory does not only depend on the power of the expanding party but also on the powerlessness of the losing party. If sanctions are a means for realizing isolation, persuasion and expressing moral disapproval, they can be counterproductive, creating public opinion on the sanctioned side that “all are against us”. If sanctions are observed as a means that will result in war becoming very costly for the sanctioned side, it will nevertheless wage war if something important is at stake. Sanctions do not usually work if the sanctioned country has a friendly neighbourhood and if their economic burden can be shifted to certain parts of the population. In the case of the FRY, one must bear in mind that sanctions were not imposed against Croatia, although it had not complied with the Security Council order that “Croatian army elements” had to withdraw and place themselves under the command of the Sarajevo government, disband or disarm (Paragraph 5 of Resolution 787). These facts bring to mind an analogy with the reasons for growing nationalism in Italy during the sanctions imposed by the League of Nations (for more details see Baldwin, 1985; Isakovic, forthcoming). Essentially the same “rally-round-the-flag” effect was noted in the case of sanctions against Rhodesia imposed in 1966 (see Baldwin, 1985: 189 and 193-4). If it is believed that the sanctions were aimed at discouraging the FRY’s decision-makers from assisting the Bosnian Serbs, one must take into account the fact that military assistance was at least partly halted as late as July 1994, when the leadership of Serbia and FRY decided that Bosnian
152 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Serbs should be satisfied with 49% of Bosnia and Herzegovina’s territory. Since early 1994, the FRY was no longer required or expected to stop their interference in the Bosnian war, but instead increased its involvement by pressuring the Serbs to accept a compromise. The economic sanctions were suspended immediately after reaching the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords; the FRY and Croatia recognized each other in 1996. However, questions were left open of the status of the strategically important Prevlaka peninsula at the entrance to the Kotor Bay; of Baranja, Eastern Slavonia and Western Sirmium regions; and of the return of the Serb refugees to the Serb Krajina region. These agreements were reached under heavy international pressures, but also because of the FRY’s transport needs as well as Croatia’s needs for importing electric energy from the FRY. The FRY promised to take “all necessary steps, consistent with the sovereignty, territorial integrity and political independence of Bosnia and Herzegovina, to ensure that the Republika Srpska fully respects and complies with the aforementioned Annexes” (1-A and 2); Yugoslavia and Croatia obliged themselves not to maintain or introduce military forces there. Complete lifting of sanctions after elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina in September 1996 was promised. However, the outer wall of sanctions was being maintained, generating the further disintegration of the country (see Dimitrijevic and Pejic, 1996: 272, 274). Article IX of the Accords’ main text foresaw the mutual recognition of the FRY and the Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Difficulties in attempts to assess the political and economic effects of international economic and other measures have lead to the conclusion that they cannot result in the fulfilment of other actors’ demands. Those measures, if anything, cause effects contrary to the desired ones. In general, social cohesion and political integration are increased rather than reduced by foreign negative sanctions, i.e. the population is more mobilized to rally around the flag than to exert internal pressure on the government to alter its policy (for more details see Galtung, 1967: 388-91, 411; Vallensteen, 1968: Doxey, 1971: 133, 265; Dimitrijevic, 1980: 21; Tomasevski, 1997: 215-16; Isakovic, forthcoming). As “the collective nature of economic sanctions afflicts both the innocent and the guilty”, it is not strange that “foreign attack is understood as an attack on the group as a whole and not on just one part”. If, simultaneously, there is the conviction of the high value of own goals and that there are no alternatives, weak identification with the attacker, the feeling of group solidarity will develop in such circumstances. Sanctions
Yugoslavia 153 frequently do not weaken the condemned government, but boost the population’s support to it (see Galtung, 1967: 389-90). Since the authorities need to rely on the national emotions’ strengthening during crises, they resort to propaganda and mass media manipulation. The outside world is painted in black or white colours and is divided into a few genuine friends and a large number of enemies conspiring against the nation’s very existence. Focus is placed on reasons why the international community is refusing to accept “the truth” and not finding other culprits, and not on what caused the sanctions. As Dimitrijevic said, “behind the simplified picture of a ‘guilty’ state or another actor is the fact that is not monolithic. If the decision-makers deserve the punishment, then it should be served upon them, but this is not easy to accomplish”. Instead, the population on the whole (primarily its most endangered categories who had the least influence on the policy provoking the punishment) is affected by the punitive measures. “The perception of the punishment by the punished population is then so distorted (the monopoly on information by the ‘punished’ government can only contribute to that) that it is counter-effective: instead of weakening and toppling the regime pursuing the undesired policy, it can provoke national pride, xenophobia and rallying around an earlier unpopular government whose intervention in dire times is awaited as salvation” (1981: 21; also Baldwin, 1985: 149,199). In 1994 Galtung concluded that the sanctions against the FRY were not adequate for intended purposes and were even counterproductive to a certain degree. Economic sanctions apply between collective senders (in principle any citizen o f the countries that have voted in favor of the sanctions) and collective receivers (in principle any resident o f the countries against which the sanctions are directed). The decision to use sanctions as an instrument is taken by very few people in the foreign policy establishments and discussed within a very narrow circle o f people likely to have the corresponding people in the receiving countries in mind [...] the distress caused when an export-dependent economy starts crumbling will force the ruling elites out of power by irate masses blaming them for their predicament. [...] this scenario may perhaps work under some conditions. But a much more likely scenario is the redirection of the distress on groups unable to bring much pressure to bear upon their rulers, such as children and old people and women, in other words the classical victims of warfare. That being the case, sanctions will probably be regarded by the receivers as the continuation of war with other means, mobilizing their
154 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia resentment against the senders rather than against their own rulers. [...] this would hold particularly for traumatized peoples who in the sanctions will find more confirmation of “the world is against us” thesis. Sanctions will be destructive, but also counter-productive” (1994: 119).
Wiberg stressed that the higher internal unity caused by the sanctions could put the third party in the dilemma between seeing a bluff called and engaging far more than originally intended. To persuade a party that sees fundamental values at stake, threats have to be absolutely overwhelming and highly credible. In this way some concrete things have been achieved in terms of restraints on or withdrawal of armed forces, verbal acceptance of some proclaimed principles and plans etc., but the fundamental conflicts in ex-Yugoslavia remain unsolved. More often than not, negative sanctions are counterproductive by making the target population rally around the flag and become less willing to make concessions. This goes already for international economics sanctions and even more for military threats. [...] if, in exceptional cases, negative sanctions are deemed productive (and are not just introduced to pacify domestic politics), it is better to have somebody else than the third party instigate them so as not to create role overload. This may create new problems, however, for instance how to create enough distance between the mediator (e.g. the UN) and the enemy (e.g. NATO) so as not to have unacceptability of the latter as mediator spill over to the former. (Wiberg, 1994a: 251)
Another option is “to abandon the mediator role entirely and get into a two-party negotiation between the sender and the target of the sanctions” (ibid.). Kosovo, Montenegro and southern Serbia have traditionally been among the least developed areas of the Second Yugoslavia. The inherited economic structure was rather unfavourable thanks to a high proportion of mature industries. For Kosovo the persistence of the long-lasting economic deterioration of Yugoslav economy has been harder than for other parts of the country. Many Albanians have lost their jobs (whether they were fired or willingly left does not matter) since the 1981 rebellion started. Many former markets abroad have been lost, foreign economic connections severed, the social and political situation has been tense and is likely to deteriorate further etc. Albanians developed their own economy, often oriented to black market, smuggling, avoiding paying taxes etc. In 1996, Serbia itself had 537,937 officially registered refugees mainly from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina (of whom 120,005 did not have recognized refugee status) plus some 100,000 unregistered. Before the
Yugoslavia 155 wars, most of them had belonged to the middle class and lived in their own or state-owned apartments or houses, and after they became refugees, some 54,409 living in collective centres in Serbia, 102,668 hiring an apartment or house, and some 296,715 being accommodated in their relatives’ and friends’ homes (Mikic, 1997). A great majority of refugees have been located in Vojvodina and Belgrade where their adaptation is a well-known problem (although most of them are Serbs), which arises after being faced with new social, environmental and other conditions. Adaptation to the refugees by their new societies is another problem. Psychiatrist Jovan Draskovic, who used to be one of the political leaders of the Krajina Serbs, has separated three phases of development of the relationship between hosts and refugees: first, the phase of optimism where both the refugees and their hosts are convinced that the relationship will last a relatively short time and that the refugees will then return to their homes; secondly, the phase of pessimism starting with the first war defeats and economic deterioration of the hosts bringing divisions between the two groups; finally, the third period (called the depression phase) of mutual animosities (Tarle, 1997). Before the wars in the Second Yugoslavia, one might have assumed that Serbs would probably have been second-class citizens of independent Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, and many of them (especially from Croatia) became second-class citizens in the countries in which they lived. Even in countries whose populations have very similar identities (like Serbs in Serbia), there are often differences that make refugees not feel like they are in their home land. One study, focusing on the process of integration among Yugoslavia’s labour migrants in Scandinavia, showed a pattern of integration ranging from their almost complete assimilation into economic, social and cultural systems of the immigration countries to the formation of relatively isolated ethnic enclaves. Schierup and Alund concluded that “in spite of growing integration, empirical evidence shows that the vast majority of Yugoslav migrants continue to harbour profound feelings of attachment to their country of origin and a desire for eventual return” (1986: 20-1). According to a national report on the migration of scientists and professionals from the FRY, the migration of qualified young people from FR Yugoslavia “has become one of the gravest problems facing the scientific and research system and the country as a whole” (National report, 1996: 104). In 1993 the Yugoslav scholar Sekelj, concluding that “Lebanon has moved to South and Central Europe”, considered that
156 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia time will tell whether Yugoslavs are to tolerate these policies of the irreconcilable national political elites’ under the disguise of democracy, or the all-pervasive min will cool the hotheads. In any case, the world in which the generation o f now middle-aged Yugoslavs were brought up and socialized, and to which the author himself belongs - collapsed like a house of cards. The price
of abolishing one type of authoritarian regime called communist was the abolishment of not only the state and political community, but also the abolishment of civilized relations and citizenship as well (Sekelj, 1993: 280). Albania’s government, Kosovo Albanians’ and some Vojvodina minorities’ political leaders protested against the resettlement of war refugee Serbs from Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina in related areas as it will change the ethnic composition of their populations (whether deliberately attempted by the government of Serbia or not does not matter). It was unclear whether the statement was (predominantly) motivated by xenophobia, possible identity fears/threats and/or political disputes with the government and its policy. Many Serbs in Serbia and elsewhere in the country have been convinced by propaganda or in other ways that the Muslims or Bosniacs, Croats, Albanians and Macedonians have been conquering historic territory of Serbs and/or Serbia, that Serbs as such in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo had been subjected to deportation, killing, rape, “ethnic cleansing” and other acts of flagrant and/or brutal injustice including several cases of prosecution by The Hague Tribunal and, perhaps most of all, the prosecution of Radovan Karadzic, Ratko Mladic and Slobodan Milosevic. Many Serbs were convinced that the sanctions were directed towards Serbs as such (“the world is against us”), i.e. towards the nation that has had at least a different (if not “wrong”) alphabet, language, role in history, geographical location, religion, in order to suppress the nation’s identity and its expressions and to prevent its ability to reproduce itself. One could observe the wars in the Second Yugoslavia and sanctions against the FRY as a sort of threat to state security and national identity. In numerous situations one could detect threats which were at least partly of an identity nature directed not only toward Serbs, but also members of other nations living in the country. As the whole society was becoming increasingly poorer and isolated by the rest of the world, communication, educational, scholarly, economic and other possibilities for expression of the nations’ identities were becoming smaller. However, it is a matter of discussion whether the nations crossed a threshold beyond which their abilities to reproduce themselves were prevented or disabled. In general, it seems that in this regard the members of national minorities in the FRY -
Yugoslavia 157 as “underdogs” - were in a worse position than the Serbs were. As the minorities largely did not consider the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo as “their” wars, they were less motivated for sacrifices and losses imposed by the sanctions, by the war efforts, bombardment, reported violations of human and other elementary rights etc. The violations of human rights by Serbian authorities in Kosovo were assessed as “extremely grave” as Serbia - basing its claim to Kosovo primarily on historical grounds - was seeking to re-establish its control over Kosovo through repressive measures which clearly violated CSCE principles and represented Albanians’ (basing their claims on ethnic grounds) human rights abuses. It was considered that official arguments that Serbian policies were directed only against Albanian separatism from Serbia and maybe from Yugoslavia became a self-fulfilling prophecy as ethnic Albanians and their leaders in Kosovo became increasingly insistent on establishing their own republic and boycotted the Serbian elections in December 1990 (see “US Policy Toward Yugoslavia”, 1991). The part of the Statement did not satisfy both sides in the Kosovo conflict as they probably considered it to contain too weak qualifications for the acts of the other side and at the same time too strong for the own side’s acts. 0berg considers each of the sides was right in its own way. It seems that in 1997 all that has been mentioned above constituted a basis for the conclusion that “the Serbs and Albanians have proved that they themselves are unable to start and sustain a dialogue process towards conflict-resolution and reconciliation” and “international attempts, lacking analysis as well as strategy, have failed, too”. The overall situation was deteriorating and violence was escalating, slowly but surely (“Help Serbs and Albanians Settle Their Differences in Kosovo!...”, 1997). The armed conflict started although it was not wished, at least explicitly, by the sides (except by extreme forces). The author predicted that it was “a very probable scenario if the Kosovo problem should be irresponsibly treated by either side” (Lutovac, 1997: 13). However, both sides’ nationalism along with Serbian repression and conservatism and Albanian secessionism and terrorism were feeding each other, as was already seen in the conflicts that had previously escalated. In fact, both sides were saying that force was the only successful diplomacy in dealing with the other side. It was stressed, “this state of affairs has a high moral, economic and political price for Belgrade. In addition it must be deplored that neither the student movement nor opposition parties in Serbia
158 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia have anything to offer that could convince Kosovo-Albanians to change their course”. On the other hand, paradoxically - or perhaps logically - “the Kosovo-Albanian leaders seem to think that the more hardline the message in Belgrade, the better for them. But that is a self-defeating attitude.” The international community, George Bush and Bill Clinton’s administrations, with their anti-Serbian diagnosis of ex-Yugoslavia’s conflicts, “in particular gave the Kosovars reason to believe that an independent state was around the comer” (“Help Serbs and Albanians Settle Their Differences in Kosovo!...”, 1997). In addition, a “lasting settlement of its status will primarily depend on the political wisdom of the leaders of the Serbs and the Kosovian Albanians. Numerous historical occurrences in the past in these parts and especially the most recent connected with the breakup of the SFRY, have, unfortunately, shown political wisdom to be more of an ideal than a reality. One can, therefore, not deny the possibility of its solution through armed conflict (Lutovac, 1997: 13-14). In spring 1997, disturbances in Albania were provoked by the crash of the “pyramidal private banking system”, in which the government was involved. Since Albania came to complete institutional disarray and the brink of a civil war on a tribal and regional basis, it seemed that the Albanians in Albania - faced with the dangers to existential survival and of civil war - suppressed the question of Kosovo from their primary political agenda, whereas the Kosovo Albanians “became less inclined to run into the arms of their impoverished and warring brothers in the homeland for the sake of their own romantic ideas” (Lutovac, 1997: 12). However, the idea was revived after the disturbances were finished. 0berg concluded that “there was much talk about conflict prevention, early warning, preventive diplomacy and non-military security”, and “the second tragic truth is that there has been very little intellectual innovation since the so-called end of the Cold War. No new organizations have been created, geared to handle the new conflicts”, and “governments still seem unaware that their diplomats must be trained in conflict understanding and management - as anyone dealing with legal issues must be trained in law”. In addition, the global media were still focusing on violence, and not on the underlying conflicts or solutions. It seemed that the 1997 dispute and split between the two factions or wings within the ruling DPSM led by Momir Bulatovic (in 1998 his wing became SNPM) and Milo Djukanovic had little to do with the national identity issue, although the Bulatovic’s faction has been supported by Milosevic. For some authors the distinctiveness of the Montenegrin identity
Yugoslavia 159 is problematic as they do not have their own language, although some local intellectuals have been identifying the language that the Montenegrins use as the “Montenegrin” language (see Wiberg, 1995b: 105); they do not have their own religion and church, although there were some attempts aimed at establishing it, and in addition Montenegrins have long been secularized rather than zealots. Some Serbian intellectuals consider that there were no Montenegrins in Serbian kingdom before Turks invaded it, and after the end of the Second World War they acquired their own republic and were officially recognized as one of the Yugoslav nations. In that way the distinctiveness of the Montenegrin identity is completely denied. Montenegrin intellectuals reply that it is true that the Montenegrin nation was created by decree after the Second World War, but later it became a genuine nation, hi addition, Albanians’ demand for republic Kosova was partly based on the fact that they are much more numerous than Montenegrins. The political differences between them reflected the fact that in the first place existing pragmatic political interests as well as some longer lasting tribal73 and ideological divisions among Montenegrins, which could have some indirect relations with that issue as far as state traditions are concerned, are an element of national identity. Since the beginning of the Yugoslav crisis the divisions seemed to have been revived, primarily thanks to the fact that many Montenegrins did not see the wars in Croatia (except in the Dubrovnik operation) and Bosnia and Herzegovina as theirs or at least not to the extent that Serbs did. Secondly, as the UN sanctions badly damaged Montenegro’s underdeveloped economy (particularly its tourist industry), a groundswell developed there, as well as among parts of the opposition in Serbia, towards the faster acceptance of the conditions demanded by the international community. Bulatovic has been more ready to follow the Milosevic post-Dayton resistance to Western political pressure, not taking much care of the economic cost, while Djukanovic’s orientation includes economic recovery as the primary goal, and resistance to pressure as a much less important one. In that way, the two orientations constitute problems for each other. Besides the Djukanovic orientation, Milosevic has several additional problems: in the first place the Kosovo conflict; the economic situation and uncertainty on how long social peace will last; a movement for recovering the autonomy of Vojvodina74 and various problems with ethnic Hungarians there; a dispute with Sandzak Muslims’ leaders; and problems with
160 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Belgrade and other bigger cities which were economically and in other regards exhausted during the wars and by sanctions, etc. Finally, Milosevic’s initiative to strengthen the federal state (and probably politically weaken the position of the two republics), launched when he became the President of Yugoslavia, was opposed mainly by Djukanovic and his followers in Montenegro (which itself would be threatened by disintegration in the event of its separation) and also by a number of opposition parties in Serbia. Consequently, the dispute could create a divisive constitutional conflict to some degree similar to those of which the two former Yugoslavias suffered and which brought the Second Yugoslavia to disintegration. It seems that the core problem (how much the FRY should be (de)centralized) remains. Additional disputed issues are Djukanovic’s initiatives for promoting relationships with the neighbouring Albania and Croatia including solving the Prevlaka dispute with Croatia by an international arbitration etc. In this regard, his political orientation looks at least to some degree close to those adopted by the Biljana Plavsic’s and Fikret Abdic’s orientations in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The lifting of the stick called the “outer wall of the sanctions” was linked with the above-mentioned acts of the FRY and Serbia authorities related, among others, to Kosovo making worse the overall economic and political situation within the FRY, Serbia and probably particularly Kosovo. At the end of 1997 the FRY was facing the issue of strategic choices for its future once again, as its isolation from the main international institutions was reconfirmed and as the crisis overshadowed its temporary economic recovery. After a few years of continued growth, industrial production and GDP have reached at best only half of their 1990 levels. The unemployment rate was 26.1%, and could actually be twice as high if 770,000 people employed in bankrupt firms were included in the figures; one-fifth of the population could be considered poor, while the majority of others were also very near the poverty line (Teokarevic, 1998: 12). It seemed, however, that the worsening of the situation did not make the Yugoslav government and population become any readier to accept compromises. Economic problems as well as the conflicts, the Hague Tribunal, etc. created the possibility for the Waldheim effect to appear in Serbia and the FRY: namely, one could assume that the message of the first (failed) 1997 presidential elections in Serbia - when Vojislav Seselj received the majority of votes - was: “Nobody has any business to intervene in whom we elect for President.” The population of Serbia seemed to be desperate and did not seem to have any perspective. Maybe making an analogy with the situation in Germany
Yugoslavia 161 before the Second World War would be going too far, but one should mention that several Gypsies were beaten in Belgrade and elsewhere in the FRY, and a group of skinheads - apparently out of purely racist motives murdered a Gypsy boy in Belgrade on 18 October 1997. In March 1998 Vojislav Seselj became vice-president of the Government of Serbia.75 In 1992 and 1993 the US administration sent the Belgrade government warnings that widening of a war in Kosovo would result in the intervention of NATO. In 1997 there was a question of whether new economic sanctions against the 10 million people in Yugoslavia (of which 2 millions were Albanians) would “make ordinary Serbs reconciliate with the Albanians or whether they will make the Yugoslav leadership including President Milosevic initiate negotiations?” Those statesmen who want to prevent violence “would address the problem and ask: how can we help solve it? They would need facts, analyses, and some basic knowledge about conflicts as well as history and psychology - in short understanding - before making proposals” (“Kosovo - What Can Be Done Now?”, 1997). It was concluded that by attacking the actors of the conflict, the statesmen helped solidify locked positions and hardened the attitudes of the actors. After the intensification of the Albanian liberation struggle/terrorism as well as Serbian-Yugoslav terrorism and counter-terrorism at the beginning of 1998, it seemed that the most powerful members of the international community supported the territorial integrity and sovereignty of the FRY. Simultaneously, the Kosovo problem has become a regional security problem. This probably meant that their support would not last for ever. One can assume that the West did not support the independence of Kosovo openly, since this could jeopardize the illusion of success in Bosnia and Herzegovina by raising the question among local Croats and Serbs, “If Kosovo, then why not us in Herceg-Bosna and Republika Srpska?” The Albanian side did not respond to the series of invitations for negotiations; instead they insisted that they were only prepared to discuss independence and demanded an outside mediator. In rejecting the second condition, the Serbian side was able - at least for a while - to use as an excuse the result of a referendum held in spring 1998 in which a great majority of the participants - fearing the influence coming from an unfavourable international community - refused the participation of foreign representatives in negotiations on Kosovo. The attitude towards the struggle of brothers from Kosovo became an important argument in the power struggle between politicians supported mostly by Ghegs or Tosks in Albania. Later, the development of the
162 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Kosovo situation (stemming from a statement by KLA spokesman Jakup Krasniqi that the KLA’s goal was the unification of all Albanians in the Balkans76) attracted attention and revived fears in neighbouring countries and the international community that a violent way of resolving the Albanian question could initiate a chain reaction of forceful ethnic and territorial conflicts in the Balkans (see Wiberg, 1993: 105). The modem Albanian diaspora in the West originates mainly from Kosovo. It seems that its members understood the changes in the Eastern Europe and the reasons for the need to legitimize the Albanian national movement, accepting Western values and seeking for its points of support in the West. During the eighties, within the diaspora, a modem, mass and organized movement appeared in Kosovo and Macedonia, which was supported by influential parts of the American and German establishment, a number of French intellectuals, and people from different countries. Thanks to both legal and illegal activities, parts of the diaspora gained significant financial power and influence in Kosovo, Macedonia and in the West (for more details Simic see 1998: IX-XIII). During the war in Kosovo there seemed to be some 1,750,000 registered and unregistered refugees and displaced people in Kosovo, Macedonia, Albania, proper Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina and numerous other countries and areas in the world. It has been labelled as a humanitarian catastrophe, disaster or crisis, the fundamental issue of which was the distribution of aid. In February 1998, the USA and UK unilaterally threatened military strikes against Iraq without a UN mandate, which they finally put into action in November. In August 1998, the USA struck against the alleged terrorist camps and chemical weapons plants in Afghanistan and Sudan, and Turkey repeatedly invaded Iraq. For example, according to UNHCR estimation, from June to October 1998, some 25,000 Kosovo refugees had arrived in Albania, most of them, similarly to refugees from other parts of the Second Yugoslavia, with little or no belongings and exhausted. Since the influx had begun, a large number remained in the north straining the economy and infrastructure. Emergency assistance efforts were hampered by fighting between local family clans, combined with the KLA, an increase in armed robberies, car thefts at gunpoint etc. Civil unrest led to the looting of private and public properties including UNHCR and other agencies’ warehouses. Most international agencies withdrew from the northern area due to a lack of improvement in the security conditions. “The crisis created by the arrival of significant numbers of refugees into Albanian territory has increased the vulnerability of Albanian families in areas already suffering economic and social
Yugoslavia 163 difficulties.” Many refugees - invited by host families - could not afford to pay rents for long in cash or in kind. A large number of small collective accommodations were privately owned and rents were paid by international funding. It was considered that even if a political settlement was reached in Kosovo, many refugees would not return in the short term, particularly because many no longer had homes to which to return. It was possible that many refugees would still see Albania as the preferred temporary solution and join relatives there rather than return to their destroyed villages during the winter (“Funding and Donor Relations”, 1999). It was more or less possible to predict the same thing for Albanians along with Serbs and others in Macedonia, Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina or elsewhere. In addition, clearing landmines and eliminating numerous unexploded NATO cluster bombs will probably last for a long time and will be costly. Children will be among the first candidates as victims. As was the case in previous wars, even if people are allowed to return to their friends, relatives, homes and property, how can they do so if the fields are planted with mines, and how can they feel “at home in nature” if it becomes dangerous? Many elderly and unaccompanied minors refugees reported having had to work for the KLA carrying food and arms or cooking. “Young men were sent by families from Kosovo to Albania to avoid being ‘rounded-up’ by the Yugoslav army. The refugees reported atrocities committed against civilians prior to flight.” Women were sexually abused in Albania (“Funding and Donor Relations”, 1999) as well as in Kosovo. In October-November 1998, after a massive military build-up, NATO threatened military intervention in the FRY with the purpose of enforcing its compliance with NATO’s interpretation of UN Security Council Resolution 1199 (1998) despite the fact that its two permanent and several ordinary members were opposing the use of force (see Moller, 1998: 3). Fighting stopped and a massive pull-out of a part of the military and police forces took place. The KLA moved swiftly back into vacated areas; since it was not consulted in detail about the withdrawal agreement and did not sign it, its members felt free to accept or ignore its provisions as it suits them. A few days after the withdrawal started, the Council of NATO decided to postpone the air strikes for an indefinite time. After the Rambouillet ultimatum to FRY (see “Rambouillet Imperialism...”, 1999; “Rambouillet - A Process...”, 1999) the bombardment and a new escalation of KLA attacks and Serbian police and
164 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia military actions started. According to one assessment, during the bombardment several thousand people lost their lives, and the total economic damage for the FRY was around $29.6 billions excluding killed, wounded and displaced Kosovo Albanians, damage to households in Kosovo, natural wealth that was destroyed and ecological damages.77 According to another judgement, the cost to the FRY was in the region of $60 billion. Both sources agreed that its real GDP would be reduced to around 40% in 1999, pushing it behind Albania, which is the poorest country in per capita terms (Reuters, 1999). The economy of Montenegro although it escaped wide-scale air strikes - was “in a most precarious state” as a result of the breakdown of normal economic activity in the FRY and the imposition of various controls and restrictions by the federal authorities (more “Briefing to the Security Council...”, 1999: 6). One can conclude that the strikes badly crippled the already weak Yugoslavia and particularly Serbia’s economy and society. It was not known in details how badly crippled were the economy and society of Albanians in Kosovo and elsewhere as a result of the overall war destruction and of Serbia by the war efforts. In June 1999, it was concluded that the FRY was “in a general state of calamity, with important qualitative distinctions, by region”. There was “a depressing panorama of empty villages, burned houses, looted shops, wandering livestock and unattended farms”; “widespread evidence of systematically damaged, abandoned Albanian homes, shops and businesses... ” and incidents of house-burning were witnessed in areas where no fighting was occurring, undermining the official response that “most damage had been caused in fire-fights between Yugoslav forces and the KLA. In one town ... the head of the regional government - in reply to ... question as to what the police forces had done to prevent anti-Albanian vandalism - admitted that the police had targeted most Albanian-owned property to prevent their homes and shops from being used by KLA sympathizers. This explanation was consistent with refugee accounts” (for more details see “Briefing to the Security Council...”, 1999: 6). The same document (“Briefing to the Security Council...”, 1999) notes: all the arguments articulated by the government, regarding the legitimacy of counter-insurgency operations against growing armed separatism, the terrorist activities o f the KLA - including summary executions of security personnel and o f ‘loyalist’ Kosovar Albanians - the frequent cases of persecution of Serbs minorities throughout Kosovo, the irrational effect of NATO bombing on the behaviour o f Serb individuals - including army and police personnel - even if combined, can not account for, explain or justify, the extent and magnitude of
Yugoslavia 165 the brutal treatment of civilian populations, leading to massive displacement inside the FRY and refugee outflows into neighbouring countries.
Among the most pressing needs of the refugees were food, health care and clean water, and the returning refugee population in addition required rehabilitation of schooling, health services, telecommunications, assistance with reconstruction of shelters, water and sanitation, electricity, recovery of agriculture and livestock, heating, etc. (“Briefing to the Security Council...”, 1999:6). After the KLA returned to Kosovo, Serbian and Gypsy houses were burnt; many of them left Kosovo during and after NATO’s bombing, fearing ethnic Albanians seeking revenge for atrocities previously committed against them. According to a UNHCR representative, “out of 169,824 refugees and internally displaced persons from Kosovo in the FRY, some 22,000 were in Montenegro and the rest of them in Yugoslavia”, particularly in central and northern Serbia (“UNHCR Warns...”, 1999: 2), which is the country with the highest number of refugees in Europe and one of the countries with the largest refugee populations in the world. Since deployment of KFOR troops in Kosovo started in June 1999, more than three-quarters of a million people (mostly Albanians) have returned mainly from neighbouring countries and territories as well as from European and other countries. The Kosovo crisis resulted in about 970,000 Albanian refugees and some half a million internally displaced persons (“Fact Sheet: Humanitarian Facts...”, 1999). One could summarize that from February 1998 to late March 1999 about 4 civilians were killed and some 600 refugees were leaving Kosovo daily. From 24 March to 11 June some 100-200 civilians were killed and there were more than 10,000 refugees per day. From 12 June to early September 1999 around 4 civilians were killed, there were some 1,000 refugees per day and simultaneously the great majority of them from the previous phase returned. Some authors consider that civilian victims, displaced persons and refugees were at least partly the result of KLA’s skilful utilization of a tactic which made it hard for the other side to distinguish civilians from solders, fighters from non-fighters etc. That guerrilla tactic had been previously used in the Vietnam war by the Viet Minh soldiers (the Viet Cong) during their campaign of ambush, assassination, sabotage and proselytizing.
166 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia There was “ample evidence of serious additional damage inflicted by the air strikes on an economy already debilitated as a result of sanctions and the break up of the former Yugoslavia”. According to the “Briefing to the Security Council...” (1999: 6) the priority concerns in Serbia were civilian casualties and unemployment due to bombardment and the collapse of the country’s economy; the health and environmental implications of the destruction of plants producing contamination; damage to health, water supply, education, transport, telecommunication, heating, electricitygenerating and distribution infrastructure and agriculture-production; the landmine problem in Kosovo and the unexploded ordnance in the whole country; psychological problems among the population due to unemployment; the danger from the sky from the “invisible enemy”, a sense of humiliation; and the possibilities of irregular emigration from the country etc. After the KLA returned, Kosovo was divided into five operational sectors under the control of NATO members USA, Germany, Italy, France and Great Britain. In late August 1999 ethnic Albanians refused to accept Russian peacekeepers in a part of Kosovo as allegedly Russians committed crimes against Albanians, and Western diplomats rejected a Serb proposal to carve out ethnic enclaves in Kosovo to protect their people from attacks by ethnic Albanians. The Serb proposal to partition or cantonize Kosovo was allegedly influenced by an idea created in the SASA. An unsigned article comments: “one of the enclaves almost certainly would be in the north, above Mitrovica. That would give the Serbs control over much of Kosovo’s most valuable mines and mineral rights.” For this reason and “because the Serbs no longer hold many cards in Kosovo, canonization is a non-starter [...] we don’t want to end up with de facto partition here as we did in Bosnia. But if we rule out partition what’s left?” (“Western diplomats reject call ...”, 1999.) The anonymous author probably meant: what’s left of the international concept and efforts to create a multi-ethnic and unified Kosovo, rather than a divided society. During the bombardment Serbs had been united supporting Milosevic explicitly or implicitly more than ever after 1991 proving Wiberg’s opinion that massive bombing leads to a massive “ rally-around-the-flag” effect. Bearing in mind that Pearl Harbor was one of the most dramatic demonstrations of that effect, it was ridiculous to read American authors’ analyses speculating to the opposite effect. The patterns from the previous wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were basically repeated before, during and after the war in
Yugoslavia 167 Kosovo, with irregulars, militias and/or terrorists doing dirty jobs (mostly plundering, raping, killing, burning) with similar effects that featured previous cases. According to TFF, Lund, people were running away “a) because of ethnic cleansing by Serb/Yugoslavs who feel that the ongoing destruction of Yugoslavia is the result of Albanian policy, b) because of the war between Yugoslav and KLA forces, and c) because of NATO’s bombs which repeatedly also happens to hit civilian targets” (“Covering up NATO’s...”, 1999). Many Serbs in the FRY and elsewhere were asking why - according to their views - the norms of international law, and primarily of the UN Charter, were not respected. Most of them did not accept the humanitarian apology for this intervention but considered that the land-grabbing was its main goal. It seemed that NATO has just strengthened Milosevic’s position and assured his significance in the history of Serbs and that Clinton did not know the element of substance of the Serbs’ mentality. People who have been in opposition to Milosevic’s regime were talking about aggression against their country. For them, who the President of Yugoslavia was did not matter any more. Those “realistic-oriented” Serbs were asking could Serbia defeat the most powerful military alliance in the world and probably in the history of humankind? Numerous non-Serbs, foreigners and some Serbs were feeling as if caught in a double cage, each of them constructed by the sides in the Kosovo conflict (see “Support Free Media.. 1 9 9 8 ) . During the air strikes in Belgrade, many people stayed in their homes refusing to hide in the shelters. Boys played basketball outdoors, thus protesting against the bombardment. Other youngsters used to gather at state-organized rock, pop and folk concerts and visit theatres, ignoring the air strikes. The slogans they used at these gatherings were “Europe, do not leave us - we love you”, “Our songs to your bombs”, “Sorry, we did not know it was invisible”, “F-117A! Ha-ha-ha-ha”, etc. Attracted by the sensational events, several boys were wounded or killed by the shrapnel of bombs that exploded in the same places after the first explosions had happened. A psychologist from Belgrade said the strikes were destroying internal psychological life, killing hope, breaking ego defences and developing war neuroses, phobias, even psychosomatic illnesses. It is not far from logic that, in defensive war, collectivism and an already existing undemocratic orientation is strengthened or renewed as well as authoritarian consciousness and the cult of the leader. The last two have earlier been conspicuous national characteristics, maybe developed thanks to the force
168 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia of circumstances (see Mijatovic, 1999: 8). Probably similar qualifications could be used for the Albanians during the exodus from their homes. According to the Sunday Telegraph, 29 August 1999, a document “Air Power 3000” (largely written before the bombing) stressed that “comprehensively bombing large ‘strategic’ targets, such as bridges across the Danube or civilian power stations, to destroy a country’s national will, ‘may not be the most effective way of achieving an objective.’ Air power should not - or should only rarely - be ‘used in isolation’ during a multinational campaign, the document reportedly says.” This was “the first admission that the air campaign could have been coupled with the threat of a ground war, as many critics have said” (SHAPE NEWS, 1999: 3). Some Western politicians and diplomats considered that NATO was authorized to intervene beyond its area without an explicit mandate from the UN Security Council for the purpose of neutralizing threats to international peace and security. On the same basis, Moller concluded that NATO and its individual members “appear to be increasingly disposed toward military interventionism” (1998: 3). Journalist Milos Milosevic concluded that the idolization of power was having catastrophic political effects in that area (1998: 13). That was the phenomenon that pushed Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo towards the conflict escalation process. Does one meet it again in another form? Using the excuse that Milosevic only understands the language of force, those who were threatening and attacked FRY acted as if they only understood the same language. When the 11-week-long bombardment started, the planes became, in effect, the air force of the KLA. From time to time, it seemed that Remington’s prediction that “inevitably efforts to make NATO the morality cop of Western civilization are far more likely to balkanize NATO than put out ethnonational fires in Eastern Europe” (forthcoming) was becoming at least partly reality. Finally, “however much one may dislike Milosevic and his treatment of the Albanian minority, reaction would, legally speaking, have amounted to an outright invasion of a sovereign state” (Mailer, 1998: 3). According to Joenniemi, there was the question of whether it was acceptable for international society to tolerate jeopardizing the principles of human rights and democracy in the name of the principle of non-violence if all principles are relative. “With some security spaces being based on systematic repression and murdering, the luxury of operating with absolute principles is no longer there ... With human rights and democracy played against non-violence, the compromise could also be about non-violence.” Thus, “the emergence of an international society built on common values
Yugoslavia 169 such as human rights and democracy presents the peace movements with some formidable challenges” (Joenniemi, 1999: 57). It seems one of the theoretical challenges appears if one tries to analyse a case such as the NATO bombardment, which violated several human rights including primarily those which belong to their “third generation”: the right to peace, to development and to a healthy environment (see “NATO’s War...”, 1999). It could happen that the international community will soon be faced with the dilemma whether peace or human rights are of greater importance and which has priority if both cannot be protected at the same time. However, a problem could occur in finding the borderline between these two phenomena because of the tendency that they may be becoming two aspects of the same phenomenon, which the international community tends to protect. Another dilemma could be the human rights or state sovereignty. In the long term, the rights - supported by the process of globalization - seem to have a better chance of winning. There is also the open question of the price, especially related to powers such as China, Russia or the USA. The leaders of many NATO members ethically perceived the bombardment as a sort of just war waged against Milosevic’s policy of ethnic cleansing in Kosovo and that view was mostly supported by the Western media. The leadership of Serbia - supported by media operating during the state of war in Serbia - interpreted the bombardment as supporting the secessionism of Albanians. According to another thesis, the bombardment was (also) a revenge for the Serbs’ forces’ actions in Srebrenica during the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. According to some opinions, after the bombing the “patriotic” rhetoric (which was also considered as anti-liberal, anti-Western and xenophobic) was getting back to the state and some opposition media, which remained very powerful despite the smashed TV headquarters and transmitters, and the long-term political prospects were confused. Many sympathizers of opposition parties and even some experts believed that another election without a free media and international supervision could be another farce and would be regarded as cheating. The bombing and the image of a dictatorship endowed with war crimes might have weakened it in the long run internationally, but life in the ecologically and economically devastated country did not seem to be leading to democracy. It seems that the FRY’s and Serbia’s regime became even stronger after the bombing, retaining some or parts of the laws and
170 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia practices introduced before and during it. Citizens of Serbia did not see a way out of the spiritual and political tunnel they entered before and particularly after the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia started, especially after the USA message “no help to Serbia until Milosevic is in power”. Street pressure has been shown as futile and a coup d ’état by military and/or police could lead to yet another violent escalation. For the sympathizers, the only acceptable way for change seemed to be (lacking) selective and more intensive support of the international community towards democratic forces, civic society, a so-called independent or free media, NGOs, an internationally recognized alternative academic educational network etc. * * *
In the case of the identity and societal security of the First and Second Yugoslavia and FRY as well as the other successor states, the major questions are what is identity and state, whose state it is, what is sovereignty, autonomy, independence, whose territory it is etc. Another important issue is how facts (states) have been affecting existing identities. One possible way is through perceptions, i.e. because people know the fact and attach certain significance to it. Another possibility is transition of that knowledge from generation to generation. In the latter case myths seem to be just as effective as facts. Serbs have long period of statehood behind them, which nobody disputes, and Yugoslavs can hardly do it. Sandzak Muslims seem to be the weakest in this regard, while Albanians are in somewhat better position. The linkage of the Serbs to their state seems to be more complex than of Croats and Slovenes, who managed somehow to find and pres erve their state traditions although from time to time one can question their quality as their states used to be parts of other states. One of the Serbs’ problems seems to be the movements of the population and core territories before, during and after the Turkish times including the one after KFOR arrived and KLA returned to Kosovo. While Slovenes and Croats succeeded in linking their identities with certain core territories, for Serbs it was not possible to achieve this. One of the main reasons was that during the history of the Serbian state the core territory and population was moved by Serbs themselves, and/or by their enemies, to the south and later to the north. In addition, while Slovenes are everywhere Slovenes, Serbs as well as Croats have their above-mentioned ‘extensions’. The case of Montenegrins shows how the extension could become a distinct nation with a parallel identity which is, as such, sometimes disputed.
Yugoslavia 171 What constitutes national identity is not in many cases what actually happened, but what people believe happened. One of the basic questions is: whose state is Yugoslavia? According to others, the First Yugoslavia belonged to the Serbs but many Serbs would not admit it. The Second Yugoslavia was also nobody’s state or - according to others - it also belonged to the Serbs. As Serbs do not admit that and even consider that it was antiSerb, a logical question is: was it anti-everybody? Thus the most complex question for the First Yugoslavia was whose state it was, and for the Second whose state it was not. While Croats and Slovenes do not identify themselves with the Second and particularly with the First Yugoslavia, Serbs see the First Yugoslavia as an extended Serbia, although there are very few of them who would admit that. This means that the Second Yugoslavia was nobody’s, although Croats and Slovenes believe that it was dominated by the Serbs (and Tito was not one of them). Territories in the First Yugoslavia were not identified by the nations, while in the Second Yugoslavia there was Serbia, Croatia, Slovenia, Montenegro etc., which enabled its main nations to build important elements of their national identities. Finally, there is the open question to whom does the FRY belong: the Serbs, the Montenegrins or the Yugoslavs, who again seem to be rather rare? There is an impression that both the Montenegrins and Serbs from time to time feel uneasy within the FRY. Serbs principally because they do not feel supported or are insufficiently supported in their efforts to keep Kosovo and sometimes even some other parts in Serbia and sometimes even in Yugoslavia. On the other hand, many Montenegrins feel uneasy in the FRY because they believe that their economic, political and cultural life - after all the years of sanctions and other sufferings - could have been much improved if the parties in the Kosovo conflict had found a quick solution, almost regardless of the price for the various sides. One could conclude that the Serbs were more or less inappropriately keeping the territorial integrity and legitimacy of the First and Second Yugoslavia and they have been doing the same for the FRY. On the other hand, many Albanians were challenging the territorial integrity and legitimacy of the Second Yugoslavia. Albanians in Montenegro do not, at least openly, participate in challenging the FRY just as Albanians in Macedonia were not doing it as long as Macedonia was a part of the Second Yugoslavia.
172 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia 5.3 Religious affiliation The “Theodosian Line”, which divided the Roman Empire in 395, later also marked the organizational division of the Christian Church. As the line was drew starting from Skadar through present-day Montenegro, the Roman pope took jurisdiction over Christians in present-day Albania. In 732 jurisdiction was moved from Rome to Constantinople, but after the 1054 split of the Christian Church, the northern part of Albania returned to the jurisdiction of Rome while the southern parts remained under the jurisdiction of Constantinople. While the above-mentioned Western Catholic Sorbs or Lusatians in Germany are mostly Roman Catholics, South Slavs - who used to follow the animistic religion - were divided along the line of division between the two parts of the Roman Empire and Christian Church. Thus when Zupan Vlastimir recognized the supreme power of Byzantine around 850, he became an important channel for the spreading of the Eastern tradition of Christianity, and it was adopted by the Serbs, Bulgarians and Romanians. During the ninth century, Greek monks Cyril and Methodius, “apostles to the Slavs”, created a script which made it possible for believers to read religious books and papers in the Slavonic language. According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1995) this was a great step toward establishing the liturgical and literary language of the Balkans, but it also meant that, with Greek remaining in use in commerce and in the administration of the Byzantine Empire, the Orthodox world no longer had a common language that functioned as Latin did in the Catholic world. The lack of a universal language developed in part from a political assumption established at the very beginning of the Orthodox Christian world: that the church and the state were twin pillars of legitimate authority. Consequently, each state which separated from the Byzantine Empire tended to establish an accompanying church.This association o f state and church was intensified by the fear of invasion by non-Christians, a fear shared by state and church, ruler and ruled. Ruler and ruled were much less united, however, when social tensions arose - especially when, as was frequently the case, these tensions found expression in support for religious heresies.
Independent thinking within the Church was persecuted as it was perceived as dangerous to secular and spiritual power, “and this inevitably hindered the development of those forms of intellectual exchange that later proved vital to the flowering of intellectual life in the West - Catholic Croatia-Slavonia and Dalmatia included” (ibid.). Following the developments in the western parts of the territory settled by the South
Yugoslavia 173 Slavs, Hungarian ruler Geza accepted Christianity in 1015 and his son Stephen continued the Christianization of Hungarians. An important man in the history of the Serbian Orthodox Church was Sava Nemanjic, whose achievement - which is considered to be a great success - was the separation of the church from the archbishopric of Ohrid influenced by the Bulgarian Church. In 1219, he became the first autocephalous archbishop of Serbia, and after his death was recognized as a saint (ibid.). After the Turks’ arrival the Serbian Church became the so-called millet - one of the recognized non-Muslim churches - and placed under the direction of the patriarch of Constantinople again (see Mirkovic, 1972: 188-92). During the Turkish rule the Church lost most of its property, and its priests made great efforts to preserve national identity and achieve national interests as they were perceived by the Church, which principally meant preventing Islamization and Hellenization of the Serbs. For that reason, religious centres (monasteries, churches etc.) also became also nuclei of education and cultural life. Finally, in 1557 a Turkish sultan persuaded by Grand Vizier Mehmed Pasha Sokolovic (of Serbian origin) restored the autonomy of the Church and appointed as the Patriarch his relative Makarije. Thus the Church got rid of the Greek clergy from Constantinople, and not of the Turks (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1971: 426-7). The Church was suppressed again and placed under the direction of the Greek patriarch of Constantinople from 1766 to 1832, when it got its independence. It seems that in the above-mentioned way the importance of the Serbian Orthodox religion and Church (as the institution for reproducing the religious element of national identity and transmitting it from one generation to the next) was not reduced. On the contrary, the suppression of the Serbian Orthodox Church, on the one hand, and its activities, on the other, made religious affiliation an important element of Serb national identity. Serbs have perceived the Church as an institution that was not only acting as the church but also replacing the state as well as various cultural and educational institutions at the same time. According to the Encyclopaedia Britannica (1995), “the year 1516 saw a shift in the constitution of Montenegro that many historians regard as having ensured its survival as an independent state”. During that period the last member of the Cmojevic dynasty retired and endowed the succession upon the Cetinje bishops.
174 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Formerly, the loyalty of minor chieftains and of the peasantry to their rulers had been unstable. It was not unusual for political control throughout the Balkans to pass from Slav rulers to the Turks, not because of the defeat of the former in battle but because of the failure of local magnates to secure the support of their subjects, (ibid.)
The new position of Montenegro vladika as the prince-bishop stabilized the leadership of the country. “The link between church and state elevated it in the eyes of the peasantry, gave it an institutionalized form of succession that prevented its becoming a matter of contest between minor chieftains, and excluded the possibility of compromising alliances with the Turks” (ibid.). Although Montenegro had elected rulers (prince-bishops or vladika) from 1519 to 1696, the first of them from the famous dynasty PetrovicNjegos - Danilo I Nikola Petrovic (1670-1735) - was elected with the ability to nominate an inheritor. As Orthodox bishops are an exemption of the rule that allows Orthodox priests to marry and oblige them to celibate, Danilo I nominated his nephew as his successor. The Montenegrin theocracy lasted until Danilo II Petrovic Njegos (1851-60) abolished it, and Montenegro became a hereditary principality. The Ottoman Turks in Albania applied mechanisms for Islamization, which were basically similar to those used in Serbia and Bosnia and Herzegovina: the population was converted in order to take advantage of lower taxes levied against the Muslims and some other privileges. However, at the end of the sixteenth century and during the seventeenth century the Turks were making great efforts to Islamize the population of Albania, and as a result two-thirds of the inhabitants were converted. Thus since the arrival of the Turks the most numerous among Albanians have been members of Islam. One can only form weak hypotheses on the reasons why Islamization was most successful among Albanians and members of the peoples in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and relatively unsuccessful among Greeks, Romanians, Bulgarians, Serbs in Serbia etc. In Montenegro, the ebbing of the Ottoman tide proved significant for Montenegrin religious identity, which appears to have been particularly unstable throughout the 18th century. In spite of the establishment of a theocratic, Orthodox state and the legendary mass slaughter of those who had converted to Islam (the “Montenegrin Vespers” of Christmas Eve, 1702), there is considerable evidence that Montenegrin lineages shifted in a very fluid manner not only between the Catholic and Muslim faiths but between Montenegrin and Albanian identity [...] it seems that, given the uncertainty over who held power
Yugoslavia 175 in the region, the retention of a foot in more than one confessional or linguistic camp was often regarded as a kind of collective insurance policy. The decline of Turkish power, however, was accompanied by a gradual stabilization of Montenegro’s Orthodox identity, (ibid.) Catholicism remained in the area, and Catholics have identified themselves as Croats (ibid.). Some authors concluded that during the period of separation between the Serbs and Montenegrins, the latter developed their own characteristics and institutions. Among important institutions was the head of Montenegro’s own ecclesiastical province, which used to exist until the “Montenegrin Orthodox Church” was included in the Serbian patriarchate in 1920. In addition, in 1969 nationalism intensified among Montenegrins when the Serbian Orthodox Church protested against the erection of the Lovcen mausoleum dedicated to Petar II (ibid.). It is considered that the Goranci are autochthonous people of Serbian origin who received Islam as a means for protecting their existence during the sixteenth, eighteenth and the beginning of the next century (Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1958: 491). The fact that Bunjevci share their Catholic religion with some of the Hungarians was used as a means towards Magyarization by the Hungarian clergy as well as those of the Bunjevci (for more details see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1956: 306-7). According to the census taken in 1921, out of 12,545,000 inhabitants of the First Yugoslavia, 5,593,000 (44%) declared themselves as Christian Orthodox, 4,708,000 (32%) as Roman Catholics, and 1,345,000 (10.7%) as Muslims. Although it was difficult to estimate the percentages for the religious structure of the Second Yugoslavia, some estimates made in 1953 showed little change: 42% Christian Orthodox, 32% Roman Catholics, and 12% Muslims, respectively (Jelavich and Jelavich, 1965: 10). Between 1921 and 1953 the percentage of Muslims did not increase, though an increase might have been expected because of higher birth rates. After the First World War religions were politicized among Orthodox and Catholics. The first were making efforts to dominate over the second. Before the Second World War about 65% of Hungary’s population was Roman Catholic, 25% Protestant, 6% Jewish (who during the war were almost completely eliminated), and 3% Greek Orthodox. In that country since the war no religious statistics have been released (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998).
176 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia During the Second World War, members of all major religious groups took part in civil warfare in the territory of the First Yugoslavia. Since within Pavelic’s state a form of forceful conversion was practised, one could conclude that religion was emphasized in Croatia. Within the Second Yugoslavia, an attempt was made to suppress and politically neutralize all religions during Tito’s lifetime. They were tolerated, however, as long as they stayed away from politics and did not use national symbols. This denationalization and depolitization as well as politization in the First Yugoslavia and after Tito’s death all at least partly led to civil wars. After the Second World War, around 70% of the population of Albania belonged to Islam (dispersed in all country), 20% to the Christian Orthodox Church (mostly in the south), and 10% to the Catholic Church (mostly populated in the north of the country). Among Muslims the most numerous were Sunnites, and one-quarter were members of the Bektachi sect (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998) sometimes considered by Suniites Orthodox as a sect on the brink of Islam or even as a non-Islam sect. As Communists declared Albania an atheist state, all churches and mosques were closed, confiscated and more than 2,000 of them destroyed. During the Communist rule, the religious establishment was officially banned, and religious freedom was restored by Ramiz Alia (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). By the closures of places of education and worship (which can thus be qualified as denying freedom of worship), the institutions that reproduce religion were forbidden to operate, curtailing the religious element of national identity that should be transmitted effectively from one generation to the next. Substantial changes in states’ relations toward religions happened only in 1990. All Balkan Communist leaderships were more or less threatening to the identities of members of their societies by suppressing their religions by various means and in that way interfering with their ability to reproduce themselves. Although in this as well as in other regards (chiefly the poor economy) the Albanian Communist leadership was the worst, Albanians in Serbia - who are also mostly Sunnite Muslims (with some Shi’ ite Muslims, Orthodox and Catholics exceptions, whose CDP can be included in a group of 10 minor parties in Kosovo) - have not been discouraged from more or less intensively demanding unification with their motherland. Data collected in 1991 census showed the Second Yugoslavia to be a very religious country although some authors warn that data were collected
Yugoslavia 177 by simply asking people to declare their religious affiliation without the duty of presenting any documents or other proofs of their affiliation. Lately there has been a development in Montenegro that could be compared with that in Macedonia a few decades ago: Pimen, the selfappointed patriarch of a church that became separated from the Bulgarian Orthodox Church, appointed Mihailo Dedajic, ex-priest of the Serbian Orthodox church, to a metropolitan Montenegrin orthodox church. During the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, assuming that it would be preferable for third parties to be relatively invulnerable to domestic or external political pressures concerning conflicts, Wiberg stressed the importance for third parties to maintain religious closeness with the sides in the conflict. He concluded that an East Asian group of countries would have fared better than the EC, because it would have the additional advantage of not being made up either of Catholics, Orthodox Christians or Moslems (Wiberg, 1994a: 250). Using this way of thinking, one may roughly guess which group(s) of states would be appropriate as mediators) in the Serbo-Albanian conflict. Finally, more than two-thirds of present-day Hungarians are religiously affiliated to the Roman Catholic Church; and one-quarter of them are Lutheran or Calvinist Protestants (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). During the war in Kosovo and after it, many believers and priests escaped from their cities and villages, and many places used for the purpose of worship were destroyed, unattended, poorly attended etc. At the same time, there was an impression that churches’ leaderships - with occasional exceptions - were also at least tacitly supporting the political sides, waiting for war benefits for themselves. 5.4 Language and culture For a hundred years Sorbs have been surrounded by Germans, but they have preserved their own identity (literature, customs, a language called Serbean, Lustian or Wendish including an alphabet of Latin origin) to the present day. The language - whose earliest written record originates from the fifteenth century - is closely related to the western group of Slavic languages spoken in eastern Germany. After 1815, when southern Lusatia was transferred to Prussia, the area was subjected to Germanization. In its western section, the number of
178 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Sorbian speakers was greatly reduced and they were Germanized; a similar process happened within the eastern section after 1871. In the late 1930s, Hitler suppressed the Serb inhabitants of the region, and in 1949 they were given the right to maintain their culture including the use of their own language (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In the time of the migrations to the Balkans, Slav ancestors of presentday Serbs used to speak an unwritten proto-Slavonic language that belonged to the Indo-European family of languages. In the Balkans, in addition to ancestors of present-day Albanians, the old Slavs met people who spoke mostly local dialects of the Latin language (so-called Balkan Latinity) and received some of its words. After their settlement in the Balkans, this language was transformed into the Old Slavonic language that had several dialects (see Ivic, 1981: 125-40). Expansion of Christianity to the Slav populations and its territories received a great stimulus from the Cyrillic script (used by present-day Serbs in a modified version) which was employed in translating the Bible, liturgy and other texts. According to the (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995), “not only was the influence of the Eastern church permanently assured over the greater part of the Balkans, but the apostle Cyril’s Cyrillic alphabet also became one of the most visible cultural badges separating the Serbs (together with the Bulgarians, Montenegrins, and Macedonians) from the Croats and Slovenes”. Most of the refugees who came to the FRY from Slovenia, Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina - particularly after the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina started - had been using Latin script and a (sub-)dialect, which is different of that used by most of people in Serbia. The Albanian language “is apparently descended from the ancient Illyrian language” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). The oldest Albanian written records, which originate from the Gheg area, are in makeshift spellings based on Greek, Italian or in Turko-Arabic characters. A prevalent opinion among Albanians is that they are descendants of the ancient Illyrians, and therefore are a nation whose culture has one of Europe’s oldest traditions. It is considered that some of the Illyrian tribes were assimilated by the Slavs, while other moved to modem Albania, managing to preserve their own identity, and chiefly their own distinct language. “Indeed, these Illyrians are thought to be the ancestors of the Albanians, an argument supported by the latter people’s unique language” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995; 1998). Some other experts consider that Albanians have been descendants of a few indigenous peoples in the Balkans who kept their own language and
Yugoslavia 179 customs through many centuries and in spite of the Roman, Visigoth, Hun (from the third to the fifth century) and other invasions. The present-day cities of Durres and Lezhe were originally established as Greek colonies, and the population of Southern Albania was mostly influenced by the old Greek culture. After the invasions in the sixth and seventh century, Albanians were acculturated by the Slavs, who became their new neighbours and from time to time enemies. The Albanian language also belongs to the Indo-European group of languages though it does not have obvious similarities with any other existing language from that group. It was detected for the first time in 1854 by the German philologist Franz Bopp, and in 1880s and 1890s correspondences were elaborated by another German philologist Gustav Meyer. The Danish linguist Holger Pedersen and the Austrian Norbert Jokl enlarged on the details of that conclusion. It seems to be “the sole modem survivor of its own subgroup”; it is likely that “in very early times the Balto-Slavic group was its nearest of kin” and the ancient Illyrian language as well as unknown languages Dacian or Daco-Mysian “have been tentatively considered its ancestor or nearest relative”. Some sources also mention the Thraco-Illyrian language as a possible ancestor of the Albanian language: in general, the grammar and formal distinctions of Albanian are reminiscent of Modem Greek and the Romance languages, especially of Romanian. The sounds suggest Hungarian or Greek, but Gheg with its nasal vowels strikes the ear as distinctive [...] a fair number of features - e.g., the formation of the future tense and of the noun phrase - are shared with other languages of the Balkans but are of obscure origin and development; Albanian or its earlier kin could easily be the source for at least some of these. The study of such regional features in the Balkans has become a classic case for research on the phenomena o f linguistic diffusion (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995).
The characteristic that makes the Albanian language quite different from the Serbo-Croatian, Serbian, Croatian or Bosnian is that the Albanian can be written in a Latin-based alphabet only. The principal dialects of Albanian language are Gheg (spoken to the north of the Shkumbin river and by Albanians in Kosovo and Macedonia), and Tosk (used to the south of the same river in Albania as well as by Albanians in villages in Italy and Greece) (for more details see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995; 1998).
180 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia For many centuries Arabic, Latin and Greek language and script were used among Albanians instead of their language in public and educational institutions as well as in Albanian literature and culture in general. For some parts of the Middle Ages, “Albanian urban society reached a high point of development. Foreign commerce flourished to such an extent that leading Albanian merchants had their own agencies in Venice, Ragusa, and Thessalonica ... The prosperity of the cities also stimulated the development of education and the arts” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). The foregoer of the renewal of the modem Albanian literature was Albanian Jeronim de Rada, an Italian, who was collecting examples of old folk poetry combining them in poetic epics (like the one on Skanderbeg). He was also the editor of the first journal in Albanian language Fjamuri (“Flag of Albania” ) existing from 1883 to 1887. Satirist and folk-poet Gjergj Fishta devised the first standardized and official Albanian spelling, which was adopted in Bitola (present-day Macedonia) in 1909. It was based on the Gheg dialect and the Latin alphabet. Albanian literature started to flourish after 1912. The most prominent works were the poetic dramas and novels by Mihal Grameno, Mehdi Frasheri and Foqion Postoli. The works were centred on the Albanian mountain people who competed with each other fighting with the Greeks and Turks. Mid’hat Frasheri’s book of short stories Hi dhe shpuze (“Ashes and Embers”) was published in Albanian in 1915. The best poets in the early twentieth century were Gjergj Fishta, Alexander Drenova and Ndre Mjeda. During the period between the world wars, Albanian exiles to the USA Kristo Floqi and Faik Konitsa edited Albanian literary journals, and Bishop Fan S. Noli translated plays by Ibsen, Shakespeare and other authors. Ernest Koliqi and Dhimite r Pasko (pseudonym Mitrush Khuteli) created short stories, Kristo Floqi wrote dramas in Albanian language, and Lasgush Poradeci was a prominent lyric poet (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). After the Second World War, the official language adopted the Tosk dialect as its model. This was decided in 1948 by Albanian political leaders in the town of Monastir (Bitola). “Albanian is of special interest in the study of languages because it stands alone ... It holds its linguistic place along with other principal branches (e.g., Germanic) of the Indo-European language family, despite the fact that the language is spoken by a relatively small number of the world’s people” (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Hungarians speak the Hungarian or Magyar language, which is a member of the Finno-Ugric family of languages. The language is most closely related to the Ob-Ugric group of languages as well as to Finnish
Yugoslavia 181 and Estonian. Like other nations in the region, Hungarians have been under a mixture of Turkish, Slavic, German and Romanian cultural and other influences; “nevertheless, national consciousness was not quenched; an indigenous art, music, and literature persisted over the years, and such folk arts as embroidery and ceramics are still important” (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). As the main basis for the assumption that Bunjevci’s origins are in the above-mentioned areas is the fact that they speak the i-kavski stokavski dialect. In their language one can also find some cakavski and other elements depending on their linguistic surrounding. According to Enciklopedija Jugoslavije (1956), they were chiefly victims of Magyarization before and also after they were capable of developing their own national consciousness and culture {Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1956: 304; Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974). As the last who received Islam among the Balkan Christians, the Goranci have been keeping Serbian traditions, customs and language. They are considered the group that speaks a pure form of the Serbian language (Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1958: 491), while Bosniacs or Muslims from Sandzak share their language with those in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Before the Ottoman Turks occupied their country, the Serbs had developed a rich cultural life, which was based on their religious affiliation and aimed to eliminate the cultural and other influences of Latinism and Bogomilism at the same time. From the second half of the twelfth to the end of the thirteenth century, the Raska school became, in fact, a complex art movement, whose members produced wall paintings as well as icons and miniatures painting, sculpture etc. The well-known architecture of monasteries Khilandar (built in 1199), Mileseva (around 1235), Pec (1250), Moraca (1252), Sopocani (around 1260), Decani (1327), Gracanica (1321) and several others have been among the highest achievements of the same school. As a rule, the monasteries and churches were decorated by numerous frescoes,78 among the most famous of which are those made by artists who developed the Raska school, which is “known for their capacity to blend a reverential sense of the awe in which secular authority is held with a deep sense of religious devotion”. Among the most important accomplishments of the Nemanjic dynasty was advancement in a unanimous culture for all Serbs (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1968: 46-8; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). At approximately the same time, literary work in Serbia resulted in several distinguished manuscripts such as the biography of Stefan I
182 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Nemanja by St Sava and his brother Stefan and Miroslav’s Gospel (created around 1185), studies of the lives of the saints (hagiographies) biblical stories etc. (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1965: 132-3). Fine considers that the almost wholly mountainous Dinaric range “to a considerable degree was responsible for isolation of what became Bosnia, Herzegovina, and Montenegro and formed a border between the Italian culture of the coast and the Slavic culture of the interior” (1983: 1). Between 1423 and 1426, a centre for book copying was established in monastery Resava in Serbia (Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1968: 66). At the end of the same century, during the Ottoman attacks, Ivan Cmojevic (1465-90) or his son Djuradj (1490-96) imported a press from Venice to Montenegro, which was used for printing some of the first church books in the Cyrillic script (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995; Bjelica, 1983: 235). In 1768, the first number of the Slaveno-serbski magazin (Slav-Serbian Magazine) was published in Venice. Serbs, along with Albanians and Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina, were prevented from experiencing many European Renaissance humanistic achievements and from maintaining cultural contacts and exchanges with the rest of Europe. Instead of that, after the sixteenth century, as more and more Serbs were hiding in mountains and becoming hajduci (outlaws), folk poetry about them preserved the memories of the Serbs’ past “glory, power and independence”. As literacy was low among Serbs as well as other indigenous peoples in the Turkish Empire,79 the songs were passed on mostly by oral family traditions, and in that way became an element of Serbs’ national heritage, which is learned and analysed in present-day schools. Before and after the above-mentioned migration under Arsenije III Cmojevic from Old Serbia, several cultural and educational centres were established in some parts of Vojvodina (particularly in monasteries on the Fruska Gora hills) as part of an effort to recover national self-respect and pride (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1968: 603). During the rule of the theocrat and suggestive poet Petar II Petrovic Njegos (1813-51), who considered himself to be a Serb, the printing press was set up in Cetinje, the capital of Montenegro, and schools were founded in the country. Njegos’ main works are Gorski vijenac (“The Mountain Garland”), Luca Mikrozoma (“The Ray of the Microcosm”), Lazni car Stjepan Mali (“The False Tsar Stephen the Small”) etc. (see Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974). The Encyclopaedia Britannica ( 1995) concluded that
Yugoslavia 183 [In addition,] Montenegrin pronunciation of Serbo-Croatian is closer to speech heard in Croatia than to the standard used in Serbia. Many inhabitants of Montenegro resent modem Serbian attempts to minimize their national distinctiveness, and a strong Montenegrin nationalist movement has developed [...] differences between Montenegrins and Serbs are a matter of continuing controversy. Although isolated from each other for centuries during the Ottoman period, when Albanian families came to dominate the intervening Kosovo region, both groups retained their Orthodox religious traditions and many other common cultural attributes - including the Cyrillic alphabet.
Most Serbs - because of the obvious commonalities - “see Montenegrins as ‘Mountain Serbs,’ and many - but certainly not all Montenegrins see themselves as Serb in origin” (ibid.). Writer Dositej Obradovic (1739-1811), a member of the Enlightenment movement, had an important role in the development of educational institutions in Serbia after the first Serbian uprising against the Turks in the early nineteenth century. Raising his voice against clericalism and religious dividing of the South Slav peoples as the main obstacle of their development, he influenced members of the Illyrian movement (for more details see Pavlovic, 1932; Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1965: 361-2; Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda, 1974: 695). Linguist, ethnographer and historian Vuk Stefanovic Karadzic was a member of the European Romanticism movement, who reformed the Serbian literary language, its grammar, dictionary, changed the Old Church Slavonic Cyrillic script on a phonetic basis (strongly opposed by the clergy) and translated the New Testament. The language he used and proposed was the Western dialect group of Serbo-Croatian language ijekavski stokavski spoken in Western Serbia (where Karadzic was bom) and shared with most people in Croatia, Montenegrins, Serbs and Muslims in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Karadzic collected and published the results of mass intellectual activities (the authors of many of the stories and poems he collected were unknown) of the Serbs and also the Croats, awakening their pride in their own culture and respect for their own of traditions and national history. Some linguists are prone to conclude that language itself contributes towards the creation of a people’s identity, and in any case Karadzic’s work provided one of the elements of Serbia’s national identity- the modem version of the Serbian language (in addition to myths on common origin, state traditions and religious affiliation). On the other hand, by establishing the “perfect” alphabet he rendered medieval Serbian literature and
184 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia documents incomprehensible for the Serbs themselves (see more details Djuric, 1964; Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1962: 193-6; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). Other known Serbian Romantics were poets Branko Radicevic (182453) and Jovan Jovanovic Zmaj (1883-1904), poet, novelist and painter Djura Jaksic (1832-78), and novelist Laza Kostic (1841-1910). The Realistic orientation was used at least partly in novels and other works written by Laza Lazarevic (1851-90), Simo Matavulj (1852-1908), humourist Stevan Sremac (1855-1906) and critic Jovan Skerlic. Between the two world wars as well as after the Second World War, Serbian literature was mostly dominated by writers of leftist and Socialist Realistic orientation. One of the most prominent writers of that period was the Nobel prize-winner Ivo Andric, who during the Second World War wrote three novels of major importance: Na Drini cuprija, Travnicka hronika (Bosnian Story) and Gospodjica (The Woman from Sarajevo) dealing with the history of Bosnia in all of them. After the Second World War Serbian literature established its distinct forms of expression in the works of numerous poets and novelists. Among the best of them are: Desanka Maksimovic (1898-1993), whose most important works are Vrt detinjstva (Garden of Childhood), Ludilo srca (Madness of Hart) and Nemam vise vremena (I Have No More Time); Oskar Davico (1909-91) who wrote Pesma (The Poem) and Hana; Ivan Lalic (191496), author of Svadba (Wedding); and Vasko Popa (1922-91), who wrote Kora (Bark), Nepocin-polje (Field of No Rest), Oci Sutjeske (Eyes of Sutjeska), Uspravna zemlja (Earth Erect), Vucja so (W olfs Salt) and Od zlata jabuka (The Golden Apple). Members of the younger generations of writers are Stevan Raickovic (1928- ); Miodrag Pavlovic (1928- ), who created Robovi poezije (Slaves of Poetry); Danilo Kis (1935-89), who wrote Grobnica za Borisa Davidovica (A Tomb for Boris Davidovich); Miodrag Bulatovic (1930- ), who wrote Crveni petao leti prema nebu (The Red Cockerel); the internationally renowned Milorad Pavic, with his Hazarski recnik (Dictionary of the Khazars), Predeo slikan cajem (Area Painted by Tea), Unutrasnja strana vetra (The Inner Side of the Wind); Svetlana VelmarJankovic (Bezdno - “Bottomless”); Borislav Pekic, author of Radjanje Atlantide (The Birth of Atlantis); Svetislav Basara, author of Virtuelna Kabala (The Virtual Kabbalah), etc. (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). The Albanian language was reformed and a single literary language created during Communist rule. As far as is known, Ismail Kadare (1936 - ) is the only Albanian novelist who became known outside of his
Yugoslavia 185 country with such novels as Gjenerali i ushtërisë së vdekur (The General of the Dead Army), Dasma (The Wedding), and Dimri i madh (The Great Winter), which were translated into dozens of languages. Hungarians have made a substantial contribution to the world’s arts and sciences. The most distinguished achievements were made by the Hungarian-born scientists Nobel prize-winners Albert Szent-Gyô rgyi, Eugene Wigner, Georg von Békésy, Edward Teller, John von Neumann, and Leo Szilard. Most remarkable were musical works by Franz Liszt, Béla Bartok and Zoltán Kodály (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). The sharing of language with Serbs, perceived by many Croats as compulsory, started after the Second World War. The name “SerboCroatian language” was created as a result of political attempts by the Communist regime of the Second Yugoslavia to create an official spoken and literary language. In 1954, the Vernacular of Serbo-Croatian language was set up by the Agreement, and in 1971 the Croatians recalled their signature, stating that it was given under intensive political pressure. In 1997 the government of Serbia proclaimed that the only language in Serbia was to be Serbian and cancelled the 1954 Vernacular too (cf. Web Development Team, 1995). Before 1990, the “Eastern” version {e-kavski stokavski) with a Latin alphabet was widely used in government communications in Yugoslav federal bodies and between the republics. In 1990, when the Croatian parliament made the above-mentioned move, many Serbs in Serbia and Croatia started to insist on utilizing the Serbian language with the Cyrillic alphabet. In that way, people of all nations, who used to name and perceive the language they used as Serbo-Croat or Croatian-Serbian (it seems that many of them identified themselves as Yugoslavs) were now actually - at least to some degree - prevented from doing so. The institutions that reproduced Serbo-Croat language and culture in most cases changed - at least nominally - the subjects of their work, thus preventing the process of transmitting the language and culture from one generation to the next. Later, a similar process happened in Bosnia and Herzegovina and partly in Macedonia. During the late years of the Second Yugoslavia educational curricula became one of the disputed issues. Serbs, being the majority in Serbia, were expecting to determine the curricula, and Albanians as the majority in Kosovo were assuming that they would be those who created the same documents.
186 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Buzan (1993) concluded that threats to societal security might come from forbidding something as well as allowing it. The second possibility sounds like part of the Serbian argumentation, which said that Albanians if they had been allowed to create the curriculum on their own - would threaten the territorial integrity of Serbia (and the FRY). It would happen by teaching children - according to Serbian opinion - the “wrong” version of some subjects, a list of which includes several points. History seems to be chiefly a matter of saying which nation came when and where, invading and assimilating whom, who was attacking and who was attacked etc. Geography consists of where political and/or demographic borders of nations are. Language education includes, among other things, knowledge of literary works which have a moral, political or other message, who are among the most distinguished experts and determining who those experts are at the same time. For similar reasons, music and other kinds of art education can also be included in the list as well as other “ethnically sensitive subjects”. The curricula of the Albanian language and culture were perceived by Albanians to be unsatisfactory and unacceptable. On the other hand, for example, over the past decade between 100,000 and 300.000 young men have fled Serbia, in order to avoid military service, and 15.000 to 20,000 during the Kosovo war alone (Schapiro, 1999). However, it seems that Serbs were concerned more about the curricula than about their unfavourable demographic perspective. Politicians, the media and other actors on both sides gave assessments of the threatening curricula and demographic trends, regardless of the warning: “With societal, as with other forms of security, what is perceived as a threat, and what can be objectively assessed as threatening, may be quite different. Real threats may not be accurately seen. Perceived threats may not be real, and yet still have real effects” (Buzan, 1993: 43). After Albanian alternative schools started to work, an Albanian political leader said that by that act the distance between Albanians and Serbs started to increase “by the speed of light”, probably meaning that the more time passes, the greater will be the differences in knowledge and minds, i.e. in creating a conflict between the identities of members of the two nations. Presenting nationalist antagonisms and tensions preserved through decades and even centuries, Job stressed the significance of the calamitous history of the Balkans, ceaselessly tom by violent disruption (there has never been time for recovery, wealth and stability to grow, professional and middle classes to establish themselves, intellectual life and educational institutions to acquire a pride in objective and rational inquiry). The installation of local fascists by occupying forces during the Second World
Yugoslavia 187 War created the possibility of fratricide. After 1945, restraint imposed on the expression of prejudice - in the context of general Communist repression - left the terrible past to fester, largely unexamined and unexercised (1993: 64). As Djilas wrote: Because under communism the spirit of critical, rational inquiry could not develop, the nations of Yugoslavia failed to free themselves from pseudoromantic images of themselves and negative stereotypes of each other. The dominant form of political consciousness beneath a veneer of Yugoslav Marxism remained mythologizing ethno-centrism that could envisage full rights only for members of one’s own group (quoted in Job, 1993: 56).
There is the fearful oral tradition of the vengeful myths consisting of fervent folk poetry, epic and romantic, native to Serbs, Croats, Montenegrins, Bosniacs or Muslims and others - that schools teach. The poetry “generally revolves around the grieving of the South Slavs at their fate, the denouncing of foreign conquerors,” and the extolling of their own nobility, heroic deeds, sacrifices for the honour and liberty of the people. “It is an oral tradition full of curses on the heads of traitors and cowards, seething with revenge.” Many of these poems were highly estimated by Goethe, Herder and the Brothers Grimm, and later generations of scholars of Slavic cultures still regard them highly for their language and imagery, their immediacy and richness of feeling, their powerful story lines and wit, and their yearning for freedom. Handed down from generation to generation by the spoken and written word, the tradition remains very strong, particularly in the countryside where illiteracy still pervades [...] the trouble was that practically all the literature was treated and often taught literally, as history, without much effort to separate poetic license from true events. The negative stereotypes of [...] foreigners, the cult of revenge, the selfpity and self-praise - all are left unchallenged [..^occasionally, glimpses of folk wit deflate boastful posturing, concede courage to the enemy, and allow that domestic oppressors can be worse than foreign ones. But educators in Yugoslav schools rarely if ever use such glimpses (Job, 1993: 65).
The folk ditties or songs (often originating as diverse arch or lewd facets of life) “sprout from gatherings in villages, provincial towns, roadside cafes, pubs and inns, military barracks, and singing competitions. But sometimes they deal in horror, a form especially favored by the peasant, semi-urban, lumpen classes, particularly in times of high nationalist
188 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia emotion, often stimulated by established poets or versifiers of a viciously nationalist bent” (Job, 1993: 66). The endurance of the nationalist myths cannot be adequately understood without recognizing the baleful role regressive provincialism (“tyranny” of the small towns) played in Yugoslavia - narrow-minded, chip-on-theshoulder, anti-urban idealization of “true folk values and culture”, the tyranny or authoritarianism of local cultural establishments, and the idolatry of the national self. The tragedy of the two periods of Yugoslav history - the monarchy from 1918 to 1941 and Communism from 1945 to 1991 - was that industrialization, modernization, and urbanization could not transcend the vindictive mores of the small towns. Just the opposite happened: with the migration from the countryside, life in the cities became increasingly dominated by a rural mentality. Instead of the provinces becoming citified, the cities became countrified, in effect turning into bigger provinces. The computer, satellite TV, and ever freer two-way traffic with the outside world were roundly defeated by Yugoslavia’s atavistic oral tradition and its lumpen-intelligentsia. “One of the more unfortunate traits in Yugoslav provincial culture is the workshop of intellectuals or, more correctly, those who pass for intellectuals” (Job, 1993: 66-8). Before, during and after the war with NATO many educational institutions used to work irregularly or not at all; professors and teachers as well as students and pupils were mobilized or escaped from war-affected regions; buildings used for education were destroyed, damaged or their purpose was changed. The process of socialization was damaged as much as it depends on educational institutions. During the airstrikes against FRY, protesters in the US, Canada and Serbia linked Clinton to Hitler. The key question in a drama rehearsed in Belgrade after that was whether ordinary Germans were partly responsible for the crimes of the Nazis. The country was occupied by Germans, and the organizers of the theatre considered “Serbia has more in common with post-Nazi Germany than many here would like to admit” and “there is something deadly and sick inside” Serbia. An actor said “here we have killed individuals, and in the name of ethnic cleansing, so there are parallels with Germany. ... And we must all in Serbia be aware of what Germany went through after the war so that we collectively can learn from their experience” (“Belgrade Theater Poses.. 1 9 9 9 ) . Albanians and other nations in the FRY and in NATO may be faced with the need to learn from the Germans’ or Serbs’ experience and culture. Unfortunately, it usually happens after the politics, which could be defined
Yugoslavia 189 as “an eye for an eye, a tooth for a tooth” being applied. Earlier learning particularly if it could lead to applying the principle “if one is slapped on one cheek, he or she should turn the other too” (see Galtung, 1980: 418-19) - could be perceived and considered as very inappropriate or even dangerous. However, “real threats may not be accurately seen”, and “perceived threats may not be real, and yet still have real effects”. 5.5 Conclusions Galtung, trying to determine what decided who is seen as “the bad guy”, considered that “if the evil acts, meaning destructive/violent acts, can be unambiguously attributed to one party the classification is easy; the actor is then defined through the acts”. If this fails, “there is the possibility of drawing lines in time and space, asking who started when and where, identifying the evil actor at the risk of doing violence to history and/or geography”. If this fails, it is possible using non-action criteria such as the wrong Christianity, alphabet, role in history, geographical location etc. Finally, “all of this would clearly80 designate the Serbs as the evil actors, and most politicians, the media and the public at large in many Western countries seem to follow this lead. The prediction then becomes self-fulfilling. Badly needed are the six other ways of looking at the conflict formation, for a more complete and complex view” (1994: 110). Some Serbian academics (including some members of the SASA) called for Serbs to get rid of Yugoslavism and the Yugoslav idea (which was considered as an illusion and/or a delusion) and to develop a Serbian identity, school curriculum etc. However, Yugoslavia has been predominantly a Serbian project or at least the project executed mostly by the Serbs and - as Wiberg stressed - “the Yugoslavia project and the Greater Serbia project were ... complementary to each other". One unknown author concluded: “After Tito’s death ... the only way to keep Yugoslavia together for the Serbian leadership was stabilization of the deteriorating economy and avoiding quarrels with political elites of other South Slav nations, especially the Croats. They were unable to do so faced with the Albanian rebellion and the generation shift”, which was “accelerated by the rebellion, and new leaders were not experienced enough to deal with problems in interethnic relations”. The short period of economic stabilization is considered to have come too late (in 1989 and
190 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia 1990), “when the big political quarrel already started, and almost nobody cared for the economy”. Simultaneously, the Cold War ended, and “it seems that the Serbian leaders did not realize the possible effects of that event”. Finally, “a nation turns other nations into enemies by living together, particularly if the nation is the most numerous and powerful, during a time full of hardships and without capable leadership. This is in summary a version of Serbian history after Tito’s death.” While the distinctiveness of identities of Slav ethnic groups in the FRY and the other groups is undisputed, mutual differences of identities between the Serbs and Montenegrins are mostly located within the field of state traditions. The small differences between national identities, which are believed to bring “damnation”, are easiest to find in comparing the identity of Serbs with that of the Montenegrins. The future will show a direction in which the rather small existing differences between the two nations will develop. It seems that the main role in that development is reserved for politics, i.e. politicians. Hay, in trying to answer the question which more or less important roles are reserved for other actors, asked: “what kind of strange community can a nation be?” For this purpose, he introduced Anderson’s idea that “nations are imagined political communities; they are primarily symbolic realities”. The communities are very real: “they set the horizon and give structure to the careers of the relevant intellectual groups”. However, “‘imagined’ should not be understood in the sense of ‘artificial’ or ‘incorrect’. ..”. There is “the idea of simultaneity, where lots of people can be joined horizontally without being at the same place or being in any direct way related to each other. So one may imagine abstract socio-political spaces, territory becomes significant, and politics becomes increasingly a struggle taking place on a map (Hay, 1968: xxii f.)”. The significance of spaces is “decided partly by politically created patterns - the territory from which ambitious educated youth could create a career at the centre. Also important was the advent of ‘print capitalism’ the widespread availability of the written vernacular language with its accompanying media of the novel and the newspaper, the two main forms of national unifier” (Wsever, 1993: 31-2). The “rallying around the flag” in Serbia could be partly explained by Serbs’ resentment and the reasons for it, the 1981 rebellion in Kosovo, the crisis in the Second Yugoslavia, the 1991 and 1992 secessions, the 1991— 95 wars, the UN and other sanctions and the perceived identity and security threats and fears caused by the sanctions, the NATO bombardment etc. Serbs have believed that their state could protect them physically as well as their identity. The problem is that at least some of the actions of their state,
Yugoslavia 191 which have been intended to be protective, have been perceived as physical and identity threats by the other nations in Serbia and in other republics of the Second Yygoslavia and FRY. The Orthodox Church, language (primarily thanks to the Serbs’ use of their own alphabet), and the long undisputed state traditions define essential identity elements of Serbs in the FRY. The most important difference between Serbs and Montenegrins lies in separate state traditions during the Turkish rule and later; under certain circumstances other dimensions might also come to be seen as differentiating. A conclusion on the distinctiveness of Montenegrin identity will depend on which definition of national identity one accepts. As has been shown, it seems that the disputes between the two parties with Montenegro have little to do with the identity issue, but more with political, economic and other conflicts and problems with which they and their country have been faced. However, it contains a potential base for development of a future ethnic conflict, whose present-day level of development seems to be comparable with the Serbo-Croat conflict at the beginning of the First Yugoslavia’s existence. The identities of Albanians in Kosovo and Hungarians in Vojvodina differ greatly from each other and the other main nations of the FRY on most identity dimensions. The mentality of Hungarians in Vojvodina is somewhat “softer” than that of those in Hungary. Language, which unites Albanians, tends to be emphasized, whereas religion, which divides, tends to be played down. The Muslims in Sandzak are similar to those in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Since 1918, it has always been difficult for the self-defined Yugoslavs in whatever state to build and solidify their own identity; its features as a civic nation are mainly derived from the rather weak Yugoslavism’s ideology and interethnic marriages. The most intensive mutual societal security threats in the country are those in Kosovo. The threats and conflict will become part of twenty-first century history as an important feature of the interplay of violent competition between local and foreign actors who are trying to establish domination and protect their own interests and identities. In continuing to do so, they will endanger other actors’ interests and identities, and cause them to respond similarly.
6
Macedonia
The Macedonians constitute the largest national group in the Republic of Macedonia, and the Albanians are the second largest. Apart from these two major groups, the Macedonian population is composed of Turks, Serbs, Gypsies, Vlachs and over twenty other national groups with more or less different ethnic identities. Table 6.1
The ethnic composition of Macedonia
Total 2.000.000 Macedonians 67% Albanians 23% Turks 4% 2% Serbs Gypsies 2% 2% Others Source: Murzeva-Skarik and Skarik, 1996: 4.
As a political, administrative or geographic unit, Macedonia has changed many times in both its form and the territory it has covered. It used to be a part of Rumelia, i.e. the Turkish territories in the Balkans, whose name means “Land of the Romans” (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Macedonian nationalists consider Macedonia as the territory of Greater Macedonia, while other Macedonians and members of various other neighbouring nations regard it as a geographic territory or region in the Balkans. The geographic region of Macedonia is located between the Shar and Osogovo mountains in the north, the Rila mountains and Mesta river in the east, the Bistrica river, the Aegean Sea and the Pindus mountains in the south, and the Albanian highlands in the west. The geographical boundaries of Macedonia are considered to include the areas Vardar Macedonia (the territory of present-day Republic of Macedonia), Pirin Macedonia (the south-western part of Bulgaria) and Aegean Macedonia (the Greek province of Macedonia centred on Salonika or Thessaloniki). On the other hand, there is still some dispute about the political, ethnic and cultural 192
Macedonia 193 boundaries of Macedonia (Craft, 1996: footnote 2; Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1998b: 5-6). Craft (1996) describes existing Greek, Bulgarian and Macedonian perceptions of Macedonia as “clearly identifiable” and as including mutually exclusive versions of history, culture and national identity. There is also a Serbian version and a Western one. All standpoints have been used to promote identity politics, and - as well as the proposed solutions to conflicts - are based on the modem national-state and sovereignty conceptions. Craft concludes that the conceptions presuppose and help perpetuate a way of looking at the world that assumes peace and community inside a state and anarchy and violence outside it. The combination o f identity politics and the concepts of national states and national sovereignty have proved everywhere to be a deadly combination (Craft, 1996).
6.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry The semi-nomadic pastoral peoples, who were of Indo-European origin, gradually came from the Russian steppes to the Balkans, but the inhabitants of the region during the first few millennia are unknown. The first-known inhabitants to dominate the region were the Illyrians (in the west) and Thracians (in the east). In the second millennium BC, during the great migrations of nations which were initiated in the lower Danube area, the Indo-European people (early Greeks) moved into their later areas of settlement on the Balkans, i.e. into the peninsula that is now known as Greece. Between the Ionian and the Aegean Sea they fused with their predecessors creating the Mycenaean civilization in the southern Balkans. Around 1400 BC the early Greeks came to Rhodes, Cyprus and Anatolia. After 1200 BC the Dorians occupied Sparta, Argolis and Crete. The movements of peoples were followed by the Dark Ages, i.e. the two-centuries-long chaotic migrations of tribes in the country of Greece, which finished in approximately 900 BC. According to Greek legend, “God distributed all of the available soil through a sieve and used the stones that remained to build Greece.” It is considered that the barren landscape of Greece has been a strong factor impelling Greeks, like the Armenians or Jews, to migrate to other parts of the world until recent times. Consequently, “Xeniteia, or sojourning in foreign parts, with its strong overtones of nostalgia for the faraway
194 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia homeland, has been a central element in the historical experience of the Greek people” (for more details, see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). The origins of present-day Macedonians in Macedonia and elsewhere in the Yugoslav successor states are mostly located within the southern Slavic tribes who came to the Balkans during the second half of the sixth and the beginning of the seventh century. [And finally,] the rivalry of Greek nationalism instigated present day amateur historians and archaeologists in Skopje to examine the hypothesis that today’s Macedonians are descendants of an archaic people related to the Etruscans and Basques - a people which is much older than the ancient Greeks (Troebst, forthcoming).
Bulgarians (who make up around 85 percent of the total population of the present Bulgaria) see their origins in Bulgars, members of a Turkic stepe tribe absorbed by the more numerous Slavs who accepted the rule of the Constantinople emperor. With the gradual obliteration of fragmented Slav tribes, Bulgars and Slavs consolidated into a unified Slav people who thenceforward retained the name of Bulgarians. This national unity, present in embryonic form during the long Ottoman domination, flowered in the independence struggles of the 19th century (E ncyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). A few sizeable minorities can be found in modem Bulgaria: Turks, who are the most numerous, Gypsies (Roma) and Macedonians (though the government does not consider them as a minority and regards them as Bulgarians). There are a few thousand Armenians, Russians and Greeks, mostly living in towns while some Romanians and Tatars are mostly in villages (E ncyclopaedia Britannica, 1998).
6.2 State traditions The political history of the Balkans begins with the emergence of Greek city-states in the second half of the second millennium BC (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Ancient Macedonia or Macedon became a major power under Philip II (ruled 359-336 BC) and his son Alexander the Great (ruled 336-323 BC). In 338 BC, Macedonia was enlarged and consolidated by Philip II to become the dominant power
Macedonia 195 during the era of the Classical Greek city-state. As his army went all the way to India, Alexander conquered a huge empire. Statehood of Dardania (mentioned in Chapter 5) is contested by Albanians and Macedonians. After 167 BC, Macedonia became part of the Roman Empire and later joined part of Byzantine Empire, except during the Empire of Tsar Samuil (ruled 969-1018), who is considered as Bulgar by Bulgarians, and as Macedonian by Macedonians (Troebst, forthcoming). At its zenith, his empire included territories between Danube and the Balkan Mountains, Epirus, a part of Albania, Serbia, Bosnia and Srem. After that Samuil gradually lost parts of his empire, and the decisive defeat of his army was in 1014. Some 14,000 captured Samuilo’s soldiers were blinded by order of the Byzantine King Vasile II and Samuil died of a heart attack, ostensibly caused by shock when he saw his blinded soldiers. In 681 the Bulgars established their first state, which from the ninth to fourteenth centuries was shifting rule with the Byzantine Empire over Macedonia. In the fourteenth century the Serbian king Stefan Dusan invaded Macedonia and Skopje became the capital of his state. When Dusan died, the army of Vukasin (in the Serbian language, Volkasin in the Macedonian language), a local aristocrat who named himself king of Macedonia, was defeated by the Turks who in the late fourteenth century gained control over Macedonia and later of almost the entire Balkan peninsula. After that the region was inhabited by a sizeable Turkish and Albanian population and in the next century by numerous Sephardic Jews expelled from Spain. As happened in most of the other Yugoslav successor states, Greece, Bulgaria and Albania, during the Turkish rule, which lasted in Macedonia for centuries, the local Macedonian aristocracy was destroyed and Christians were getting poorer, both financially and in terms of their population size. Although the nineteenth century was characterized by outbursts of nationalism and the strengthening of national liberation movements among all of the Balkan peoples, national consciousness came relatively late to the Macedonians, this was apparently due to lack of cohesiveness and international support for their national movement. On the other hand, Greek, Serbian and Bulgarian states manifested their competing claims over the inhabitants and the territory of Macedonia. Thus, the neighbouring Balkan national movements almost completely forgot about previous ideas and actions characterized by solidarity, which had been created as a result of their similarly slavish position and struggle against the invaders,
196 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia instead transforming themselves into mutually exclusive and concurrent forces. The nineteenth century was a period of Great Powers’ interventions in the Balkans (considered by the Turkish-ruled peoples as an encouraging sign) and of intensive diplomatic activities. The interventions gave a powerful impetus to the development of national consciousness which in turn gave rise to competing nationalisms. “On the other hand, due to the fact that the Great Powers had fostered their own strategic aspiration on the Peninsula, conflict of interests ... began to develop into a pronounced rivalry in the 1870s.” (Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1998: 6-7) While the United Kingdom was opposed to the dismemberment of Turkey (particularly in a way that might enable the Russians to enter the eastern Mediterranean, especially after 1869 when the Suez Canal made the Mediterranean the shortest route to India), Vienna preferred the Balkans to be liberated by Austria-Hungary than by Russia (see Bogdan, 1989: 135). “Rhetorically, they wished to liberate the Christian peoples, but in fact their actions were driven by their obvious strategic, political and economic ambitions.”81 (ibid.) In March 1878, after Russia defeated Ottomans, the sultan had to conclude a peace treaty with Russia at San Stefano. The date represents a landmark in modem Macedonia’s history. Since then the Macedonia’s fate had been decided on different diplomatic tables: from San Stefano to Berlin, and from Bucharest to Paris, and never according to the authentic will of the people concerned, (ibid.) According to the treaty, “Greater Bulgaria” was supposed to include all of ethnic and geographic Macedonia, but it had never been implemented. After sharp reactions of the Great Powers [who] feared that this Bulgarian state would act as an agent of Russian influence in south eastern Europe, the Congress of Berlin was held in the same year. Macedonia was returned to Ottoman control under which it remained until the Balkan Wars of the early twentieth century, (ibid.) From the Macedonian point of view, the provisions of the Berlin peace agreement had special significance in regard to legal and state-political status of Macedonia. According to the Article 23 of the Berlin Treaty Macedonia as well as the other Ottoman provinces was supposed to be given special legal status within the Empire, (ibid.) As a pattern for Macedonia’s political autonomy, the Constitution of the Crete island of 1868 should have been utilized.
Macedonia 197 Thus, inter alia for the first time in its political history Macedonia was granted autonomous status and was regarded as both a distinct ethnic community and territorial unit. Formally, Macedonia was constituted as an autonomous region within the Ottoman Empire, (ibid.) In that way, Macedonia “was freed from its international anonymity and entered modem world politics” (ibid.) As the Congress of Berlin left Macedonia to the Turks, all neighbouring states that claimed legitimate rights to the territory of Macedonia (Greece, Serbia and Bulgaria) were greatly disappointed, and particularly the Bulgarians. According to Bogdan (1989): by the early 20th century, Macedonians numbered about three million, living in the Vardar Valley and the surrounding mountainous regions. They were divided into three main nationalities: a Greek majority lived on the Aegean coast with the port city Salonika, with islands of Turks and Bulgarians; Serbs were present throughout the interior of the country, with a high concentration around Skopje, but were usually a minority in the interior compared to the Bulgarian population; Bulgarian influence was great, and strengthened noticeably with the creation o f an independent Bulgarian exarchate in 1870, with jurisdiction over all o f Macedonia [...] besides these three major nationalities making up roughly four-fifths of the population, there were a multitude of other ethnic groups: Albanians and Vlachs in the mountainous regions, and Turks, Armenians and Jews in the cities.
Thanks to the liberation of Bulgaria in 1885, “local intellectual circles were becoming more and more conscious of a ‘Macedonian’ entity. Bulgarian influence grew even stronger with the formation in 1893 at Salonika of IMRO” (Bogdan, 1989), which organized sporadic assaults and terrorist attacks against Turkish authorities. On 2 August 1903 it launched a massive uprising (the rebellion of Ilinden, Saint Elias’ Day) throughout Macedonia and extending into Thrace. As the reaction of Turks was brutal, thousands of Macedonians escaped into Bulgaria. The Great Powers were divided on the Macedonian question: Great Britain wanted to see major reforms in Macedonia; Austria-Hungary and Russia, who were attempting to mend their relationship, agreed at Murzteg not to intervene but to ask the sultan for a few token reforms. Bulgarian neutrality on this matter led to dissent within the IMRO and a splintering along ethnic lines. (Bogdan, 1989)
198 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia As some Macedonian revolutionaries reoriented themselves towards Belgrade, in 1910 a Macedonian socialist group upholding a Balkan federation, including an independent Macedonian republic, was founded in Skopje. As the rest remained faithful to Bulgaria, the Macedonian question became yet another subject of disagreement between Bulgaria and Serbia (see Bogdan, 1989: 142-3). Vankovska-Cvetkovska (1998a) considers the establishment of new organs of government on the liberated territoiy in the Krusevo city by IMRO to be the most important step toward de facto state-building. Bearing in mind the fact that ultimate success would depend mostly on the support of the Great Powers, the leadership undertook several steps towards its own legitimization.82 However, the status of Macedonia only changed during the First Balkan War (1912-13), when its territory was liberated by Greek, Serbian, Bulgarian and Montenegrin military forces who - supported by Romanians - defeated the Ottoman Empire whose power had been declining since the seventeenth century. According to Kaplan (1991): from the perspective of FYROM, Macedonians themselves represented one of the key actors in this period of national struggle. Much of tins conflict represented a competition for the identity of Macedonians of rival church officials, school teachers, journalists, and publicists. [Nonetheless,] these cultural/political struggles often turned bloody, involving armed uprisings 83 against the Turks, numerous terrorist activities, and four wars.
The Greek, Bulgarian and Serbian Greek guerrillas units fought against the Turks (for national liberation), and also between them (for national identity), which was a pattern that would be repeated in the First and Second Balkan Wars. Many of the uprisings that were crushed remained in nationalist struggle’s memories. Except for the Turks, all sides continue to see the casualties of these suppressed revolts as martyrs for national liberation. Even if we are discussing the same group o f people, present day Bulgarians see these martyrs as Bulgarian, while for FYROM they are obviously Macedonian heroes (Craft, 1996).
In 1912, during the First Balkan War, forces of Bulgaria, Greece, Montenegro and Serbia were almost fully successful in driving out Turkey of Europe. Most of the territory of the present-day Republic of Macedonia was taken by Serbia and called South Serbia (see Pettifer, 1992: 477). As it was prevented by a Serbo-Greek agreement from realizing its ambition to take the largest share of Macedonia, Bulgaria attacked the allies (for more
Macedonia 199 details see Bogdan, 1989: 145; for the causes of the Second Balkan War see also Roskin, 1991: 33-4). However, in that war Bulgaria lost almost all of the newly acquired territory in Macedonia (except the Pirin mountain region) and Thrace as well. Craft (1996) considers that the desire to change the outcomes of the Second Balkan War was one of the motives that led Bulgaria to become an ally of Germany in both First and Second World Wars. In a 1913 report (see Kennan, 1993) it was stressed that the Second Balkan War was “waged not only by the armies, but by the nations themselves” and this is why these wars are so sanguinary and produce so great a loss in men and end “in the annihilation of the population and the ruin of whole regions”. According to Kennan (1993) “the object of armed conflict ... was ‘the complete extermination of an alien population,’ and “Great streams of pathetically suffering refugees could be seen on many of the roads of the peninsula” (for more details see Kennan, 1993: 5). Vankovska-Cvetkovska (1998) stressed the attitude expressed in Isakovic, 1997d: 9) that an analysis proves the thesis that the strongest motivating factor involved in the Balkan wars was aggressive nationalism. On the other hand, the Great Powers’ involvement in the wars intensified nationalism and rivalry between neighbouring peoples with race and even religion in common, dividing the region by fostering divergent allegiances.
In fact, “the Balkan peoples did not realize they were not masters of their own fate, but that decisions concerning them were being made in St. Petersburg, Vienna, London or Paris (Bogdan, 1989: 146)” (VankovskaCvetkovska, 1998a: 8). One can conclude that in Macedonia as well as in most of the other Yugoslav successor states there have been two main sources of nationalism in the above-mentioned meaning of the term (which could be rather labelled as chauvinism): the internal and external ones. It seems that the abovementioned and other historical developments in Macedonia and other former republics of the Second Yugoslavia show and adequately illustrate the existence of an old pattern of the strengthening of nationalistic (chauvinistic) attitudes and behaviour.84 First, trying to protect their own state and identity security, domestic parties in conflict threaten each other’s state and/or identity security. Secondly (or possibly first, depending on the actual circumstances of each case), foreign powers (great or otherwise) become involved in the conflicts
200 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia dividing the region, supporting some parties and strengthening their capabilities to threaten other parties, which makes the threatened parties retaliate in the same way etc. In these circumstances, the Balkan nations do not realize that they are not masters of their own fate, but believe that their leaderships are the decision-making actors. The foreign power are “merely” supporters of one or other side in the conflict, although the “Balkan troubles cannot have been caused simply by Western prejudice or interference” (for more details see Craft, 1996). In fact, nationalism has been produced among the local population in the Balkans along with rulers in St. Petersburg, Vienna, London, Paris, Washington (it seems particularly during the twentieth century) and other world metropolises and capitals. In 1943, Tito’s communist partisans, who fought the Germans and Bulgarians, promised the Macedonians their own republic in a postwar Yugoslav federation. After the Second World War the Vardar Macedonia became one of the six Yugoslav republics (SRM) and the question of Macedonia’s distinct identity had been the source of tensions in relations between Bulgaria, Greece and Second Yugoslavia (see Stanovcic, 1988: 23). At the same time, the Macedonian nation used to be a significant element of communist Yugoslavia. Rossos (1994) follows national identity of Macedonians back to at least half a century before the establishing of the Second Yugoslavia: “the point here is not that Tito created Macedonian nationalism but that he gave it formal legal and institutional expression” (p. 369). By asserting that the Macedonians were a separate nation, Tito was able to neutralize Bulgarian claims to parts of the territory of the Second Yugoslavia. As mentioned above, in both world wars Bulgarian soldiers occupied Macedonia,85 trying to apply the concept of the “Greater Bulgaria”. After the Second World War Bulgaria recognized the existence of a Macedonian minority,86 but subsequently denied it and also later denied the existence of the Turks in Bulgaria.87 After the separation of the Second Yugoslavia, Bulgaria has recognized the state of Macedonia but refused to recognize the existence of a distinct Macedonian nationality. Reportedly, in a 1999 agreement with Bulgaria, the government of Macedonia renounced its right to protect citizens of Bulgaria who do not declare themselves as Bulgarians, which could be interpreted as a negation of the existence of a Macedonian national minority in Bulgaria. In return, the Bulgarian side promised some 150 old tanks, which were supposed to be used in a possible war with Yugoslavia.
Macedonia 201 For Bulgaria, Macedonia is simply another Bulgarian state. Craft (1996) concluded that “Bulgarian identity is intimately bound to Macedonia as an area inhabited by Bulgarians. ... As such, a separate state can exist in FYROM, but there can be no Macedonian people”. The idea of the inhabitants of Macedonia as ethnic Bulgarians enables them to keep their history and to anticipate extending their western border (Craft, 1996). It seems that another function of the Republic of Macedonia was in diminishing the relative size of Serbia in comparison with the other Yugoslav republics. Finally, according to Craft (1996), “with the creation of a Macedonian nation came the creation of Macedonian minorities in Bulgaria and Greece”, i.e. slavophone Greeks (see also Perry, 1992: 36). As already discussed, Macedonians were in the group of nations of the Second Yugoslavia that were too small and too weak to do anything more than shift alliances and manoeuvre between main groups. However, the Memorandum of the SACA claimed that Serbs were exposed to the “hatred that all Yugoslav people have toward them”. The hatred was also a dominant theme in the writings of Serbian intellectuals, which was expressed in many different ways. “Each Yugoslav nation has its own distinct hatred toward Serbs. For instance: Macedonian Communists have simply ‘Macedonized’ Serbs (i.e., they have committed ethnocide against Serbs in their republic)”. The Serbian resentment theme maintains that the republic had to endure the unequal and humiliating position of the Serbian people in the present-day Yugoslavia under the rule of an anti-Serb coalition, especially of “Serbophobia,” which in the last decades has grabbed wide layers of Slovenian, Croatian, Albanian peoples, and some parts of the Macedonian intelligentsia and Moslems.The Serbian nation is “surrounded by hatred, which made its peace more tormenting than the war” (Dobrica Cosic, quoted in Pesic, 1996: 19-20). Before the break-up of the Second Yugoslavia, the Presidents of Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina tried in the third constitutional proposal, “The Platform on the Future of the Yugoslav State”, to reconcile the two viewpoints. This document (known as the “Gligorov-Izetbegovic Platform”) opted for Yugoslavia as an “commonwealth of republics” or “commonwealth of states”, avoiding the terms “federation” and “confederation”. It assumed transformation of the federal units into the status of independent sovereign states, stressing common economic interests and the international legal subjectivity of the commonwealth. Another issue was the interpretation of the right of nations to self-determination, which was restricted by republican borders. However, according to Pesic (1996):
202 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia creating independent, ethno-national states from the disintegrating federation was highly problematic from the very beginning, since the maximal solutions proposed for most of Yugoslavia’s various national questions were in fundamental conflict with one another. The all-or-nothing nature of these solutions, leavened with the nationalist fervor with which Yugoslavia’s republican political leaders pursued them, made war and gross violations of human rights natural accompaniments. [Also] when a maximal solution is proposed for one national question, then all other competing national claims emerge in the same extreme form. In these predictable and potentially lethal conditions, such conflicts require early preventive actions that aim at inhibiting the rise of extreme solutions and the escalation of nationalist responses (Pesic,
1996: 28-9).
The proposal was not accepted by both sides; Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina were caught in the middle, having made declarations of illdefined sovereignty (objecting to secessions to a lesser degree), and presented their federative-confederative alternatives until June 1991. In 1990, when Croatia and Slovenia established national guards, and the YPA secretly attempted to bring the territorial defence units’ weapons in depots, the SRM’s government did not protest as Slovenia and Croatia did. The next year Macedonia did not stop sending recruits immediately after the war in Croatia began, but waited until the first half of 1992. These and other acts were indications that Macedonia was proceeding more carefully in its relationships with the YPA than with the other secessionist republics. During the few years since the YPA was withdrawn from Macedonia, the FRY has recognized the Macedonian nation, but not the state of Macedonia; some authors held that Macedonia was no more than a pre-war southern province of Serbia until Tito supported and advanced the notion of a distinct Macedonian nationality (see Doder, 1993: 10). Macedonia and the FRY have no greater mutual territorial demands, but after Macedonia’s separation minor border incidents occurred. The Serbian minority is concentrated mostly along the northern border of Macedonia, and the Belgrade government requested equal constitutional and actual treatment for the Serbs and other minorities. It was stated, however, that this demand was not a precondition for normalization in relations between the two states, but that it should be used to reach a solution in the dispute between the Macedonian and Greek governments (see Jovanovic, 1995). As the Skopje authorities believed that Belgrade has never lost its intention to control the Macedonia, the main threats were perceived to be coming from Yugoslavia. The first government feared that as soon as the second one is no longer involved in wars in Croatia and Bosnia and
Macedonia 203 Herzegovina, it will turn its armaments against Macedonia. The fears were decreased after FRY and Macedonia recognized each other in April 1996. However, in the Balkans there were intensive fears that ethnic violence could have spilled over relatively easily from Kosovo to Macedonia. It was within Yugoslav federation that Macedonian nation was first recognized. Craft (1996) considers that “it is now difficult for the Serbs to renounce this position officially. The nonofficial position is a bit more complicated, although it can be reduced to simple terms which reflect the Bulgarian standpoint”. Unofficially, “Macedonia is sometimes remembered as South Serbia and its people are understood to speak Old Serbian (Perry 1992: 43). Thus, ... the popular conception rejects the idea of a separate Macedonian people” (Craft, 1996). Both positions could be utilized for justifying Serbian expansion into Macedonia by denying Macedonian otherness (Craft, 1996). Economic relations between the two countries have been traditionally developed, and they also have mutual interests within the field of traffic (the shortest distances from Macedonia to Western Europe go via Yugoslav territory and those from Yugoslavia to the Middle East and Aegean Sea go via Macedonia). It seems that planned traffic connection in East-West direction over the Macedonian territory can change relatively little and probably is supposed to have a reserve role n a case of exceptional circumstances, like the ones in case of known economic blockade by Greece as well as sanctions against the FRY. In a case of rise of tensions between Macedonia and Yugoslavia, one can expect that Macedonia would intensify relations with the USA and other NATO members. It seems that their support for territorial integrity of the FRY could be interpreted more as support for peace in Macedonia, Greece, Bulgaria, Albania and Turkey, than as support for the Belgrade attitude towards the Kosovo conflict (for more details see Isakovic, 1997d). Before Macedonia was recognized by Yugoslavia, the Macedonian government perceived Albania as the second most dangerous neighbour which would recognize Macedonia only if it were not exclusively that of the recognized Macedonian people. It was emphasized that Macedonia is in great danger not from Serbia, but from the Albanian minority. In case of escalation of the conflict with the Albanians, Serbs would become Macedonia’s allies, and not a threat. According to Ejal (1994), “an authentic problem is Macedonian relationships with Albania and Bulgaria” (pp. 8-9). One could also assume that domestic political considerations in Skopje influenced the Macedonia’s government decision to downplay the
204 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia threat of Albania (particularly as the PDPAM was a member of the governing coalition) and to have a false sense of security due the presence of a small number of soldiers as UN observers (for more details see Isakovic, 1995: 8-9). The Tirana government considers the Macedonian census downplays the number of Albanians in Macedonia, stating that the Albanians make up nearly 40 percent of the population. Former Albanian President Sali Berisha proposed a diplomatic solution to the issue, but has declared that in case of war in Macedonia, Albania would not be idle but would try to rescue its brethren. However, the government was terrified at the possibility that Albania would have to care for numerous Albanian refugees who would cross the border. The rapidly growing Albanian minority in Macedonia (concentrated in western parts of the country) has demanded recognition as one of the two “state-building nations” and a territorial autonomy. The Skopje government steadfastedly refused this demand, and later Albanians in Macedonia demanded full independence. They did not participate in the 1991 referendum, but in 1992 organized their own referendum, which resulted in 90 percent of votes for their own independence and clashes with Macedonians. At the beginning of independence, Macedonia had almost no army or arms of its own. An army, whose many officers used to belong to the exYPA, was gradually created and the empty border posts were filled in cooperation with police forces. Meanwhile, an unknown number of Albanians - living in Albania in misery - entered Macedonia illegally. During the war in Kosovo, hundreds of thousands of them came to Macedonia, and the peak level was around 360,000. It is believed that many refugees were not recorded as they stayed with their relatives and friends in western parts of Macedonia. In early November 1993, police arrested a group of Albanians (including a deputy minister of defence in the government of Macedonia) and accused them of attempting to establish an “autonomous province of Tlirida’” in the western part of the state territory. Their next steps ostensibly would have been separating “Ilirida” by force, and then unifying it with Albania and an independent Kosovo. The Albanians from Macedonia - along with their compatriots in Kosovo - have formed their own paramilitary units (reportedly, the arrested group had a list of 21,630 conscripts in a “Pan-Albanian Army” and some 300 “Kalashnikov” rifles88). Thus, it seems that conflicting relations in Macedonia exist
Macedonia 205 primarily between the Macedonians and the Albanians; the Serb minority is rather small (for more details see Murdzeva-Skarik and Skarik, 1996: 4). The Constitution of Macedonia provides the right to express, foster and develop the minorities’ (nationalities’) identity and national attributes and guaranties the protection of their ethnic, cultural and religious identity (Paragraph 1 and 2, Article 48). According to the Law on Local SelfManagement, local communities have the right to create and use their own flags, which can be adapted to specific local features of related communities. However, in local communities in which elections were won by Albanian political parties regularly flags of the Republic of Albania were used (these were allowed on state festivital days and some others, but only along with the Macedonia’s state flag). At the beginning of July 1997, there were clashes between the Albanians and policemen trying to implement the Macedonian Constitutional Court’s decision on illegality of the flag usage practice. Albanians considered that the Albania’s state flag also represents the flag of all Albanians, i.e. their national symbol wherever they are, while the state organs took the stand that the flag is exculsively the state symbol of Albania. A division among Macedonian political forces could be partly compared with the one existing in Montenegro: IMRO could be at least technically compared with Bjelasi89 and some other parties with Zelenasi. The technical coalition government in Skopje between the reform communist SDLM and PDPAM used to keep the strongest political nationalist and irredentist party IMRO-DPMNU out of power. In 1998, parliamentary elections were won by IMRO-DPMNU and PDP. A government was formed by IMRO and PDPA, which established election coalition with PDP. The new government has been challenged by problems of Albanian demands for changing the constitution; representation of Albanians in the state administration (including in the first place the army and police) in proportion with their share of the population; the legalisation of Tetovo University; reanimating the economy; decreasing unemployment, organized crime and corruption; increasing foreign investments; integration with NATO and EU; and developing relations with neighbouring countries etc. (“Opposition Wins...”, 1998). It could be concluded that there is a significant source of political and even armed conflict between the two largest ethnic segments in Macedonia, namely the Albanians and Macedonians. The existing social and political atmosphere could generate frustrations and threats on both sides. On the
206 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia one hand, it could be a threat to the integrity of the state and Macedonians’ identity by the other side. On the other hand, it could serve to prevent the Albanians joining the mother state or forming their own federal or other unit within Macedonia and in that way avoid identity threats generated by the opposite party. In both cases there are obvious and intensive identity threats that make the sides act in a security mode, and from time to time this can trigger certain forms of security behaviour (see Waever, 1993: 23). Until the end of July 1992 neither the EC nor other states had decided to recognize Macedonia in spite of the Badinter Arbitration Commission’s opinion on meeting the criteria for doing so. Namely, Greece put conditions (including changing the name of Macedonia) fearing territorial aspirations toward parts of northern Greece’s territory. Greece denies that there is a distinct and separate non-Greek Macedonian identity and views efforts to link the name “Macedonia” as an attempt to deprive Greece of its heritage and territorial integrity. The Greek government has made it clear that it has been willing to accept an independent state in place of Macedonia, but under a name other than that. Thus, Macedonia became a UN member under the “technical” name FYROM. A Macedonian Foreign Minister has asserted: We have used that name [Macedonia] for centuries to try to draw a distinction between us as a people and the surrounding people, the Bulgarians, the Serbs, the Greeks and the Albanians ... It is very important to our identity. So if we eliminated the word “Macedonia” from our name we would in fact create a crisis o f identity, we would sterilize the region where we live and we would reopen a century-long debate about who the people who live here are (quoted in Perry, 1992b: 15).
As Craft (1996) concluded, Macedonia - to set itself entirely apart - “must stress both its ‘slav-ness’ and its ‘Macedonian-ness’”. Not only did Macedonia previously appropriate areas of Greek territory but it also incorporated heraldically Alexander the Great’s star of Vergina. A former deputy speaker of the Parliament in Skopje stated that Greece “has no legitimate right over Aegean Macedonia” (quoted in Herring, 1994: 99). Furthermore, the IMRO was showing maps in which 38 percent of Greater Macedonia was in the present state of Macedonia, 51 percent in Greece and 11 percent in Bulgaria (see Wiberg, 1993: 105). It seemed that Skopje and Athens were slowly inching towards a compromise on the issue of the name “in hyphenated or some other fashion” (Zahariadis, 1994a). The first step was the recognition given by the agreement with Greece in 1995; in response, Macedonia removed the disputable symbol from its flag
Macedonia 207 and Greece removed its trade embargo on Macedonia. But domestic imperatives made both sides unwilling to offer the necessary concessions (for more details see Zahariadis, 1994a: 100-1; 1994b). Although Greece admitted the existence of a separate nation and state to the north of the Greek border, it rejected the idea that it should be called Macedonia. “Macedonia, as a concept, seems to be integral to modem Greek identity. As such there can be no separate (non-Greek) Macedonian state or people.” This quotation from a book that was financed by the Chamber of Commerce of Thessaloniki also stated: The systematic counterfeiting of the history of Macedonia by the Skopjans since 1944 [and] the fact that in recent years Skopje appropriated part of the history o f the Greek people ... caused the Greeks to react and defend their cultural heritage. Throughout history the name Macedonia was used in Greece as a geographic term in order to refer to the inhabitants of Greek Macedonia (quoted after Craft, 1996).
A state of Macedonia has been perceived as a threat for to the contiguous Greek province with the identical name partly because of the existence of slavophone Greek refugees, who came to Macedonia in 194649. The Greeks could accept (and maybe they needed to) the existence of a different nation behind their northern border, but could not accept the idea that these are Macedonians. Namely, “it is assumed that a national state for Macedonians would naturally incorporate all of geographic Macedonia. Greek identity politics presently work to preserve their northern border, and their national self-image, by ascribing otherness to FYROM” (Craft, 1996). Before the disintegration, some similarities in the republican interdependence in the USSR and former Yugoslavia had been existing. The main similarity was that “the lesser size of the republic the greater dependence on the interrepublican trade”, and the trade exceeded the volume of foreign trade. The smaller republics (Macedonia, Slovenia, Montenegro, Bosnia and Herzegovina) were more dependent on the interrepublican trade than the larger republics (Serbia and Croatia) which were, thus, affected to a smaller extent than the first ones (the analysis used the data from the studies Transition o f Yugoslav Economy, 1992, and Hinic, 1992). It was assumed that a complete rupture of interrepublican relations would result in high sensitivity of the economies to external shocks and that the separation of the Yugoslav economy would increase the share of foreign factors in Slovenia, Serbia and Croatia by three to fivefold; in
208 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia more than fourfold; and in Montenegro even sevenfold. The rupture would cause a drop in employment and total production in Serbia, Slovenia and Croatia by more than 33 percent (see Hinic, 1992: 19). However, the expected negative industrial indicators have been additionally aggravated by the catastrophic war destruction in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. The process of transformation has slowed down, and in the FRY has had a retrograde tendency which has, in fact, affected the whole region. The process of economic and political transformation in the first phase entails more expenses than profits, and the disintegration adds to the expenses. However, the disastrous consequences of the wars between and within some republics of the former federations jeopardize the emerging processes of transformation. In such conditions, the reconstruction and renewal of human and material resources were considered as indispensable (for more details see Pesakovic, 1994: 219-24). The sanctions against the FRY have cost South-eastern Europe some $30 billions (several times more than it has received in assistance and loans from the West altogether), but it has not been able to invoke the provision in Article 50 of the UN Charter for compensating for sufferings caused by participating in sanctions. The sanctions, with a Greek boycott added since early 1994 and war in the FRY, badly affected Macedonia, with about onethird of the labour force unemployed and refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Kosovo. The other main losers were the other successors of the Second Yugoslavia, Bulgaria, Greece, Romania and Albania and, to a lesser extent, Hungary, Ukraine and a few others (see Wiberg, 1995b: 102). In comparison with the neighbouring states Macedonia’s territory and population of Macedonia are the smallest; GNP is the second smallest (after Albanian), and the total number of active and reserve soldiers is lowest. The number of active soldiers per 1,000 population is among the lowest (after Bulgaria) and the number of reserve soldiers per 1,000 population (excluding Albanian paramilitary units) is lowest along with the number of military planes (for more details see Isakovic and Danopoulos, 1995: 1846). Macedonia’s defence budget was the smallest along with the share of GNP devoted to defence. In addition, the only comparative advantages of its economy are in mineral and agricultural resources; in the sparing of war devastation; in the mutual interests of Greece and the FRY for communications; and in the support of numerous economic emigrants in the US, Canada and Australia, whose strengths and readiness to help, however, are not as great as those from Croatia.
Macedonia 209 The leaderships of Macedonia and several other Balkan countries were faced with two patterns in its defence behaviour: an orientation towards neutralization and demilitarization or alignment and militarization. The steps during the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia and others indicated that the leadership of the Macedonia would have applied the first strategy; however, other later steps applied the second strategy.90 Although NATO could play a stabilizing role there (similar to that employed in the Greek-Turkish conflict), the conflicts in the territory of the Second Yugoslavia could not be eliminated quickly either by domestic armies, police and similar forces, or by the activities of UNPROFOR, or peacemaking and peacekeeping force actions by IFOR, SFOR or KFOR, nor also by the activities of UNPREDEP (for more details see Isakovic, 1997c: 3) or NATO troops in Macedonia since 1999. The cases of wars in the Second Yugoslavia (particularly the war in Croatia) indicate that, in the event of an internal ethnic conflict, the way in which professional soldiers and conscripts91 would react is uncertain. It is less likely that soldiers would be loyal to an army the more the army demonstrates disloyalty to the multinational character of its country. It could have been predicted that a strategy of neutralization and demilitarization of Macedonia in military circles would be considered as ultimately self-destructive, as the Minister of Defence put it. However, in this case demilitarization does not mean abandoning a complete army, but just avoiding creation of an army that could act in a manner which respects the Balkan “rules of the game”. The army could be capable of nonoffensive defence which would thus decrease military spending and avoiding escalation, war, destruction and divisions etc. (for more details on this kind of defence see Moller, 1997: 2-4). During the bombardment of the FRY many Macedonians considered that the efforts and results of conflict prevention actions in Macedonia almost disappeared. They were not sure that the international community was not aware of the consequences of this intervention on the security of Macedonia and the region. Macedonians were thinking that Macedonia was being sacrificed for the sake of various global concerns and did not accept the justification for this intervention for humanitarian reasons. They stressed that human suffering has increased during every intervention anywhere and among all ethnic groups. During the bombardment Macedonians considered that Kosovo Albanians had never before been so molested; that the Serbs and Montenegrins were badly hurt; that the Serbs have just engaged in another
210 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia “Kosovo Battle” which will be a basis for their nationalism in the next centuries; that peace has never been so far away from these people, and that war has never been so close to Macedonia. However, the Albanians from Macedonia did not share or care for these views. A similar contrast was present when the Macedonians were stressing that thre Albanians were innocent victims of the violent policy of their own radicals such as the KLA - maybe encouraged by NATO; and that in the Kosovo war, as in any war between two military forces, civilians inevitably become innocent victims etc. One night, when NATO hit the Serbian police headquarter building in Belgrade only a few dozen meters away from a big maternity hospital, numerous babies and their mothers were endangered by the fire and broken windows. For some or many Macedonians it was a horrible scene which reminded them of similar scenes of people’s sufferings in wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. Many Albanians, however, observed the same attack as a defensive one. Some Macedonians believed that their country was not a sovereign state any more as it had no control over that what was happening there. There was an increasingly wide gap within the governing coalition, especially between the Macedonian coalition partners. The Albanian coalition party became almost invisible, working on refugee problems and accepting and organizing KLA fighters. On the other side, the leader of the DPA complained that the Albanian ministers were excluded from making decisions, such as keeping the refugees on the Macedonian border for days, closing the border, etc. The official opinion of an Albanian minister was that Kosovo refugees were “at home in Macedonia”. Macedonians could only hope that the Macedonian leadership would be able to avoid becoming involved in the conflict and that Macedonia would be spared that time. But they were no longer sure ... Some international financial assistance was slowly coming to Macedonia, but for Macedonians it was ironic that European countries were ready to pay instead of receiving refugees in their own countries. According to a foreign minister, it would only encourage Milosevic. Macedonians were asking where were the European governments’ humanitarian concerns for the refugees and for Macedonia’s problems? Wiberg’s opinion was that “if the West is not willing to pick up and house all the refugees it is forcing Macedonia to let in, then there a real risk of things going very wrong in Macedonia and perhaps even spreading” (Wiberg, personal communication). According to Vankovska-Cvetkovska, expressed in an interview with me, the NATO intervention had very
Macedonia 211 negative effects on overall interethnic relations in Macedonia. In addition, Greece has announced that in case of the war’s spilling over into Macedonia, it would seal its border with Macedonia. 6.3 Religious affiliation Religious affiliation of Albanians in Macedonia is to a large degree similar to that elaborated within the chapter devoted to the FRY. Among Macedonians as well as among other nations who mostly belong to Eastern Orthodox Churches correlation between religion and language is high, i.e. the religion and language structure of population gives almost the same picture. Table 6.2
Religious composition of the population in Macedonia
Eastern Orthodox 67% Muslims 30% Others___________________________ 3% Source: Murzeva-Skarik and Skarik, 1996: 4. (Census 1994 data).
One author concludes that the origins of the beliefs and practices that constituted the ancient Greek religion were lost somewhere in prehistory. Around 1100 a decline of the religion began, which lasted until the eighth century BC. The Greek religion, in the established sense, commenced at the beginning of the Archaic period (from around 750 to around 500 BC). The religion was very diverse including worshipping a multitude of immortal gods (Zeus, Hera, Demeter, Poseidon etc.) who were believed to have control over natural and social forces and phenomena (like the weather, sea, harvest, marriage etc.) and sacrficice was the most important act of worship (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). The inhabitants of Macedonia were largely Christianized in the fourth century AD, after the division of the Roman Empire into eastern and western parts, when Macedonia became part of the Byzantine Empire. The Christianizing of the Bulgarians and ancestors of present-day Macedonians was achieved by the “apostles to the Slavs” Cyril and Methodius in the ninth century. The majority of present-day religious Bulgarians are adherents of the Bulgarian Orthodox Church. Minority
212 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia religious groups in Bulgaria are Muslims, Jews, Bulgarian Catholics, Protestants and Gregorian Armenians. The issue of Bogomilism92 has not been disputed in Macedonia as much as in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is considered that Bogomilism appeared in Bulgaria and Macedonia in the mid tenth century and spread to the Mediterranean during the Middle Ages. Bogomilism is believed to have emerged in the first place because of mass dissatisfaction and revolt against oppression by a corrupt feudal clergy (Jankovic, 1972: 12). The theology of this movement attempted to reconcile or create a union between the principles of good and evil whose conflict shaped human existence. The Bogomils believed that the visible world is given over to Satan and rejected the unjust material world. They encouraged asceticism and avoided what they considered to be sin. As the Bogomils believed that God first ruled only over a spiritual sphere, they denied the ultimate sovereignty of God. The Ottoman Turks applied to present-day Macedonia mechanisms for Islamization that were basically similar to those in Albania, Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and in some other Balkan countries. Another part of the population kept their affiliation to the Orthodox Church, whose estates were amassed; Slavic clergy was subjected to the Greek patriarch of Constantinople, and the Slavic liturgy was banned. During the Turkish rule Christian Slavs in Macedonia were subjected not only to Turkish political oppression, but also Greek religious domination, it seems particularly when the autocephalous Bulgarian Orthodox Church along with the archbishopric of Ohrid was abolished by the Turks in 1777. When the Bulgarian church independence of the Constantinople patriarchate was re-established in 1870, and when a Bulgarian exarchate was created with authority over “Macedonia and all of Bulgaria proper” (see Bogdan, 1989: 132), the establishing of schools by Bulgarian teachers and clergymen in Macedonia alarmed the governments and churches of Greece and Serbia. This was the beginning of a bitter religious as well as state rivalry over Macedonia between those who advocated a Greater Greece, Bulgaria or Serbia. It was recognized that religion played a part in the animosities that motivated fighting, particularly in the first of the Balkan wars, when mostly Christians were fighting together against the Muslim Turks. Similar situations happened in the Second Balkan war when there were Muslim elements in the Bulgarian and Macedonian populations. Thus the question arose in the minds of 1913 observers of how much the ferocity of the hostilities during the Second Balkan War could be properly attributed to religious fanaticism. But it was considered that it was going too far to
Macedonia 213 conclude that those differences were the main cause of animosity, and the strongest motivating factor involved in the Balkan wars was defined as aggressive nationalism, whose role has been discussed previously (for more details see Kennan, 1993). Craft (1996) stresses that during the First Balkan War, while Bulgaria was fighting the Turks in Thrace near the present-day Turkish border, Greece and Serbia occupied most of Macedonia and immediately set about securing not only their military, but also their cultural hold on these areas. Whole villages were ordered to convert to the religious denomination, and to adopt the language of the national forces that occupied them. (Craft, 1996)
Thus people were converted by force to either the Greek or Serbian Orthodox Church; those who refused were mass expelled. “At times the penalty for refusal was considerably more severe than mere expulsion” (Carnegie Endowment, 1993: 72-107) (Craft, 1996). During the First and for part of the Second Yugoslavia, the present-day Macedonian Orthodox Church was affiliated to the Serbian Orthodox Church. Tito was accused of helping to separate the Macedonian Orthodox Church93 (which has never been accepted by the Serbian Orthodox Church94), perceiving its roots to be in the archbishopric of Ohrid. As far as it is known, many religious customs, procedures and festivities, which are specific to the Serbian Orthodox Church, have not changed for the Macedonian Orthodox Church since the separation, and both Churches have put pressure on their governments to introduce religious education in schools. 6.4 Language and culture Present-day Greek is well documented and has the longest history of any language in the family of Indo-European languages, which started in the fourteenth century BC, evolving in four phases. The first phase was Ancient Greek, which is divided into the Mycenaean phase (from the fourteenth to the thirteenth centuries BC) and the Archaic and Classical period (from adoption of the alphabet in the eighth to fourth centuries BC). The second phase was the Hellenistic and Roman period from the fourth century BC to the fourth century AD. The third was the Byzantine phase from the fifth to fifteenth centuriues AD, and the fourth a Modem phase. There are two varieties of the Modem Greek language: the local dialects and Standard or
214 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia “Common” Modem Greek which is in official use (for more details see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). As the emperor Michael III encouraged the apostles Cyril and Methodius to preach in the local Slav language, Cyril invented a script based upon Greek uncial script and adapted to the Slavonic tongue using as the standard the dialect spoken among the Slavs in Southern Macedonia preserved as Old Church Slavonic or Slavic language. The language was based in the first place on the South Slavic Macedonian dialects used around Thessaloniki and written in the Cyrillic and later Glagolitic alphabets. It was used by the same apostles and missionaries for the first translation of the Bible, for preaching, and as the first Slavic literary language. It was also with some modifications - used in other regions populated by Slavs. Orthodox Slavs kept it as the literary language during the Middle Ages (Bulgarians and Serbs until the nineteenth century), and as the religious language into modem times (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). After their arrival in the Balkans, the Bulgars mixed with the Slavs and replaced their Turkic mother tongue with the Slavic language. The history of the Bulgarian language can be divided into periods of Old (9th- ! 1th century) Middle (12th- ! 6th century); and Modem Bulgarian (16th century to the present day). St Clement, a pupil of the missionaries Cyril and Methodius, developed the Old Bulgarian language in the Macedonian part of Bulgaria in the tenth and eleventh centuries. Middle Bulgarian was used after Bulgaria was subjugated by the Byzantine Empire, and the modem Bulgarian written language was established in the nineteenth century containing numerous words borrowed from Church Slavonic and the Russian language. The present-day Bulgarian language is a member of the South Slavic group of languages (together with Serbo-Croatian, Slovene, and Macedonian). It is written in the Cyrillic alphabet and spoken in Bulgaria and parts of Romania, Moldova, Ukraine and Greece and has few more or less different dialects. According to The Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995, together with Macedonian, with which it is most closely related, Bulgarian contrasts sharply with the other Slavic languages in its almost complete loss of case declension in the norm and in its use of certain grammatical features found in Balkan languages that belong to other language families
In the Middle Age the earliest Macedonian literature was religious (Orthodox Christian), and most of the time during the period of the Turkish rule it suffered an eclipse. Similar to the situation in most other Yugoslav successor states, Turkish rule meant centuries long occupation and
Macedonia 215 Macedonia’s cultural subjugation and deprivation. Centuries of Turkish rule have insulated the Macedonian, Greek and Albanian lands from the important historical movements and events that shaped the histories of Western European countries (the Renaissance, the Reformation, the Enlightenment, the French Revolution and the Industrial Revolution). When Turkish strengths started to decline, the influence of the Greeks was increased and schools began to teach the Greek language. In the nineteenth century the brothers Dimitrije (1810-1862) and Konstantin (1830-1862) Miladinov wrote lyric poetry, made a collection of folk legends and songs and in other ways contributed to the development of Macedonian literature and culture (for more details see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1965: 107). After the Balkan Wars, since 1913, in Serbia and the First Yugoslavia, the distinctiveness of Macedonian identity was not recognized and the Macedonian language was considered as a dialect of the Serbian language. Krste P. Misirkov (1874-1926) published an anthology of his papers Za Makedonckite raboti (“On Macedonian Affairs”) in 1903 in Sofia devoted to the Macedonian literary language and in 1905 in Odessa established the literary journal Vardar. After the First World War the most significant writers who wrote in the Macedonian language were poets Kosta Racin (1908-1943) and Kole Nedelkovski (1912-1941), who was writing and publishing abroad for political reasons. The Macedonian language was officially recognized in 1946, when Macedonia became one of the constituent republics of the Second Yugoslavia. On the other hand, the Bulgarian government has held the view that the Macedonian language has been a Bulgarian dialect (with no special status in Bulgaria itself) and, consequently, Macedonians have been “Bulgarians by language”. Afterwards, the Macedonian literary language was standardized by a group of linguists led by Blaze Koneski (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). As far as it is known, their work was partly inspired by the above-mentioned Misirkov’s anthology. However, Doder (1993) points out that in the Second Yugoslavia creating new political nations was often accompanied by frenetic work to develop a cultural infrastructure. In the case of the Macedonians, for example, a well-known Harvard Slavicist, Horace Landt, was brought in to create a grammar for the Macedonian language (Doder, 1993: 11).
Murdzeva-Skarik and Skarik (1996: 4) also mention that at that time a new standard grammar of Macedonian language was printed.
216 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia During the next decades the most popular writers have been poets Aco Sopov (1923-1981 or 1982), Slavko Janevski (1920- ), Blaze Koneski (1921- ), and Gane Todorovski (1929- ). The most distinguished dramatists and playwrights have been Vasil Iljoski (1902- ), Kole Casule (1921- ), Tome Arsovski and Goran Stefanovski. Zivko Cingo (1935- ) is among the best Macedonian prose writers (see Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1960, 1962, 1965, 1968; Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Article 7 of the Macedonia’s Constitution establishes the Macedonian language and the Cyrillic Alphabet as the official language and alphabet and subsections 2 and 3 of this Article establish the official use of the ethnic minority languages in the local communities where they are the prevailing population. In 1994, Albanians established an Albanian language university parallel to that held by Macedonian government, and the subsequent move by the Skopje authorities (to demolish the university makeshift buildings in the city of Tetovo) appeared to have exacerbated the level of ethnic tensions in Macedonia. Modem Macedonian - written exclusively in the Cyrillic alphabet - is a South Slavic language that is most closely related to Bulgarian language. Macedonian is spoken by more than 1.3 million people in Macedonia and, in addition, it is also spoken in the above-mentioned neighbouring areas of Bulgaria, Greece and in Yugoslavia, Albania and in Australia. Similarly to Bulgarian, the Macedonian language does not decline nouns for case. It consists of the northern (similar to the neighbouring Serbian), the eastern (similar to Bulgarian), and western dialects (most dissimilar from SerboCroatian and Bulgarian and for that reason taken as the basic dialect for the Macedonian standard language by the Yugoslav administration in 1944 (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). Whether Macedonian and Bulgarian are one or two languages could therefore be left to the politicians to decide. Perry (1992b: 15) has concluded, “to support their claims to a sovereign identity, Macedonians must speak a different language than their neighbors”, negating the Bulgarian and Serb perspectives on their identity. “Furthermore, if a truly Macedonian national culture exists in FYROM, it also negates the idea that Macedonia is a purely Greek identity” (ibid.). The outer limits of the Macedonia’s position is determined by the constellation of pressures. Macedonians from Macedonia perceive their language, culture, history, and identity as distinct or independent ones from their neighbours. “Therefore they also claim that Bulgaria contains a small Macedonian minority within its borders, mostly in the Pirin region [and] make a variety of usually muted claims to (Greek) Aegean Macedonia as well” (ibid.).
Macedonia 217 Perry described a situation in which Macedonian representatives insisted that they must speak through translators as they cannot properly understand Bulgarian, and their Bulgarian counterparts claimed that this was not necessary as they were all using the same language (Bulgarian). Perry concludes, as the Bulgarians rarely wait for the translation before replying, there must be a fairly high level of understanding on their part. However, even private individuals and groups in Macedonia sometimes correspond with Bulgarians in a second (or third) language on the grounds that Bulgarian and Macedonian are mutually incomprehensible” {ibid.).
The above-mentioned requests for translators were already seen during the peace and other negotiations and talks between the sides in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In some contracts signed recently by the Bulgarian and Macedonian government it was stated that they were written in languages which are proclaimed as official by constitutions of the two countries. The problem is that “each of these national perspectives on Macedonian identity requires a negation of the others [and] the official FYROM identity requires a clear cultural and territorial boundary between themselves and the Bulgarians, Greeks, and Serbs” (Craft, 1996). Macedonia needs a distinct language in order to defend its identity from Greece and Albania. However, since the Macedonian language belongs to the family of Slavic languages, the difference cannot separate it enough from Bulgaria and Serbia (see Craft, 1996). What the ethnic groups or nations do in an observed region often reflects more on political and, sometimes, other attitudes than linguistic realities. The signing of the inter-state convention between the FRY and Macedonia roused great public interest and the return of Yugoslav literature, film, and theatre to the Macedonian cultural scene was welcomed. After that, an article published in Skopje magazine Dnevnik (Diary) criticized the opening of Macedonia towards Yugoslavia, fearing that it might lead to a loss of national identity. Some authors consider that the national divisions lie in the confrontation of interests of the political, cultural, and intellectual elites rather than the nations themselves. The same article deplores rather than fears the fact the Macedonians prefer Serbian to the Bulgarian language, and more gladly read Serbian than Albanian fiction (more details Basic, 1996: 67). In addition, in Skopje few radio stations play Yugo-nostalgic songs; the name of the most popular red vine in local restaurants is “T’ga za jug” (Sorrow for the South) which
218 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia originates from the title of a poem by Konstantin Miladinov, who wrote it in a Moscow hospital a few years before his death. His nostalgic sentiments for the southern region of his origin are this time transferred and transformed into sorrow for the Second Yugoslavia - the state of the South Slavs. It seems that there are rational reasons for the nostalgia of Macedonians: the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina has ended, and partly thanks to Macedonia’s separation from the Second Yugoslavia a war could break out in Macedonia itself. 6.5 Conclusions By gaining independence, Macedonia successfully avoided participation in the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and with NATO, as well as the sanctions against the FRY and other actions and circumstances, affecting more or less negatively the state security of that country and the identity security of its multiethnic population, its economy, etc. At the same time, Macedonia - thanks to independence - entered into three renewed conflicts: with ethnic Albanians and Albania, Greece and Bulgaria. The analyses in this chapter show that the Macedonian conflicts with Bulgaria and Greece as well as with Serbia and in some ways with the Albanian population have long-lasting traditions, but the Macedonian identity and state seemed better protected within the Second Yugoslavia than after the separation. If one puts conflicts aside, the unfavourable overall security situation of Macedonia has been worsened by the dissolution of the Second Yugoslavia’s state and market, as well as by its attractive and at the same time handicapped (landlocked) geopolitical position after the dissolution. At this moment, it seems particularly important to stress the fact that, in 1968, 1981 or later before the secession of Macedonia, the ethnic Albanian population in Macedonia did not raise its voice to ask for autonomy, federalization of the country or even independence. It seems that Albanians in Macedonia considered Kosovo as their own political centre and in some ways the source of their identity before the separation of Macedonia. As soon as the separation happened, and they were separated from the centre and source, they started to attempt to establish such a centre and source within Macedonia or outside it. One can conclude that the Southern conflict triangle (MacedonianAlbanian-Serbian complex of conflicting relations) was divided by the independence of Macedonia into two bilateral conflicts, between which - for
Macedonia 219 identity, political and state security reasons and the logic of conflict development - there are potential relationships analogous to those of connected blood vessels. In terms of the main classic elements of political power (population, territory, military and economic power, stable political system, ideology and morale of the population - for more details see Isakovic, forthcoming), Macedonia is maybe weaker than most of the Yugoslav successor states, its neighbouring states with the partial exception of Albania. Even after having gained independence and international recognition, sovereignty of many successor states remained questionable. They are obviously caught in a vicious circle: they can be labelled as weak states because of many internal economic, social, ethnic, religious and other problems, as well as weak democratic ethos and traditions of statehood. Their efforts to fulfil their external sovereignty with internal substance very often fail and the result is a perpetuation of their weakness. The lack of legitimate authority is a product of confrontation between identities and loyalties (to the ethnic group and to the state). As Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1997b says, “die core problem lies in the fact that the bigger strength of the ethnic identification has been intensified by the absence of the other unifying forces within the society”. It is assumed that the conflict between ethnicity and state sovereignty will remain a feature of the Balkan political landscape. “Within such a context, the primary task for every state is to be learning to live with ethnic conflict and to deal with it without any kind o f violence" (Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1997b). The process of conflict resolution in the region will probably be a long-lasting one. “Reaching for swift and definite solutions in this case could mean only one thing: establishing a non-democratic rule with the aim of maintaining the state sovereignty by all costs” (ibid.). Observed “from the perspective of European integration, one must keep in mind that ‘the badly governed nations will make poor and even dangerous neighbors in the world village’ (Woodhouse, 1996: 40)” (Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1997b: 476-477). Wiberg (1993) made a concise and precise definition of the problems of Macedonia and the Macedonians, which include both security and identity terms. The security problem lies in being small and unarmed and risking to face, in case o f armed conflict, a choice between pox and cholera: joining Albanians and Bulgarians, who, if victorious, might divide Macedonia between them along the 1941 line; or joining Greeks and Serbs, who, if victorious, might want no independent state between them (Wiberg, 1993: 107).
220 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia The present-day identity problems include the facts that neighbouring Bulgaria recognizes a Macedonian state but no Macedonian nation; Greece recognizes neither under the name of Macedonia; and the Albanians and Albania recognize a Macedonian state that does not belong to the Macedonian people (they are not ready to accept Macedonians defining themselves as the state-carrying people), which they recognize at least in some occasions. The state of FRY is the only neighbouring state that recognizes both the Macedonian nation (including its name and language) and the Macedonian state (including its unitary organization). A brief conclusion could be that Bulgaria is the main identity threat to the extent that identity is anchored in language; Serbs are the main identity threat to the extent that identity is anchored in religion; Albanians the main identity threat to the extent that identity is anchored in statehood; and Greeks to the extent that identity is anchored in the name of the nation, its language and state (see Wiberg, 1993: 107). * * *
As in previously analysed cases, in the case of Macedonia the Serbs had been keeping the legitimacy of the second Yugoslavia as long as possible. The Macedonians were challenging the legitimacy of the Second Yugoslavia as long as Macedonia became an independent state. Since that time, they have started to keep the legitimacy of Macedonia but a good proportion of the ethnic Albanians and an unknown number of newcomers started to challenge it, attempting to establish a new state - probably united with other Albanians in a “Greater Albania” similar to that from the Second World War. Where the main threat comes from depends very much on where the identity dimension is being focused. The Bulgarians are the main identity threat from the point of view of language, Serbs from a religious point of view, Albanians from the point of view of statehood, and Greeks concerning the name of the nation, its language and the state. Macedonian identity is thus potentially the most threatened among the main nations in the Yugoslav successor states. Internally, the predominant dynamic is that of how the Macedonians’ and Albanians’ national identity threaten each other in a vicious circle. Since national identities have been rediscovered in the region, politicians “by definition” could hardly resist posturing as “fathers” of their nations, but in the search for security they must try to avoid “ethnic minefields” and territorial irredentas which define country-specific and
Macedonia 221 regional security problems and perspectives alike (see Remington, 1994b: 18). In another armed struggle in this “keg” the model of shifting coalitions would probably be repeated from previous “kegs” carrying a greater risk of further internationalization. In that case Macedonia -in the centre of the Balkan geopolitical axes without neighbouring political allies - can hardly expect to profit from its independence. Macedonia is simply too small and weak to succeed in a simultanenous struggle with the internal and external paramilitary forces and with armies of the neighbouring states. Thus, Macedonia would risk much in an armed conflict. Potentially engaged states cover almost the entire Balkan peninsula; another Balkan war could be much worse than any previous was, because once the shooting started, control over the political spectrum on all sides would go out of the hands of relatively rational policymakers and instead go into the hands of radicals. Simply, war operations, logic or way of thinking and perceiving, war chaos, tragedies, atrocities, bloodshed and destruction usually allow (para)military leaders and radical politicians to act (much) more autonomously than they could do in peace time. Finally, and most important, problems of ethnic relations usually cannot be solved by the use of armed forces in any case. On the contrary, as mentioned above, armed force and violence in general usually become (major) part o f the problem, not the solution (compare 0berg, 1994: 140).
7
Conclusions and outlook for the future
7.1 Myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry While the rest of South-eastern Europe has been populated for at least 6,500 years, the Balkans (Turkish for “mountains”) has been populated for some 10,000 years. Although there are, to some degree, different theories on the origin of some of the main present-day nations in the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia, it seems that a mainstream view is that they are descendants of the Southern Slavic groups of tribes who came to the Balkans during the sixth century (when the name South Slavs appeared) and seventh century. The only exceptions is the Albanian and Hungarian population, whose members are descendants of one or more nations who populated the region before Slavs came there or who came afterwards. As has been mentioned above, the Illyrian idea and movement was based on an incorrect assumption, presumption or simply conviction that the Illyrians were ancestors of the South Slav nations. Although the conviction was shown as incorrect in the light of knowledge acquired later, this historic episode showed that for studies of identity what people believe or what they are convinced had happened could sometimes be more important that what had actually happened. Some elements of conflict developments and crisis that occurred as a result as well as some developments after the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia show that this conclusion could be applied particularly within the field of identity studies related to myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry of nations. Simply put, if propaganda, manipulation (see Isakovic, 1991: 257-64) or other means persuade members of a nation engaged in a conflict that they are of a certain origin and ancestry, attempts to change this conviction could be very hard and sometimes even have counterproductive results. Generally speaking, this element of nations’ identities seems to be weaker than comparable elements of other nations who live or lived in the region (especially the ancient Greeks and Romans), as they have a longer lasting and/or richer known traditions in this regard. Reasons for that 222
Conclusions and outlookfor the future 223 conclusion vary in different cases. After their arrival, the Southern Slav tribes were underdeveloped culturally, religiously and nationally (or at least there is scant historical evidence of their achievements) in comparison with some of the nations who came to the Balkans millennia before the Slavs. In addition, the myths and shared memories on common origin and ancestry of some Slavs and Albanians are somewhat disputed. 7.2 State traditions The term state is more questionable the further one goes back through history. After their arrival to the Balkans, some of the South Slav groups of tribes established their first political organisations there, some of which could be considered as states. Thanks to that fact, the state traditions of South Slavs could be divided into various categories. First, the Serbs had had their own state since medieval times until the Turks came to the region. In that time one part of the state (roughly present-day Serbia) was conquered and liberated during the nineteenth century, and the other one (approximately present-day Montenegro) resisted the invasion for several centuries, and an embryo of the Montenegrin nation was created in the first place thanks to that and probably other previous and later geographical, political, cultural and other differences and divisions. The state of the Croats, which also used to exist in the medieval era, was renewed as a puppet state during the Second World War and after the secession of the Second Yugoslavia in 1991. It could be argued whether the Croats renewed their own state or whether it was a variation of the positions they had within the Austro-Hungarian Empire. An answer would depend on the definition one accepts of the term “state” as well as on the acceptable amount of dependence on other states of a state considered as independent. Secondly, it could also be argued whether the three main nations who live in Bosnia and Herzegovina had had their own state from the time when the South Slav tribes came to the region (particularly in regard to Ban Rulin’s and Tvrtko’s I state) to the establishing of the First Yugoslavia. Again, an answer would depend on the definition one accepts of the term “state” as well as on the acceptable amount of dependence on other states of a state considered as independent. Thirdly, some academics consider that present-day Macedonians in Macedonia had no state traditions or had them until separation from the Second Yugoslavia in 1992. According to these views, Albanians had no
224 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia state traditions in the observed period until the establishing of modem Albania at the beginning of the twentieth century although they consider Skanderbeg as the predecessor of Albania’s statehood, and the statehood of Dardania (mentioned above) which is contested by Albanians and Macedonians. Albanians in Kosovo have never had their own state, and Albania, which was itself occupied, was enlarged by Kosovo during the Second World War. However, some people’s perceptions of their own and other people’s history are sometimes different, but they often matter more than historians’ discussions. The disintegration of Austria-Hungary, the Illyrian movement and Serbia’s efforts directed toward establishing the First Yugoslavia, all provided political conditions for the unification of the South Slavs within a single state, which failed thanks to the ethno-political Serbo-Croat and other intra-state conflicts as well as later the great international conflicts in Europe, which led to the Second World War. One can conclude that the unification attempt after the Second World War, when the Second Yugoslavia was established, failed for two main reasons. First, the incapability of the Communist as well as post-Communist political elites to prevent or resolve the internal ethnic conflicts as well as those related to foreign debt and constitutional disagreements after Tito’s death. Nationalism - among its other functions95 - “offers a particularly attractive mode in times of crises and depression since the link to a glorious past ... donates immediate relief, pride and [a] shield against shame”, (Waever, 1994: 21) while Remington (1994a: 72) concluded that from the internal point of view, nationalist passions, economic difficulties and weak political parties were a potentially lethal combination for the Second Yugoslavia. Secondly, the end of the Cold War, with its political, geopolitical and other consequences in the world, disturbed the power relationships within and outside the Second Yugoslavia. When the “iron curtain” disappeared, the geostrategic importance of Yugoslavia and other buffer and border zones between the two blocks, such as the territories of Czechoslovakia and Baltic Republics (except for Russia) etc. became much less important than before. Since the changes in the USSR have finally marked the end of the Soviet threat and bipolarity in Europe, there have been efforts to establish a new international order on the continent, at least rhetorically based on the development of democracy and human rights protection. The right of nations to self-determination has also started to occupy a central place within the policy of Western countries.96 One could object that rhetoric is
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 225 not so important as realpolitik, but the problem is that rhetoric becomes part of reality and thus of realpolitik. When the Eastern and Central European states - including the Second Yugoslavia - were established with the Communist ideology as their basic legitimacy value, it prevented the idea of “nation” becoming the main value and force to mobilise the people. Thus after the end of the Cold War they lost the very idea o f the state (in the first place Communism), and for this reason in particular, Communist federations became more sensitive, fragile and unstable than the other ex-Communist states as well as other European federal states which had their own conflicts. Within a few years of the end of the Cold War no European Communist federation remained as an integral country (the Soviet Union, Second Yugoslavia, Czechoslovakia). In that time Buzan (1991) included the Second Yugoslavia among countries that were characterised by “lack of coherent national identity, or presence of contending national identities within the state” and an increasing “lack of clear or observed hierarchy of political authority”. These characteristics were two out of six used by Buzan to outline the kinds of conditions which would be expected to be found in weak states,97 “and the presence of any of which would make one query whether a state should be classed as strong” (Buzan, 1991: 100). One could also conclude that, in addition, before the wars broke out, the major political conflict on future ideology used to exist in the Second Yugoslavia. The main dilemma was whether the ideology of multiparty organisation of political system, privatisation and market economy or basically Tito’s ideology of unipartism and economic selfmanagement would prevail, organised by the state (which is another of the characteristics mentioned). In the year when Buzan’s book was published, the Second Yugoslavia, as well as some of its successor states which were emerging relatively quickly, became characterised to some degree by most of the other three kinds of conditions one would expect to find in weak states: a high level of political violence, the conspicuous role of political police in the everyday lives of citizens, and a high degree of state control over the media (Buzan, 1991: 100). One can find many excellent examples for those phenomena in most parts of the Second Yugoslavia and the successor states as well. One of the key questions that could be discussed within this chapter seems to be whether it was possible for weak Yugoslav successor states to become strong states relatively soon after the disintegration of the Second Yugoslavia and thus avoid the weakness which used to characterise it during the last decade of its existence.
226 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia As was shown in the previous chapters, the Second Yugoslavia after the end of the Cold War was increasingly subject to the interplay of enormous political forces, but these forces were different in comparison with those in the Western Europe. The end of the Cold War did not bring relief or relaxation to the Second Yugoslavia similar to that in the West. Instead, new tensions emerged, in the first place thanks to the political and economic burden of foreign debt and the continuation of Albanian of rebellion in Kosovo. Both phenomena had already generated intensive and long-lasting economic crisis during the 1980s as well as great quarrels among national leaders and elites. In the Second Yugoslavia there were divisions on an East-West line instead of widening acceptance that political pluralism and markets were essential ingredients for any successful society. At that time, for people(s) in the Eastern republics, the Yugoslav Communist system (which since Tito’s quarrel with Stalin in 1948 has been to some degree different from that in the Soviet Union and other communist countries) was maybe an element of what Waever views as the self-conception of communities (see Waiver, 1993: 24). One could add the fact that Communism in Yugoslavia was not imposed by the Red Army, but had developed during the Second World War, in the first place by its own communists (peasants, workers etc.). The western republics Croatia and Slovenia were pushing for multiparty elections and privatisation, while Serbia and Montenegro were more in favour of conservation of the existing situation, stating that these kinds of elections and economic reforms could - among other problems lead the country to disintegration. The two western republics replied by demands for confederalisation of the country (created since the First Yugoslav state was established as unitary state), and disintegration started within the LCY in February 1990. As the real threat was in violent escalation of the conflict, and not in compromising with the other side, it could be concluded that for both sides Buzan’s view would have applied, that “real threats may not be accurately seen. Perceived threats may not be real, and yet still have real effects.” Thanks to the development of communication and scientific and technical revolution Communist control and domination over societies, and particularly civil societies, in Eastern Europe became too costly and difficult. What motivated political revolution, on the other hand, was the absence of development in communication or of scientific and technical revolution. When communist ideology started to weaken, the basic thing was delivering goods, but it became hard to achieve for the ruling political forces. Although the Eastern European revolutions may be thus observed as
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 227 a response to the development of communication and scientific and technical revolutions that have been creating the infrastructure of the world order that will define the twenty-first century, it seems that there is no generic twenty-first century identity to take off the shelf. The identities that exist in the Second Yugoslavia as well as in the rest of East European Balkans are historic national identities. These have been, however, “closet” identities, cherished in the privacy of the family and church to counter the abstraction of socialist citizens. At its most basic level, the rebirth of East Europe is the rehabilitation of the nation. This was both a political and security problem. In newly independent East European societies there was substantial confusion about basic democratic concepts. In the West, democracy is associated with the rights of individual citizens to political access and governmental accountability. That has never been the most common assumption in the East European Balkans (see Sugar and Lederer, 1969). There, among the “political parties proliferating like mushrooms, the most passionate are those reclaiming national identities who think of democracy as the right to national self-determination” (Remington, 1994a: 70-1). Although “the Yugoslav model” was for years considered an exception, events after 1989 have shown that it used to belong to the same kind of the systems that existed in the USSR and Eastern Europe and therefore could not escape their destiny. On the one hand, with the collapse of the ideology of “self-management socialism”, the main integrating factor of the Second Yugoslavia disappeared - LCY. On the other hand, with the collapse of the social system (which owing to the long-lasting repression of opposition and civil society had no elaborated alternative) the Yugoslav political scene assumed the characteristics of what Samuel Huntington in the mid-sixties called “praetorian politics” (see 1968: 196). Threatened to lose legitimacy, regional Yugoslav leaders began to look to nationalism as a ‘new’ source of legitimacy to maintain their power bases - challenging the legitimacy of the Second Yugoslavia or attempting to make it legitimate, as it was shown in practice, on an inappropriate way. Leaderships of most of the Yugoslav successor states perceive their states as weak. It is manifested by their actions regardless to their public proclamations, and that what is usually called “ethnic cleansing” (although it seems to be not precisely defined term) could be considered as the key proof of weakness. Namely, the leaderships probably consider that the most stable and secure state is the one with traditions and ethnically homogenous
228 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia states. The first feature cannot be obtained relatively quickly, and the second can in mentioned way. It was concluded that the external factors that used to keep Yugoslavia together were also in disarray. The Cold War was over and thus its cohesional effect (see Wiberg, 1994a: 230). Gorbachev contributed to the dissolution by ending the Cold War which defined the same national security raison d ’être of Yugoslavia as that provided by pre-war fascist and other neighbours. The fall of East European communist regimes contributed to multiparty elections, which were held - as it was mentioned - at the worst possible moment (see Wiberg, 1993: 100). Later development proved the conclusion that democracy is imperfect decisionmaking system because it includes mass manipulation, which is easier in young than in old democracies. The manipulation could be directed toward numerous issues including the very idea of democratic society.98 At the same time, acceptance of its imperfection is a strong aspect of democracy. In the Second Yugoslavia ethnic mobilisation has become possible with démocratisation, but this kind of mobilisation has been threatening democracy itself. It is stressed that agreed rules in advance for interaction had previously permitted the actors in the Second Yugoslavia to operate “pretty much like the European balance-of-power system of the nineteenth century”. Coalitions were issue-related and shifting rather than ideological and permanent. When these rules collapsed, Yugoslavia drifted from “mature anarchy” into a “raw anarchy”, and “in addition, what happened there might easily interact with brittle balances in its neighbourhood”. When the logic of “raw anarchy” was supplemented with some knowledge of Yugoslav history and political culture(s), a number of things were clearly predictable. First, “alliances would be tactical, transitory and based on perceived interests rather than ideology”. Secondly, “the more republics seceding, the stronger the motivation of others to do so, the rest of Yugoslavia becoming increasingly Serb-dominated”. Thirdly, “Serb areas in Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina would subsecede if these republics seceded, Croats then sub-subseceding in both cases”. Fourthly, “unless boundaries were (against all odds) agreed in advance, peaceful and unresisted secessions were highly unlikely” (Wiberg, 1994a: 231-2). In the conditions of aggravated ethnic relations in the Second Yugoslavia, the programmes of these parties focused on carrying out extreme territorial aspirations. In fact, political groups that won the elections could hardly be denoted as political parties in the traditional meaning of the word because, judging by their programmes, one could
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 229 rather say that they represent “national liberation movements”.99 In spite of different ideological orientation (anti-communist nationalism vs. national socialism) most political groups on the territory of the former Yugoslavia have been antidemocratic and totalitarian. Licht and Kaldor (1992a) concluded that after 1989, when the main obstacles to democracy had been removed, the rights of citizens and the concept of citizenship were increasingly replaced by the concept of nation (to suppress civil society). The most important reason for this change was a lack of democratic experience. “Yugoslav society, like that of other communist countries, was deeply politicized and at the same time stifled independent thought. From an early age, people were drilled in loyalty to Marxist-Leninist tenets and to the regime. Children and adults participated in political meetings and joined political organizations based around youth, trade unions, women and the party.” However, genuine political discussion was lacking as well as criticism, opposition or experience of selforganisation (see Licht and Kaldor, 1992a: 7-8). The emergence and/or revival of nationalism and xenophobia in the Second Yugoslavia arose from political sources (during the quarrels over foreign debt and later over the issue of confederalisation or centralisation of the state as well as during the campaign for the first multiparty elections). These occasions (as well as the prolonged Albanian rebellion after 1981) nurtured the old traumas and hatreds, fears and threats on all sides, which bore new hatreds, fears and threats. In this regard the situation in the Second Yugoslavia was - at least to some degree - similar to what was being experienced at the same time in East European ex-Communist countries. Nationalism “offers a particularly attractive mode in times of crises and depression since the link to a glorious past ... donates immediate relief, pride and [a] shield against shame”, and the development of nationalism “is accelerated by an idea about the existence deep in the national soul of a ... golden future” (Wsever, 1993: 21). Therefore, efforts to defend a threatened identity will often strengthen not only the identity, but also the nationalism. For the above-mentioned reasons, the Second Yugoslavia was not faced with the revitalisation of integration (as Western Europe was under the banner of “ 1992”, “Maastricht”), but with the opposite process. The conflicts escalated in wars, which made the traumas even deeper and new ones emerged. Hatreds and fears became much more intensive as well as turning into threats - or at least they were perceived as such. The same approximate number of Croatian, Moslem, Albanian and other
230 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia identities were threatened by the actual, perceived and, even more so, predicted or expected Serbian domination in the First and Second Yugoslavia; while Serbian identity was threatened by the actual, perceived and, even more so, expected or predicted Croatian, Moslem, Albanian domination in independent Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo. As Galtung put it, “the more pressure to obtain unity, the less brotherhood. Brotherhood can only come to the surface in a setting that does not force artificial unity on a diversity that has been proven, repeatedly, to be volatile and violent”. The main mistake of the EC and other external actors seems to be the premature recognition of Croatia and particularly Bosnia and Herzegovina. The recognition proved that international and other exogenous conditions matter. Croats waited for favourable international conditions for establishing a Croatian state between the two world wars, and then, again, from the end of the Second World War to the end of the Cold War. Serbs from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia did not wait at all, but announced their own separation conditionally and in advance. In addition it seems that the main strategies (except the one applied in Dayton) of the Belgrade, Knin, Pale and other Serbs’ governments were based on the presumption that nobody was going to intervene in the “Balkan powder keg”. The same strategy seems to have been applied in Kosovo in 1998, at least in the initial phases of the conflict escalation. One can also conclude that as much as the Second Yugoslavia had been dependent for its internal cohesion and international position on the Cold War World Order (which added to the identity of the Second Yugoslavia, enabling its nonalignment) most of the Yugoslav successor states seem to be dependent on a post-Cold War or “New World Order” (whatever the redistribution of power and roles this new order assigns). In other words, the Second Yugoslavia had lasted along with the Cold War World Order, and the situation established by the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords and other agreements and solutions for establishing most of the successor states will probably last along with the Post-Cold War Order. Domestic and foreign politicians are the chief social protagonists who are interested in nationalistic ideologies, in particular since the end of the Cold War. However, they are as a rule less concerned with theoretical and historical deliberations about when nations emerged and how. Rather, they focus on their own and other nations as “geese laying the golden eggs”, enabling them to increase the quantum of political power they possess.100 For these reasons, politicians - among other means - use conflicts of identities, which are at least to some degree different and whose differences
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 231 begin to threaten each other, i.e. the peoples who possess them. Therefore, it can be assumed that these threats are mostly generated not by identities themselves, but mostly by their utilisation as a sort of tool in a political power struggle. A number of authors list as a reason for Second Yugoslavia’s disintegration the indirect contribution by certain parts of its political elite. The overall tensions and conflicts among its ethnic groups definitely consolidated the positions of the republican and local leaders aspiring to become representatives of specific ethnic groups (see Stanovcic and Remington, 1991: 204), or ‘fathers’ of the nation etc.101 Pecujlic and Nakarada (1995) concluded that one of the chief features of the Second Yugoslavia was the crucial role of small power elites, at a time when the country’s unity did not depend as much on organic ties as on the elites’ political will and deals (due to the Second Yugoslavia’s multi-ethnic structure and semi-peripheral status). They failed to modernise and they did not advocate collective wisdom, which implies awareness of the conditions in which collective survival is possible. As the elites’ social profile, their authoritarian spirit and inability to compromise were in deep contrast to the society’s multi-ethnic structure, and they faced a general communist social crisis and the danger of overthrow. They turned to defending “endangered” national interests, to the “ethnification of the community and politics, as the last tool to hold on to power. The failure of other ideals to gain credibility turned aggressive nationalism into the only strong magnet capable of rallying national support, causing a strong feeling of loyalty to a great goal, homogenising society.”102 Job (1993) is firmly of the opinion that despite everything, the old gripes need not have led to savagery. Leaderships allowing the crimes committed during the wars in ex-Yugoslavia were needed for that. The eruption of violence and rampant butchery do not happen without the approval of the senior authorities (state authorities, ethnic, religious, nationalist political movement leaders). “Such large-scale crimes do not take place until the wild and deformed leaders acquire the strongest power in a society, in a process which can best be described as criminalisation of politics and state” (Job, 1993: 68-9). The LCY, which was the sole ruler of the Second Yugoslavia since the Second World War, was not able, or did not want, fully to suppress the national, ethnic passions (furies, as some authors dubbed them); instead, the leaders took over state institutions despite their communist labels. Even if these “furies” seemed suppressed, they were not forgotten, and they re-
232 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia emerged when the politicians needed them again. A broad range of feelings (from love to hate) existed among the people living together in the Second Yugoslavia, as is often the case with many other nations. The political elites were the ones who determined when and which feeling they would use as a tool to ensure the legitimacy of their rule. If one were to resort to comparison (often not a reliable method in social sciences), one might conclude that the nation replaced God’s will and inheritance of rule after the French Bourgeois Revolution, while in the Second Yugoslavia, nations and their voluntarily determined interests replaced the working class and its interests after the first multiparty elections in 1990. While the Yugoslav elites were more or less united, it was possible to base legitimacy on the Yugoslav peoples’ brotherhood and unity policy. However, when they split up in January 1990, the elites focused on using national hatreds for the same purposes. Therefore, when these conditions were fulfilled, the “furies” of the Second World War were rapidly revived and again used in the power struggle. Politicians exploited ethnic hatreds, thinking they could control them, but the hatreds started to control the politicians, i.e. politicians did not control the situation at all, but just thought they controlled it. In addition, this mass intoxication created social and psychological conditions for the good people (the “us” group) to act badly towards the bad people (“them” group), culminating in crimes against civilians, the wounded, war prisoners and other categories protected by international humanitarian law, without the problems which conscience can pose in the process. On the other hand there is an explanation which says that the Yugoslav crisis is in the first place a result of the conflicts of different identities and/or of mass, and that politicians, i.e. national leaders within such circumstances simply try to protect their nations posturing as their fathers or taking care of their societal security and national state security. Within this type of explanation, politicians or at least some or most of them are not power-thirsty but are scrupulous individuals who honestly serve their nations. Doing that, they - among other actions - help their nations to retrieve their own history, where national treasures can be found that are not just important as historical values, but can also be utilised in the current situation. However, history, when cumulatively subjected to pragmatic and subjectivist criteria within a conflict, can become in some interpretations a rich and ‘reliable’ source of facts used for creating a desired vision of one’s own ancestors and, thus, of one’s own successors, who thus become creators of history along with other contemporaries who belong to the same
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 233 social group (nation, family, tribe, etc.). The more one moves back into the past in this manner (often implying access to less reliable or comprehensive data, which are impossible to be verified by utilising sources that are more reliable), the greater is the impression of one’s own perfection and, for that reason, supremacy over others. A great majority of ethnic and other social groups could find in their own distant or recent pasts monumental and positive feats that can be given a higher profile - frequently by propaganda - and which overshadow other (mis)deeds (see Garczynsky, 1973: 96-100; Isakovic, forthcoming). Nationalist campaigns, however, rarely cease stressing the qualities or virtues of a nation or other group, which one could represent as such. Nationalist ideology - in order to improve “our” image - frequently try to vilify rivals, enemies or “their” side as inferior or less perfect. On this point, chauvinism steps in implying passionate and zealous hatred and vilifying nations on the basis of previously constructed biases, stereotypes and prejudices. It is aimed at presenting other nations’ identities as badly as possible, bringing their handicaps to the fore and suppressing or forgetting their qualities and virtues, or, what is more effective, turning them into faults. Thus in extreme cases, the members of the rival nation are proclaimed satanic, inhuman beings in the process called demonisation. Once politics, history and ideology unite to achieve national or similar political goals, especially in giving an ideological interpretation aimed at winning in a power struggle, it can be relatively easy to enter George Orwell’s circle of control, described in his book 1984 as the ingsoc party slogan: “Who controls the past controls the future: who controls the present controls the past.” One could conclude that within the duels between “us” and. “them”, the aim is to make large-scale violations of narcissism that could also be a significant source of human aggression. Fromm considered that group narcissism has important roles in psychical and social along with political life. First, it furthers group cohesion and solidarity, and facilitates manipulation appealing to narcissistic prejudices. Secondly, it can be viewed as a very significant element that gives satisfaction to the group members (particularly to those of them whose other reasons to be proud and worthwhile are very few). Even the least respected and most miserly member of the group should receive some compensation for his situation feeling that he belongs to the world’s most wonderful group. The narcissism group feeling is proportional to a lack of genuine satisfaction in life: groups enjoying life more are not as fanatical as those suffering
234 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia deprivation in material and cultural life and leading a life filled by unquenched boredom. Nurturing this narcissism is very cheap in comparison with the expenses for raising the living standard: one only needs to pay the ideologists coining appropriate slogans, and numerous ministers, teachers, professors and journalists would be engaged in it for free. Their reward is a feeling of satisfaction and pride in serving such a worth cause, the promotion of their careers and personal prestige (see Fromm, 1973: 204). People whose narcissism is directed to the group rather than to themselves are as sensitive as those whose narcissism is directed to themselves. They react with anger to imaginary or real damages made to their group; they react even more intensely and consciously. Unless an individual is mentally sick, he or she can doubt at least to some degree their own narcissistic image; the group member has no such doubts, since he or she shares the narcissism of the majority. When groups challenge each other’s narcissism, it can generate strong hostilities in them. The group narcissistic image is raised very high, and the opposite group’s evaluation is very low. “One’s own group becomes a defender of human dignity, decency, morality, and right.” Basically inhuman and devilish qualities are ascribed to the other group. “The violation of one of the symbols of group narcissism - such as flag, or the person of the emperor, the president, or an ambassador - is reacted to with such intense fury and aggression by the people that they are willing to support their leaders in a policy of war” (Fromm, 1973: 204). In the First World War the British called the Germans “Huns” and the French “Boches”, and many Americans called Vietnamese soldiers “gooks” in the Vietnam war. Thus Fromm concluded that in war governments try to generate among their populations “the feeling that the enemy is not human”, using a different name for it instead of its proper name, and this also happens in intra-state conflicts (Hitler’s called his political enemies “Untermens” (subhumans) etc.). Bearing in mind the brotherhood and unity politics during most of the Second Yugoslavia’s existence, it could be concluded that another method - cutting all affective bonds with the enemy - was also utilised during the Yugoslav crisis. This becomes “a permanent state of mind in certain severe pathological cases, but it can also occur transitorily in one who is not sick”. It is not important when the object of aggression is a close relative, friend or a stranger: “what happens is that the aggressor cuts the other person off emotionally and ‘freezes’ him”. He is not perceived as human any more, but as “thing-over there” and one does not suppress even the most severe
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 235 forms of destructiveness. “There is good clinical evidence for the assumption that destructive aggression occurs, at least to a large degree, in conjunction with momentary or chronic emotional withdrawal” (Fromm, 1973: 122-3). Keen (1995) concluded that nationalism was partly nurtured during socialism by certain communists and parties that saw it as a chance to give their regime legitimacy. He says that the second source of nationalism (which surged during transition, after the East European “quiet” revolutions) is found in the first experience of creating a multiparty system, as the possibility of violating the old regime’s rules resulted in anxiety. Vaclav Havel, President of Czechoslovakia and an ex-dissident, said there was a phenomenon of so-called post-prison psychosis, according to which people could hate the old regime but at least knew its rules. Rules are unclear in the new regime and in the post-communist period, nationalism grows, because in a way it absorbs the shock of destruction, provides a home for the homeless, provides the feeling of security for the insecure, gives sense to what was previously senseless (Keen, 1995: 12). In Fromm’s meaning passions are irrational and rational “major motivations of man”: the strivings for love, tenderness, freedom, truth, and solidarity and “the drive to control, to submit, to destroy; narcissism, greed, envy, ambition” (1973: 266). He expressed his understanding of human passions in the following way: “Man’s passions are not banal psychological complexes that can be adequately explained as caused by childhood traumata. They can be understood only if one goes beyond the realm of reductionist psychology and recognizes them for what they are: man’s attempt to make sense out of life and to experience the optimum of intensity and strength he can (or believes he can) achieve under the given circumstances.” Passions are his religion, cult, ritual that he has to keep hidden (even from himself) as much as his group disapproves them. By skilful conditioning (by blackmail and bribery) he can be convinced to abandon his “religion”, but this psychic cure prevents him being a man and not a thing. One can understand “good” and “evil” human passions only as man’s attempts to make his life have sense. “Change is possible only if he is able to ‘convert himself to a new way of making sense of life by mobilizing his life-furthering passions and thus experiencing a superior sense of vitality and integration to the one he had before. Unless this happens he can be domesticated, but he cannot be cured” (Fromm, 1973: 9). However, “even though the life-furthering passions are conducive to a greater sense of
236 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia strength, joy, integration, and vitality then destructiveness and cruelty, the latter as much as an answer to the problem of human existence as the former. Even the most sadistic and destructive man is human, as human as the saint” (ibid.). Fromm went on: “he can be called a warped and sick man who has failed to achieve a better answer to the challenge of having been bom human, and this is true; he can also be called a man who took the wrong way in search of his salvation”. Fromm stressed that quoted considerations “by no means imply that destructiveness and cruelty are not vicious; they only imply that vice is human”. They are destructive of both the victim and the destroyer himself. They constitute a paradox: “they express life turning against itself in the striving to make sense of it. They are the only hue perversion”. But “understanding them does not mean condoning them. But unless we understand them, we have no way to recognize how they may be reduced, and what factors tend to increase them” (ibid.). Political passions in Fromm’s meaning have largely and obviously been present during the twentieth-century Southern Slavs’ history. They can be detected before the common state was established, during both its existences, and particularly during both its disintegrations (1941 and 1991— 2) followed by civil and international wars. Passionate attempts led the Serbian King to centralise the state of Yugoslavia. Its double disintegration was at least partly caused by the conflicts of centralising and decentralising ethnic and political forces based on the results of his attempts. At least theoretically, it was possible to find a sort of compromise within the various federal solutions’ field. Rulers of the Southern Slav country have not yet learned that destructiveness and cruelty are “destructive not only of the victim, but of the destroyer himself’ (ibid.). On the other hand, politicians of secessionist and other nations, by passionately ignoring possible compromises, smashed the state that was once considered desirable by members of their own nations, i.e. by their ancestors. The future could show whether they would be capable of adapting themselves “to a new way of making sense of life (by mobilising their life-furthering passions and thus experiencing a superior sense of vitality and integration” in comparison with the previous one). Using Fromm’s terminology, meanwhile they could not be cured but just domesticated. An analogous logic could be partly applied to politicians of powers who had supported the Second Yugoslavia’s existence and then executed the concluding acts of Yugoslavia’s disintegration (see Fromm, 1973: 9; Isakovic, 1997a).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 237 As relatively often happens in analysing historical turbulence, it is hard to make a final verdict on the specific political weights of the roles of politicians and masses in the Yugoslav crisis. What one can conclude is that many of the politicians as well as nations were affected by the kind of prison psychology that makes prisoners believe that they will have a joyful and magnificent life as soon as they leave prison. In a similar way, politicians believed and successfully tried to make others (many of whom as Fromm said - were among the miserable, poor, and least respected citizens of the Second Yugoslavia) believe that all or at least their main problems and grievances would quickly disappear as soon as their nation had its own state. Consequently, for the accomplishment of such a goal, “no human price is too high to pay”. However, among other problems and tragedies created during the wars in the region, the conflicts in most of the Yugoslav states created, or intensified existing, societal insecurity which in turn made the conflicting parties more rigid and unready for utilising the necessary compromises for conflict resolution or some other means of - at least partly - diminishing the conflict intensity. It was stressed that “any durable solution to the Balkan conflict web must take societal security into account”. On one side, “pure ‘state security’ solutions along EC lines can be temporarily imposed by force. They would leave some five million people in states where they feel their very identity threatened, and the very presence of that force would make that worse, while its withdrawal would mean the end of the solution”. On the other side, “pure ‘societal security’ solutions have no better prospects: using ethno-national boundaries to define states in former Yugoslavia would make Croatia and Serbia booth losers and winners and Macedonia a loser, while Albanians and Moslems would get states they did not have before. Yet unless considerable exchanges of population were made, neither Serbs, nor Moslems would get coherent states; territorial and demographic components of identity would clash in Kosovo and Krajina”. Wiberg concluded, “if any solutions can be found, they must be based on recognising that there are some incompatibilities between state security and societal security and trying to limit these incompatibilities by means of trade-offs rather than worsening them by letting one kind of security dominate entirely” (Wiberg, 1993: 108-9). In short, the outcomes were that Slovenia became an independent state but lost the Yugoslav market. Croatia became an independent state too, but has lost the possibility of all Croats living in the same state. Serbs from Croatia were expelled from large parts of the country, and those from the
238 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Republika Srpska do not live with the rest of Serbs in the same state (as they used to live in ex-Yugoslavia). Muslims or Bosniacs and other nations also became divided into two or more states. Macedonia escaped from the war in Croatia and avoided the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, but its identity and state security are severely threatened. The migrations of great segments of most successor states’ populations (some 4.95-5.75 millions of refugees all over the world, most of them from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo) to other successor states, Albania or to the rest of the world, generate societal insecurity and in some cases the same kind of insecurity in the of host populations and also state insecurity in recipient countries. It could be concluded that initially the First Yugoslavia was formally the unitary state of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes (perceived by Croats, Slovenes and other non-Serb nations as heavily dominated by the Serbs) and was later transformed into the state of Southern Slavs. After the Second World War it became a federation of the constituent Southern Slav nations and finished its life as a (confederation of the Southern Slav nations and to some degree Kosovo Albanians. At the end of its existence - because of the above-mentioned reasons - it was perceived by all of the nations as dominated by the “them”, i.e. some of those who do not belong to “our” nation. The complex web of most of the described Yugoslav conflicts concerns both state or quasi-state security as well as societal security, i.e. national identity elements, with varying emphasis. The external security problems of Yugoslavia stemmed from its strategic location; solutions included non-alignment and strong defensive forces. Internal security problems primarily concerned the idea o f the state, which was not questioned internationally (its identity included co-foundership of the NonAligned M ovement103 and “Y ugoslav socialism”), but mainly internally.
“Creating a Yugoslav identity overshadowing ethno-national identities had failed: only a small and decreasing percentage defined themselves as Yugoslav in censuses ... The alternative solution was to avoid competition between identities by successive decentralisation in constitutional compromises” (Wiberg, 1993: 105). Later, “the end of the Cold War redefined traditional security problems. The JNA had been part of the solution; some republics now saw it as the problem, calling for drastic cuts while creating national guards” (ibid.). These efforts “attacked one of the few remaining symbols of Yugoslav identity: Yugoslavist ideology harmonised with vested JNA interests and with government interests in counteracting secessionism. The republics defined their own security problems even before proclaiming independence” (ibid.).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 239 Since 1992, the FRY has been a multiethnic federation of Serbs and Montenegrins, while the status of Kosovo was changed into one of Serbia’s two provinces with reduced autonomy. Albanians in both Kosovo and western Macedonia have been attempting to establish their own states, which will remain within Serbia and Macedonia or separate, eventually uniting with each other and/or with Albania.104 The multiethnic states of the all Yugoslavias, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina (and both its Entities) and Macedonia provide an appropriate empirical proof for the statement that political boundaries of states are always sharp, and boundaries between nations are sharp only in special cases (Wiberg, 1996a: 28). Some authors consider that during the above-mentioned ethnic divisions and establishing of national states on the Second Yugoslavia’s territory in 1995, one nation was silently “cleansed”. The disappearance of Yugoslavs was unnoticed although they used to be more numerous than Macedonians and Montenegrins in the country (Ciric, 1997). The Yugoslav idea created in previous centuries was rationally based on more or less same grounds as the idea of European integration, but was spoiled by Yugoslav nation’s politicians during the twentieth century. For Yugoslavs living in the FRY, it could be considered as a replacement or substitute for the Second Yugoslavia. However, in this case as well as in many others, the replacement cannot be a complete substitute for the original. After the separation of Slovenia, Croatia, Macedonia and Bosnia and Herzegovina the northern conflict triangle was transformed in a conflict whose remaining members were Serbs and Croats from Croatia. Gaining recognition and independence in 1992, Slovenia is not a party to the conflict any more. The number of conflicts within the central conflict triangle was increased from two (Serbo-Croat and Serbo-Moslem or Bosnian) to three (Croat-Moslem or Bosnian is a new one). In the southern conflict triangle, the increase is much higher: in addition to the SerboAlbanian, there are three old and revived conflicts (Macedonian-Albanian, Macedonian-Greek and Macedonian-Bulgarian), and the SerboMacedonian conflict seems to have hibernated. The total number of active conflicts on the territory of the Second Yugoslavia was increased from four to seven. Within the field of state traditions studies, it is sometimes hard for understandable reasons to make distinctions between what is perceived in certain (especially early) historical periods and/or what is officially and/or theoretically recognised as a state, and it seems that the same situation exists today, at least to some degree. For the above-mentioned reasons, the
240 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia best example within the group of the Yugoslav successor states for this conclusion seems to be the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina and its Entities. As there is a collision between the rights to national self-determination and to territorial integrity of sovereign countries, it was assumed that a solution could be found in applying the principle “all rights to minorities, excluding the right to secession”. Thus states could, on the one hand, protect their territorial integrity and, on the other hand, the rights of minorities could be sufficiently and efficiently protected at the same time. However, for example, if Bosnia and Herzegovina should “continue its legal existence under international law as a state”, with its modified internal structure by the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords, in its internationally recognised borders, membership in UN and other international organisations (Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Article 1/1), it also seems important to determine which organisation(s) are perceived and recognised as state(s) by large portions of local populations. Otherwise, Bosnia and Herzegovina - at least partly but very importantly for some elements of problematical societal security - deserves the qualifications of “the fiction of a single state” or “nominal Bosnian state”. In other words, a common logic rule says that an organisation and idea of state, which is the state under international law provisions, should also be at the same time perceived and recognised as such by its citizens or at least by a majority of them. However, Croats mostly recognise Herceg-Bosna as their state; Serbs mostly recognise Republika Srpska as their distinct state; and Bosniacs mostly recognise the whole of Bosnia and Herzegovina, and it seems particularly the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It is easy to make a general conclusion that avoiding violations of the Yugoslav successor states’ territorial integrity would be one of the very important (pre)conditions for a barely established peace in the Balkans, but the conclusion is of minor practical significance in these circumstances. In this conflict situation involving to some degree all the main three nations of Bosnia and Herzegovina (and it seems particularly Bosniacs and Croats), the presenting of counter-arguments (related to the non-possession of some basic sovereign state prerogatives or features such as police, army, foreign politics organs, supreme legislative organs, courts etc.) could be perceived by the same people as identity threats. In addition, international and other official non-recognition of such an “our” state could be perceived as a threat to state security as well as identity. Most of the Yugoslav successor states try to achieve qualities that are supposed to maintain a homogeneous sense of community within the country. In some cases, state identity politics “are directed inward at least
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 241 as much as they are a defence against purely external pressures”. These countries desperately try to convince the world - as well as themselves that they exist. Campbell considers foreign policy as a process in which difference is ascribed to foreigners in order to keep up a domestic identity and he understands identity in terms of difference. Consequently, it is not important whether an identity politics is a matter of domestic or foreign policy as in this case they are inseparable. States support their own identities by regarding everything foreign as threats and dangers (1992: 767). Taylor (1994) considers that as in all Balkan states the conventional ideal of the sovereign nation state as container of political community is embraced, Macedonia should do the same thing. Balkan states fit precisely into traditional models of international relations. Within the nation state there is assumed to be a common identity, culture and purpose. Outside the state only those not sharing the common identity, culture, and purpose may exist by definition. This understanding leads theorists of international relations to assert that “nothing but anarchy and the threat of violence can exists beyond the level of individual states” (Craft, 1996). Secondly, as the qualification depends on recognition granted by other states and international organisations (from a state-security point of view) and members of society (from societal-security point of view), there is a dilemma on the qualification of some act of separation as secession or some other process. If these two points do not coincide, it could happen that the same act could be qualified in various ways by these two kinds of subjects, and that members of the same organisation could be called freedom fighters and terrorists at the same time, as was the case in Kosovo with the KLA. According to one author, the state has three main elements or component parts. The first element is the idea o f the state, the most central element, whose function was stressed by Buzan: “unless the idea of the state is firmly planted in the minds of the population, the state as a whole has no secure foundation. Equally, unless the idea of the state is firmly planted in the ‘minds’ of other states, the state has no secure environment” (see Buzan, 1991: 69-82). Most of the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia seems to fit into this description, and it seems that their weaknesses originate from internal as well as external sources. In addition, most of them seem to be weak powers not only in comparison with the Second Yugoslavia, but also with the neighbouring states which are not among the successor states. Among
242 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia the successor states, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Macedonia seem to be among the weakest in Buzan’s sense of that word105 as well as in terms of the political power at their disposition. The second element o f the state is its institutional dimension or construction composed of its institutions or a network of governmental executive, legislative and judicial bodies, organs, agencies, etc., and the laws, procedures and norms used for their functioning. The institutions are much more vulnerable to physical threats than ideas. “Institutions can be threatened by force or political action based on ideas which have different institutional applications” (Buzan, 1991: 86). It is this understanding that leads international relations theorists all over the world (and not just the Balkans) to assert that nothing but anarchy and the threat of violence can exist beyond the level of individual states. “When institutions are threatened by force, the danger is that they will be overpowered, and the remedy is defence. When they are threatened by opposing ideas, the danger is that their legitimacy will be eroded, as in Poland after 1980, and that they will collapse for luck of support, as East Germany died in 1989-90” {ibid.). Buzan concluded that, “armed force might sustain them ... but institutions without mass support are much more precariously positioned than those with it” {ibid. : 87). Buzan (1991) noted trends evident in modem states that the number of institutions is increasing and the scopes of their operating within the society is widening. It is considered that without adequate institutions there cannot be a state at all, and the state in the international relations is represented and legitimised by the institutionalised power-bearers. In fact, the institutions are observed as a kind of materialisation and operationalisation of the ephemeral state-idea, and - what is more important - some institutions are devoted to defence of the state-idea. Despite the undoubted complementarity of these components of a state, they might have a distinct existence, and a lack of social consensus concerning the state-idea is very often compensated for by a strengthening of the institutional component. Buzan (1991) concluded that - within this context - there are two approaches available: strengthening the repressive part of a state apparatus is the first and most often used, creating one of the main characteristics of weak-states in the above-mentioned sense of the term. In this case, a stateidea could be found that is neither clearly crystallised nor planted within the major part of society, and state institutions are primarily expressions of the narrow interest of a dominant political elite. Governments of most of the successor states have serious concerns about internal threats to their own authority acting at the same time as strong governments, in Buzan’s
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 243 sense of being dictatorial and repressive (see Buzan, 1991: 104). Domestic threats can in rare cases be completely separated from the influences of foreign powers, and thanks to that their internal security problems are linked with their international relations and positions. For these reasons, their future seems to be chronic insecurity, which was generally predicted for weak states (see Buzan, 1991: 106). Within such conditions, the overemphasised significance of institutions that perform state repressive function does not make the state stronger, but weaker. As the basic problem of a weak state is that it cannot be strengthened by repression, the circle is being closed: more repression brings more weakness and - this weakness “asks” for more repression. In such states, security-related discussions give priority to internal threats,106 and the lack of legitimacy of the regime is “solved” only by a temporary alleviation of social conflicts, while the roots of the problem remain almost or completely untended to (see Buzan, 1991: 82-90). The overemphasised significance of the institutions that perform state repressive function could be detected in the FRY (in Serbia thanks to the Albanians’ armed rebellion, and in Montenegro due to unsettled relationships with Serbia). However, similar situations had existed in this country before the rebellion as well as in Croatia during wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina and in cases of several students protests, trade union and opposition demonstrations in Zagreb, Belgrade and some other cities. The third element o f the state is its physical base, which consists of its population and territory. The potential territorial instability of most of the successor states - despite the fact that they sometimes desperately try to identify with closely defined territories which are perceived as associated with their histories (like the above-mentioned cradles of the Croatian and Serbian state) and whose contractions thus become unacceptable - proves their potential immaturity (for more details on the physical base of state see Buzan, 1991: 90-6). If one were to call the act of threatening another’s land ‘a grab’, one would often be faced with the very sensitive question of qualification. To resolve this problem, one should concretely determine whether or not the support of a weak government for its national minority in a neighbouring country can be observed as the real threat of invasion of that part of the territory. Another dilemma, which could be viewed as to some degree similar to the above-mentioned one, is to determine whether or not the simultaneous support of the possibly threatened country to its own national minority in a neighbouring country can be observed as the
244 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia real threat of a similar or same kind, etc. In addition, in a similar way the government’s non-recognition of language and name - and the claims of leaders directed towards parts of the geographical area with the same name as their country’s name, but outside of their state - can be interpreted and qualified. One could conclude that the territories of most of the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia have been implicitly or explicitly threatened with aspirations of other neighbouring states, which at the same time support secessionist or “secessionist” (the qualification depends on one’s perceptions) national movements within the neighbouring state or “state”. The main problem seems to be that all main nations of the Second Yugoslavia and some neighbouring nations would live in their own national states, but would not be ready to give the same right to other nations in existing or desired future states. At least once during history most of these states used to have a large territory (Greater Albania, Bulgaria, Croatia, Serbia etc.), and in the region there is no free land that could enable them to create states of similar sizes, i.e. what one of them gains must be taken from some of its neighbours. For these reasons, the above-mentioned states are in a situation to “define their security in terms of territory and population not under their control” (see Buzan, 1991: 96). In addition, some pieces of territory of the successor states seem to be more valuable than others. For example, this is the case with the territory around the city of Brcko in Bosnia and Herzegovina, communications along the rivers Morava and Vardar in Serbia and Macedonia, tourist resources in Istra in Croatia and Slovenia, in Serbia Sandzak and Kosovo (not only as a symbolic area, but also as a source of coal and some rare minerals etc.). Vankovska-Cvetkovska (1997b) concluded: viewed from the national security perspective, indivisible connection between the population and the territory points out two main matters: first, the threats (especially external) directed toward population always assume certain dangers toward the territory, and vice versa; second point, having in mind the premise that threats can easily originate from the inside, shows that there is possibility a part of the population to be mobilized in activities directed against territorial integrity o f the state they live in. ... Therefore, concerning the first kind of threats against the physical base of the state it is relatively easy to response. [If this is the case,] the identification of potential sources of threat is simply to be done, because it is usually a matter of classical military dangers coming from the other states. The second kind o f threat is, certainly, much more delicate to be identified in regard to its sources and the optimal mechanisms for their elimination (Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1997b: 470).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 245 The conclusion that “the idea of the state, its institutions, and even its territory can all be threatened as much by the manipulation of ideas as by the wielding of military power” (Buzan, 1991: 97) seems to be applicable to a large degree to the situation in most of the successor states and some of their neighbours. In this regard, manipulations of ideas such as that mentioned in regard to the Greater States in the region seem to be particularly threatening. On the other hand, although its territorial losses do not have to mean the end of the state,107 potential losses are mostly interpreted in that way and/or as the end of the nation to which the state belongs or should belong or as some other catastrophe. The process during which many new states emerged in Eastern and South-eastern Europe was burdened by historical considerations, frustrations and traumas from the very beginning. Therefore, the sovereignty of some of these states remained disputable after they achieved independence and international recognition. Because of many internal problems (primarily economic underdevelopment and fragmentation, social, ethnic and religious fragmentation and animosities, weak or broken state traditions and a lack of democratic ethos), these states can be qualified as weak ones in the above-mentioned sense elaborated by Buzan and some other authors (see for example Holsti, 1996: 104-8). As it was concluded, “the core problem lies in the fact that the bigger strength o f the ethnic identification has been intensified by the absence o f the other unifying forces within the society ” (my emphasis; for more details see Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1997b: 477). The impossibility of creating completely pure national states in the territory of Central and Eastern Europe, and it seems particularly in the Balkans, requires members of two or more ethnic groups to live in one state, namely to share these states in a certain way. Therefore, the most important task of the states in the Balkan region is to acquire such knowledge as is necessary for life in circumstances in which ethnic conflicts exist, and to face them without using violence. The elimination of ethnic conflicts in the Balkans will probably be a lasting process; the danger is the establishment of undemocratic rule with the aim of maintaining state sovereignty at any cost. The new states have undergone a process in which they perpetuated their weaknesses, as illustrated by internal and external tensions and threats. By their consequences - i.e. a general weakening of the respective societies and states (except, maybe, in some cases in the military sense) the wars in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and the FRY (particularly in Kosovo) can only be compared with the consequences of the Second World
246 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia War in this region. They showed how inadequate the military is when it comes to the solution of the three key groups of problems of the successors states: ethnic conflicts, perpetuation of state weaknesses (which is underlined by participation in conflicts) as well as the problems which emerge due to intensification of ethnic identification and societal security threats. Some authors suggest that the institutionalisation of politics, establishing of the rules of the political game and establishing the rule of law - instead of rule of parties and even individuals - should remain the basic mechanisms for solving, managing, mitigating, transforming or resolving the conflicts (see Wiberg, 1998: 177-8). It is only in such a case that the state itself also becomes a mechanism for limiting conflicts. The cases of Switzerland, Great Britain, Belgium, Canada and some other multi-ethnic states indicate that potentially it is realistic to presume that - at least in the elementary sense - it is possible to create guarantees for peaceful separation from the societies in which ethnic and political divisions had grown so high that they could lead to a questioning of the very idea of the state, its institutions and sovereignty, and thereby its very existence (see also Reitere, 1996; Laponce, 1996; Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1996; Isakovic, 1997c: 2-3). Buzan (1991) noted that because the idea and institutions of the weak states are subject of internal violent contests, the states “are not properly nationally in scope, and do not offer clear referents as objects of national security”. Inhabitants of very weak states do not have a widely accepted idea of the state. A governing power - strong enough for imposing unity in the conditions of political consensus’ absence - does not have the same idea. “The fact that they exist as states at all is largely a result of other states recognizing them as such and/or not disputing their existence.” From the outside they look like states as they possess flags, boundaries drawn on maps, seats in the UN, embassies, etc., inside they are anarchic, with different and more or less independent armed groups, which control their own territories and fight between themselves and with central government. “Such states exist in a condition of effective civil war which mirrors all the worst and none of the best features of anarchic structure at the international system level” (Buzan, 1991: 101). Basic (1996) has noted that in the multiethnic Second Yugoslavia, hounded by its past and myths, with the nationalistically-bigoted elites, the path towards a national state was paced with the domination of the ethnic majorities over the minorities. [Thus] national homogenisation and intolerance towards everything ethnically impure widened the gap between ethnic groups, and the
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 247 constitutional and legal protection were not sufficient to provide the implementation of their rights and freedoms. In order to secure their power newly-formed states made no allowances for the national feelings or religious beliefs o f all their citizens and thus contributed to the deterioration of interethnic relations, stirred up the strife and, as a rule, vindicated their nationalistic euphoria by the behavior of the others. [In this context, one] may wonder whether nationalism has been established as a value principle of these societies. If this is so, we cannot expect a swift resolving of any problem including the one o f the status of ethnic minorities. [...] this issue can be settled by the application o f universal rules rather than by mere copying of the uniform model because the conditions in which these societies develop have changed. ... Slovenia is in a more favourable position than other ex-members of the former federation. [...] all other countries to which Second Yugoslavia was both mother and step-mother, should swiftly resolve the question as to which values they have to attach importance and how to organise the society to enable all their citizens regardless of race, nationality, language and religion to live up to the maxim: Honeste vivere alterum non laedere, suum cuique tribuere108 (Ulpianus). The future of ethnic minorities in this parts is still uncertain (Basic, 1996: 73-4).
The very notion of society is problematic within the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia, with the repeated exemption of Slovenia (see Wiberg, 1995b: 104). In some successor states, it is quite complicated to detect even which ethnic group is perceived and recognised by whom as a minority or majority population. This is not just a result of the fact that the latest censuses in the states - with the exception of Macedonia - were held in 1991 and mentioned migrations of the populations of Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo etc., but also because of constellations of political relationships and the above-mentioned lack of political and social cohesion. For example, Albanians are members of the majority population in Kosovo, and minority in Serbia, and Serbs have the opposite position in both cases. However, as the Albanian Parliament decided to declare Kosova independent, many Albanian political parties do not perceive Kosovo Albanians as a minority (just as Kosovo is not perceived as part of Serbia, but as a self-governing political unit) and many Albanians do not regard themselves as being part of a society of Serbia. On the other hand, as the autonomy of Kosovo was unconstitutionally cancelled by Serbia’s Parliament after the declaration of independence, the main Serbian parties perceive Kosovo as a part of Serbia. Consequently, Albanians in Kosovo are not perceived as the majority population, but as Serbia’s minority. According to Macedonians’ perceptions, Albanians are a minority in
248 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Macedonia, and many Albanians perceive and regard themselves as one of the two state-carrying nations etc. Wiberg (1995b: 104) has concluded that a Bosnia and Herzegovina society does not exist and it is questionable whether one can ever be recreated, particularly for members of numerous portions of its population, who are refugees or displaced persons, and members of minorities in the Republika Srpska as well as Serbs in the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. The expelled Serbs from Croatia and Kosovo and Albanians from Kosovo - returning to Croatia and Kosovo hopefully - will all be probably perceived by themselves as members of majority populations in Serb Krajina and Serbia/Kosovo, and will not regard themselves as being part of a Croatia Kosovo/Serbia society. However, as Krajina and Kosovo do not exist as politically autonomous units any more, the same Serbs from Croatia and Albanians from Kosovo will be perceived as members of one of Croatia’s/Serbia’s minorities by the government of Croatia and many Croats/govemment of Serbia and many Serbs. A future possible government of Kosovo will perceive ethnic Serbs in a similar way. In these cases as well as in others, it seems that the threat could originate from a conviction that many people have which confirms Max Weber’s definition of nation. Thanks to that conviction, and for other reasons, the Croats from Croatia separated from the Second Yugoslavia, but since the moment of disintegration, and even before, they have been fearing the Serbs’ separation from Croatia. Secondly, the Muslims (with the Croats for a while) have started to fear the disintegration of their own country by the Serbs (and later the Croats) before and particularly after the separation of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Fourthly, the Macedonians since their own separation have begun to fear the Albanians’ separation. In addition, the Serbs, who are separated in Republika Srpska from the rest of the people in Bosnia and Herzegovina, also fear the disintegration of their country, and those in Serbia fear its disintegration as well as that of the FRY. Croats and Slovenes fear the separation of Istria etc. Albanians in Kosovo would probably fear the separation of ethnic Serbs, Goranci, Turks, Gypsies - and so on. These fears are in a sharp contradiction with the above-mentioned beliefs and expectations of a joyful and magnificent life that appeared before the secessions. Now, like the secessionist nations from the Second Yugoslavia, members of several minorities (or those who perceive themselves as such) in most of the Yugoslav successor states believe that everything will start to grow and flourish as soon as their ethnic group
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 249 unites with their mother state or establishes its own state, which used to be the characteristic for secessionist political movements and parties in the Second Yugoslavia. Existing states or “states” (for the above-mentioned reasons) are perceived by the “majority” or majority nations as incomplete as long as their states do not include all of the people who belong to the same nation, although the “majorities” or majorities seem to be less ambitious in attempting to reach that goal than those parts of the same nations that live outside the mother-states. Fearing identity as well as state security threats, aspirations etc., minorities (in the above-mentioned sense) attempt to represent and make their identities as different as possible from the identities of majorities (also in the above-mentioned sense) and eventually other populations in the successor states. At the same time, majorities in the same states try to represent and make their own and the minority’s identity as similar as possible. It seems that the problem occurs when a minority in a state belongs to the same nation as the majority in another successor state. In that case conflict may develop between these two groups that share a common nation but are in different states because the part of the common nation which is living outside the mother state tries to represent their own national identity as different, while that part living within the mother state tries to represent their identity as similar to the identity of the same national group that is living within another state. When necessary, identity differences are more or less carefully downplayed, minimised or represented as unimportant, insignificant, and the similarities are given the opposite treatment. As a rule, the existence of subidentities within “our” national identities is ignored and within “their” identities is emphasised (especially if the subidentities are somewhat similar to “our” identity). To conclude, within the given conditions and bearing in mind the existing political orientations, on the one hand, a majority in a successor state has two choices in their treatment of a minority: coopting or trying to discriminate against it. On the other hand, the minority could try to assimilate (or undergo conversion) or distinguish itself from the host nation and, finally, separate itself from them. In 1991, at the very beginning of the Yugoslav crisis, Buzan (1991) concluded that the complex threats to population can arise from human migrations. This threat works primarily on die societal level, especially when the incoming population is o f different cultural or ethnic stock from those already resident. It
250 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia can also work in the economic and environmental sectors if newcomers overburden a fragile environment or compete for scarce resources as in marginal desert lands. [But] immigration can be seen as a threat as well as a boon. In the long run, it has a potential to reshape what ‘nation’ stands for, and thus to redefine the idea of the state. ... Proportionally small immigration can raise local fears about cultural and ethnic purity. [...] racism, as immigrants everywhere have discovered, is widespread and politically potent sentiment. Ethnic and cultural parochialism is everywhere a stronger political force than cosmopolitanism (Buzan, 1991: 93—4).
If one tried to apply this conclusion to the various situations within the Yugoslav successor states, one could conclude that their environments seem to be characterised by a fragility, which is either a result or part of the above-mentioned weakness. Secondly, most of the same states seem to be burdened and some of them overburdened by refugees, displaced persons etc. at least for the relatively small resources they have at their disposal (although the resources in that area are not as scarce as in marginal desert lands). Thirdly, the immigration already rouses local fears about some kind of purity, which seems to be of different intensities in different states etc. Parts of the population of Croatia and the FRY fear being involved in a new violent conflict between the two states on their territories and/or in Bosnia and Herzegovina thanks to the problems related to refugees and/or displaced persons. In return, the refugees and displaced persons are threatened by what they perceive as the possibility of being forgotten as well as misused in the power struggle process. Meanwhile, an unknown number of displaced persons and refugees are moving within, to and from Kosovo. The general conclusion that “it [nevertheless] seems a safe bet that societal insecurities related to migration will occupy a prominent role on the national security agenda for the foreseeable future” (Buzan, 1991: 93-4) seems to be particularly applicable in the observed region. 7.3 Religious affiliation When they came to the Balkans, the religion of the early Southern Slavs was of an animistic kind, and the process of their Christianisation was started in the seventh century and lasted until the tenth century and in some cases even later. The beginning of the process was among southern tribes and it was finished on the Northwest of their territories - in present-day Slovenia. Cleavages between southern Slavs started to grow especially after the creation of the north-south Theodosian Line, which had marked the two
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 251 segments of the Roman Empire since the fourth century AD. As division of the Christian Church was based on the same principle, the Slavs were divided into Catholic (ancestors of Slovenes, Croats and part of Albanians) and Orthodox (ancestors of Serbs, Montenegrins, Macedonians and a part of the Albanians) branches of Christianity, with the exception of Bogomilism, which appeared in Macedonia in the tenth century and was extended to Bosnia and Herzegovina during the following couple of centuries. Islam, which was brought by the Turks to the region, can be mostly found within the present-day populations of Bosnia and Herzegovina,109 FRY and Macedonia. Just as Serbian Orthodoxy used to be an identity threat for Croats and Slovenes within Yugoslavia (especially the First Yugoslavia), Croatian Catholicism became the same kind of threat for Croatia’s and Bosnian nonCatholics after Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina obtained their independence and even before. The same kinds of threats could be detected to some degree in regions dominated by certain religions in a few of the other Yugoslav successors states. The problem is that there is a lack of tolerance and protection for some religious minority rights: those who are in a dominant or ruling position do not care for the religious identification of those who do not support and follow them, even in cases when it is a matter of family traditions, national identification, beliefs etc. In the region covered by the territories of the Second Yugoslavia’ s successor states one can find a mixture of three dominant religious affiliations. People with an Orthodox affiliation are mostly divided between the Serbian and Macedonian Orthodox Church, though the latter church is not recognised by the former. Another Orthodox Church could be bom or was already bom in Montenegro which also had a high probability of not being recognised by the Serbian Orthodox Church. Wiberg (1995b) concluded, “religion is mostly given an elevated role in defining national identity, with two main exceptions. The Albanians, like Palestinians, are divided, rather than united, by religion, and the leadership therefore try to keep it out of national identity.” The leadership of the Bosnian Muslims is “split between those who want to emphasize Islam as a part of national identity, there being little else to define a difference from Serbs and Croats, and those who want to de-emphasize it, so as to make possible a common Bosnian identity anchored in territory, history, etc”. (Wiberg, 1995b: 104). One could conclude, however, that it seems that the religious differences - as well as state traditions, religious, cultural, linguistic, economic and other differences —contributed to, but did not create, strong rivalry that
252 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia emerged in the First and Second Yugoslavias and the FRY between the aspirations of the main nations, which escalated during the Second World War, from 1991 to 1995, and in 1997 in Kosovo. 7.4 Language and culture Present-day knowledge of the population of South-eastern Europe during the first and earlier millennia BC is based on archaeological evidence, but does not provide data on languages that were spoken in that time. In addition, changes in evidence do not often reveal whether they are the result of invasion or of cultural influences. Some inscriptions were made in Ancient, Early or Proto-Greek language. There are different theories and ideas, but - with a few exceptions - little is known on other languages spoken there until 2000-2500 years ago. Since the Southern Slav tribes arrived in the Balkans, they have been faced with relatively intensive cultural (often mixed with religious and political) influences from neighbouring, indigenous and other tribes, empires and peoples. At the same time, the Southern Slavs were influencing indigenous populations and to a certain extent other populations in the region. Among other cultural achievements, the Western Slavs received the modified version of Latin alphabet, and Eastern branches - the specific versions of Cyrillic alphabet. In certain periods of their histories, the Southern Slavs were subjected to quite strong influences, which can be described as threats to their cultural identity: while the Western Slavs were faced with threats of Germanisation, Hungarisation, etc., the Eastern Slavs were subjected to Byzantinisation, Bulgarisation, Hellenisation, Turkanisation etc. In many cases, the language spoken by people can be classed as belonging to their “small identity” while the language they were ordered to speak by the state (how government would like people to speak) - can be classed as part of their official identity. One can conclude that a few major political changes radically affected this situation of the Slavs: first, the arrival and withdrawal of the Turks, and secondly, the establishment and disintegration of the Austro-Hungarian empire after the First World War. Turks brought their Oriental culture, politics, religion and economy, whose influence can be qualified at least in two different ways. In any case, their influence at least partly prevented the cultures of Eastern South Slav branches from being integrated into the cultural and other achievements of Western Europe and into the rest of the Slav population in Europe. The multiethnic Austro-Hungarian empire
Conclusions and outlookfor the future 253 stimulated the Western Slav branches from being integrated into Western Europe culture, but at the same time in some cases prevented them from creating their own Slav cultural offering and from time to time it imposed its own Austrian, Hungarian, German or other patterns. It seems that the establishment of the First and Second Yugoslavia provided the necessary conditions for an independent development of the South Slavs’ cultures, but it failed because of the above-mentioned conflicts and for other reasons. Distinct cultural identity as an element of the national identity of the Croats and later almost all other nations was perceived as threatened by nations which considered themselves as having distinct cultural identities within both Yugoslavias. All three Yugoslavias seem to lack not only people of Yugoslav national identity, but also a Yugoslav language and culture. A common characteristic of all Yugoslav rulers and leaders was that they were interested in keeping their power and positions, while they did not care too much about the culture. It seems that the disintegration of the First and Second Yugoslavia clearly showed that the existence of a relatively strong Yugoslav army was not enough to prevent the disintegration of the country. The LCY also did not help in that effort as the final disintegration actually started within its structure. In 1995, Wiberg concluded that in most of the successor states cultural specificities were more emphasised than ever, by state policies and social movements. For most successor states, the central problem was the way in which a nation can be made out of the state, which is cut out for itself by the majority ethnonational group. History was rewritten to emphasise old martyrs and heroes. The number of officially different languages multiplied even more since all governments wanted their own: from the creation of a Bosnian language in 1993, to the demands by Montenegrin intellectuals for their own language. As, however, these changes within the majority cultures were accompanied by similar changes in the minority cultures, most of these states have similar problems to Yugoslavia with even worse forms, despite official proclamations made to please the West. Thus, “their political systems then get working at them, with discrimination and forced assimilation as the mildest instruments, hard repression, mass expulsion and mass murder being further steps on an ascending scale” (Wiberg, 1995b: 104-5). An increase in the number of states within the observed area of former Yugoslavia was preceded or followed by an increase in the number of official languages as well as dominant religions, which can also be observed as an element of cultural identity. Now at least six out of seven
254 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia main nations have official languages as well as cultures that are perceived by members of the same nations as distinct and different from all other South Slavic and other languages. However, the Bosnian language is unrecognised in the first place by many Serbs and Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina. While the leadership of Croatia tries to impose Croatian as the language with a similar status, the language is not regarded mainly by (at least rural) Serbs from Croatia, Bosniacs or Muslims in Croatia as their language. As has been mentioned earlier, the Macedonian language is not recognised particularly by Bulgaria, some Serbs and Greece (as far as the name is concerned), and the hypothetical Montenegrin language, which can be observed as a possible candidate for separation from the Serbian language as well as for recognition, will probably not be recognised by Serbs within and outside Montenegro. As a language is a dialect with an army (Ernest Gellniar) and is believed to be (in)distinct by those who are learned and convinced in their (in)distinctiveness, in these cases the utilisation of arguments customarily used in discussions among qualified linguists seems to be useless, and within the above-mentioned conflict circumstances the utilisation can be easily observed as a kind of threat to identity, despite the fact that “cultural identity is not necessarily threatened simply because it is interpreted as being threatened” (Wsever and Kelstrup, 1993: 70). In the Second Yugoslavia what was (not) allowed to be published was known, and the freedom of the media was limited as long as Tito was living. After Tito’s death, the growing disappointment with the 1974 constitutional provisions became increasingly visible by the mid-1980s among Serbian intellectuals and media, provoking implicit and explicit responses in Croatia and Slovenia, in the first place because of the inability of the federal leadership to find a longer-term political solution to the Kosovo problem in 1981 as well as discontent with the overall economic and political situation in the country. Since their establishment in 1991-92, in most of the successor states there has been a kind of simulation of freedom of the media. Ruling parties have factual control over most media and especially over the most influential media (television and press, which in large parts used to be heavily engaged in propaganda wars, particularly during the wars in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina) which is maintained by various means. Culture in the second Yugoslavia largely remained at the level of republics and autonomous provinces of the Second Yugoslavia as long as Tito was living. It even had a tendency to move down towards the regional level. Before and particularly after Tito’s death, the leaderships of the
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 255 Yugoslav republics wanted to increase the power of the state, but not primarily as a stronger shell for their cultures (which were perceived by them just as tools in the political power struggle), but for themselves or their powers. It seems that the cultures of the main Yugoslav nations were not able to defend themselves with their own culture (according to Waever and Kelstrup, cultures defend themselves with culture110) because they had already become political tools within the conflict circumstances. This seems to be the main or at least one of the main reasons why “Yugoslav peoples have indeed been betrayed by their intelligentsias”. Buzan considers that strengthening societal identity is one obvious line of defensive response for societies that are threatened by using cultural means to reinforce societal cohesion and distinctiveness, and to ensure that society reproduces itself correctly (Buzan, 1993a: 191). However, for the above-mentioned reasons the national identities of the main nations within the Second Yugoslavia were not “sound and relaxed”, they did not play the role of the best guarantee against nationalism and defence against reactions of fear (see Waiver and Kelstrup, 1993: 70). As cultures that exist within successor states (with the weak exception of Slovenia) seem to have the same role of the political tool and as they do not seem to be “sound and relaxed” either, the tradition seems to be continued, but in partly different circumstances and much narrower frameworks. As long as political elites are holding cultures quite firmly in their hands, the lesson learned during national crises about the European Union - leave culture to the nations (see Wsever and Kelstrup, 1993: 80) - hardly seems to apply in most of the successor states. 7.5 Concluding considerations Most successor states in the region confirm the rule that what constitutes national identity in many cases is not what happened, but what people believe happened (i.e. whether they have their own distinct state traditions, religion, language and culture or not, and the historical moments which gave birth to them etc.). What one believes is often what one learns or is persuaded to believe or what one ‘sees’ through other people’s eyes. It seems that the Yugoslav crisis also confirmed the stand that “the decisive questions in regard to identity arise when and if there are conflicts between different identities” and that “it is in times of crisis that people show their identitive priorities” (Waiver and Kelstrup, 1993: 80). The
256 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia magnitude of Yugoslav successor states’ integration problems could be compared in Europe outside Russia only with those in the Baltic states (see Wiberg, 1995b: 104). Wiberg also comments that the simplest hypothesis on the relationship between heterogeneity and the balance o f different cleavages is the following: “The more ethnonationally heterogeneous a state is, the higher is the likelihood that ethnonational cleavages, possibly also identified as regional cleavages, will predominate over class and class-related ideological cleavages”.
This hypothesis is also based on data on national structures of postcommunist CSCE member-states and their successors. These data show that many more of these multinational states disintegrated or faced local political tensions and wars than the states made up of one nation. Wiberg concluded that the greatest risks of the prevalence of ethnonational mobilisation and divisions over others could be expected in the Second Yugoslavia and in Bosnia and Herzegovina; that similar phenomena could also be expected in Macedonia, the FRY and in Croatia; and that Slovenia was the only ex-Yugoslav successor facing a relatively low risk of such mobilisation. However, intensive ethnonational or other kinds of mobilisation do not automatically imply war, but additional conditions have to be fulfilled as was the case in ex-Yugoslavia (see Wiberg, 1995b: 96-8). Wiberg concludes that in cases where cultural distinctiveness depends on, for example, the use of language, religion, education and so forth, nonmilitary means might be used for defence of identity. On the other hand, military means can be used to defend ethnic (societal) identity particularly in the case where identity is tied to territory and to maintain the continued existence of the group’s members, so as to pass on their identity. Indeed, war can be a means for protecting a state (including not just its territory, but also population, state institutions and the idea of the state) and these goals can be achieved if the state wins the war,111 and as long as the state is able afterwards to protect or keep national identity or what is left of it. However, as the cases in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and the FRY (Kosovo) show, during war identity can be badly damaged and thus at least partly sacrificed. The example of Krajina Serbs from Croatia shows what could happen if a party is defeated in war and the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina and its Entities presented above shows what could happen in a situation where there is no war winner. One could even state that in most of the Second Yugoslavia’s successors, identity threats could be found more among the wars’ results than among the wars’ causes.
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 257 It seems noteworthy that threats to a society’s identity - as well as other threats - can be actual or existing threats as well as predicted or future threats. One of the central preoccupations of politicians, generals and other public servants and members of an elite are the calculations of both kinds of threats to state security and the wider political dimension of security, economic security as a dimension of security in its own right and as the foundation of military and other power, societal security, environmental or ecological and “developmental” dimensions of security (for more details on these kinds and dimensions of security, see Moller, 1993). As people are capable of being persuaded and brainwashed by their leaders to see dangers which in reality don’t exist, a government can make the population believe that it is being threatened, and in that way the normal biological, individual as well as social, reactions against the threat are mobilised.112 As far as this issue is related to war, Fromm put it as follows: “Most modem wars ... have been prepared by systematic propaganda of this type; the population was persuaded by its leaders that it was in danger of being attacked and destroyed, and thus reactions of hate against the threatening nations have been provoked. Often no threat existed.” Particularly since the French Revolution, when large citizens’ armies appeared instead of relatively small ones consisting of professional soldiers, it has not been easy for nations’ leaders to order their people to kill and be killed because of the needs of industry for cheaper raw materials and labour, or new markets. If war was justified by such aims, only a small minority would be ready to participate in it. “In addition, these predictions of threat from the outside are often selffulfilling: the aggressor state, by preparing for war, forces the state that is about to be attacked to prepare also, thereby providing the ‘proof of the alleged threat” (Fromm, 1973: 196). Fright tends to mobilise either aggression or flight in the event of the appearance of threats to one’s vital interests113 and in other situations. The flight tendency “is often the case when a person still has a way out that saves a modicum of ‘face,’ but if he is driven into a comer and no possibility of evasion is left, the aggressive reaction is more likely to occur”. One must not overlook that “the flight reaction depends on the interaction of two factors: the first is the magnitude of the realistic threat, the second is the degree of physical and psychical strength and selfconfidence of the threatened person. On the one end of the continuum will be events which will frighten virtually everybody; on the other, there will be such a sense of helplessness and impotence that almost everything will frighten the anxious person”. Therefore, fright is conditioned by real threats
258 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia as much as by an inner environment, which “generates it even with little outside stimulation”. Like pain, fright is a very uncomfortable feeling; men do almost anything to get rid of it in many ways such as by the use of drugs, sleep, sexual arousal, and others’ company. Becoming aggressive is among the most effective ways for getting rid of anxiety. “When a person can get out of the passive state of fright and begin to attack, the painful nature of fright disappears” (1973: 198). If an individual or a group feels threatened, the mechanism of defensive aggression is mobilised even through the threat is not immediate; hence man’s capacity to foresee threats enhances the frequency of his aggressive reactions (1973: 196). With threats related to the forbidding or requiring use of language, names, dress, education, worship etc., i.e. identity threats, people are partly dealing with politicians again. “Security” in general is “the move that takes politics beyond the established rules of the game and frames the issue either as a special kind of politics or as above politics” (Buzan, Waever and de Wilde, 1998: 23). In addition, the societal security area is at least partly reserved for a wide range of professions, such as teachers, professors, scholars, priests etc. This may be another reason for the statement mentioned above that Yugoslav peoples were betrayed not only by politicians but also by their intelligentsias. In the Second Yugoslavia as well as in most of its successor states one can find both external sources of societal insecurity as well as those within the state. The first source strengthens sociopolitical cohesion of the states making society defend the government, and the government look to society for support against a common threat. The second source weakens cohesion as well as the weak state, whose governments are in many cases the sources of domestic threats to the society. As Buzan (1993b) concluded at the beginning of the crisis in the Second Yugoslavia: “Weak states are by definition plagued by their inability to establish a stable political legitimacy. Either government is at odds with all or part of society (the Soviet Union, Yugoslavia, Pakistan, Israel, South Africa), or less commonly, it is trying to hold the ring between parts of society that are seriously at odds with each other (Canada, India).” These states are vulnerable, among other things, to outside penetration or intervention, and to secessionism and violence within them. “Their weakness as states (i.e. their political weakness, not necessarily their weakness as powers) may drive them towards aggressive foreign policies, in an attempt to offset domestic instability by raising the level of perceived threat from outside” (Buzan, 1993b: 51).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 259 One can add that in the Yugoslav case the aggressive foreign policy was replaced by Yugoslav national elites’ mutually aggressive policies, which were aimed at offsetting instability within their nations by raising the level of perceived threat from other nations. It seems that the level of perceived threats from outside has been underestimated mostly within the Serbia’s, Bosnian Serbs’ and Montenegro’s elites (although this orientation changed in the last case), and expected foreign support was overestimated by the other national elites (except perhaps the Slovene elite). In a way that can be qualified as analogous one, weakness of most of the successor states (as well as of some of their neighbouring states) makes their governments - trying to decrease domestic instability by increasing the level of perceived external threat - to conduct foreign policies that can be in some cases or even often qualified as aggressive. The foreign policies are perceived as threats by governments of other observed weak states, provoking responses of the same kind. Consequently, this group of states, or rather their governments, start to feed each other with mutual threatening. At the same time, the same governments are sources of domestic threats to society, but attempt to mask or disguise their role in this, partly by using the nationalist pattern of behaviour (by representing themselves as part of the “we” group), and partly by invoking the need for defence against external threats. The international community, which from time to time interferes by supporting some of the successor states or their nations and neighbouring states, makes the whole situation worse than it is.114 Finally, considering the possible impacts that existing conflicts as well as societal, state and other threats and problems can have on international security, the following conclusions by Buzan seem to be noteworthy: “Although weak states may serve some short-term economic, political and military interests of the great powers, those gains have to be weighed against the risk that conflict within and between weak states poses to international security. For weak states themselves, the idea of national security borders on nonsense unless they can make the transformation to strong states structures.” Buzan also stressed that “weak states simply define the conditions of insecurity for most of their citizens ... [Alas,] the building of strong states is only a necessary, and not a sufficient, condition for improved international security” (Buzan, 1991: 106). One could conclude, first, that that there have indeed been great methodological difficulties in detecting who sees whom in the successor states and around them as a societal security threat. In different cases, emphasis is given to actors’ language (mainly by propaganda) or to their behaviour and
260 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia interpretation of it. In either case, it is normally more difficult to establish who speaks for a nation than who speaks for a state (where they do not largely coincide). As for the questions stated in the Introduction, one answer is that the relative weights of the components of national identity in the area studied vary in time as well as space. The issue of state (“national”) security may, or may not, be closely connected with issues of societal security: this is partly a matter of theoretical conceptualisation, and partly of empirical investigation. The experience from other parts of Europe seems to indicate that the more legitimate political mechanisms there are for acting out conflicts on societal security, the less likely it is that they turn violent, thus also endangering state security. This experience should be respected by the successor states and their nations should they try to avoid the destiny of the First and Second Yugoslavia. Finally, according to some estimates, the main war destruction in Bosnia and Herzegovina accounts for some $100 billions US dollars (the government estimated a reconstruction need for Bosnia and Herzegovina of $30 billions), economic sanctions for $50 billions on the Second Yugoslavia’s territory, with Serbia, Macedonia, Montenegro and parts of Bosnia and Herzegovina as the main victims, plus tens of billions of dollars in neighbouring states; the total war costs of the local parties have also been measured in tens of billions. If one sums up the outsider costs already borne or firmly predictable, one arrives at the magnitude of 50 billions dollars. Out of these, the West European contribution has been 30-40 billions, those of the USA some 3-4 billion. This does not include how the World Bank estimate of what will be paid by Europe, the USA, others or - most likely - by nobody. The total costs of the Kosovo war could come close to a half of the above-mentioned costs of war in Bosnia and Herzegovina. If one adds a rough estimate of costs of the wars in Slovenia and Croatia, the total could be even more than ten times higher than the Yugoslav foreign debt (with interest), which appeared after Tito’s death. 7.6 Prospects 7.6.1 Slovenia If the above-mentioned conclusions hold, one could assume, with the risks usually associated with predictions, the mythic Carantania will probably continue to serve as a symbol of nationhood for the Slovenes, who will be,
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 261 however, turned more towards solving political and other problems and questions. In the first place, Slovenia could be expected to put more emphasis on solving border and other disputes with its neighbours; to develop its economy following the examples of moderately developed countries within the EU and outside it; to develop the principle of civil state, civic society etc. Possible Slovenia’s entering to NATO and/or EU will face Slovenes and their government with problems of adaptation and compliance to the law and political rules applied within them. If the EU creates a national European identity, the Slovene national identity could be faced with more or less serious problems. It seems that the main dilemma is how a relatively small nation can protect its national and political identity when becoming part of a larger state or of what is possibly becoming a state. Thus, the German influence could be compared not only with Yugoslavisation or Serbianisation, but also with Europeanization. Slovenia will try to keep its territorial identity, the coincidence of its territory and people, the distinct language and culture, and the Catholic religion. The more Slovenia achieves the desired economic development the more it will be expected to become a giver instead of receiver of financial and other support, which could put the country in a situation which could be compared at least to some degree with what it experienced in the Second Yugoslavia. Another challenge for Slovenia along with the EU could occur in the case of an economic crisis in Europe and other developed parts of the world. Membership in NATO could also bring financial and state security risks. Another armed conflict in its southern or other neighbourhood could bring additional waves of refugees and generate various economic and security threats including societal ones. In that case, the desired and claimed identity could conflict again with Slovenia’s undesirable identity although both of them have no fixed meanings. Secondly, although Slovenia can hardly be considered as a national heterogeneous country, it could be expected to establish a degree of local autonomy in its choice of official languages; creating its own “transethnic” identity, minorities could be probably assimilated into the majority group by using the politics of the stick and the carrot. 7.6.2 Croatia State and many actors have been seeing national heterogeneity of Croatia as a problem, which was attempted to be solved by getting rid of as much as possible of the Serb minority populations by various manes in various
262 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia times (conversion to Catholicism, terror, state-organised deportation, or other forms of mass expulsion in more legal forms), “neutralising” them politically, etc. The Croats’ bad memories will remain for some time, but, sooner or later, the problem originated in the Croatian identity’s close links to state identity (sanctity of state) will be probably overcome as Croats got their own state in the 1991 war. Although in 1991 YPA and ethnic Serbs used more or less the same methods against Croats like Croats used against Serbs in 1995 - the Serbs’ bad memories will remain nourished by the fact that many of them cannot for various reasons return and live in the locations and social groups of their origin. The fact that Serbs from Croatia became a kind of stateless people could give birth to the future spiral of mutual threats and violent conflicts. On the other side, the more Croatian national identity will be liberated of immediate threats the more it will probably be relaxed and become even more divided into the major territorial sub-identities and vice versa. Croats in Croatia will incline towards unification with Croats in Bosnia and particularly Herzegovina, similar to the inclinations of Serbs in Serbia for unification first with Serbs in Croatia and then with those in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and to Albanians in Albania to live in the same state with their brethren in neighbouring countries. The possibility of entering the EU and/or NATO will bring Croatia basically very similar dilemmas and problems as in the case of Slovenia. In addition, Croatia could be faced with NATO’s opposition to plans for Croatia’s unification with Herceg-Bosnia. 7.6.3 Bosnia and Herzegovina The national identity of ethnic Serbs and Croats in Bosnia and Herzegovina is largely similar to those in Croatia, perhaps with a greater emphasis on religion. On the other hand, Serbs and Croats share a territory with a state tradition (variously interpreted) with the Muslims or Bosniacs, who would be the main obstacle to the realisation of the Croats’ and Serbs’ desires. Resolving the Muslims’ or Bosniacs’ identity problems has two interrelated aspects. The first aspect is contained within the question of how to provide the missing 8-9 per cent of the population of Bosnia and Herzegovina with the means to become an absolute majority in the country not waiting for the expected respective demographic increase of the members of their own nation.
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 263 Secondly, there is an open question of how to provide an identity that will make that population a distinct people or nation. It remains unclear exactly who, beyond the Muslims, the Sarajevo government claims to belong to that category. The identity of present-day Bosniacs could potentially be based on the Bosnian language. However, as this language is the particular heritage of Bosniacs, this solution could be contradicted and rejected by those who consider themselves speaking Serbian, Croatian, Serbo-Croatian, Croatian-Serbian or any other language considered as at least formally distinct. The second possible source of identity could be territory as a quasi state solution. It has existed for a long time, but today this solution could be contradicted and rejected by those who consider themselves living on the territory of the Republika Srpska, Herceg Bosnia and/or Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, some of its cantons etc. The third solution could be the very long history of Bosnia and Herzegovina, regardless of whether it was an independent or semiindependent state or a state without independence. However, the same history contains many conflicts between Serbs, Croats, Muslims etc. Finally, the fourth possible solution for the same problem could be to emphasise religion as facet of national identity as there is little else to define the difference between the Serbs and Croats. In this regard, there is a choice between Islam, Bogomil or the Bosnian Church’s religion. However, as religion might bring conflicts among the nations of Bosnia and Herzegovina regarding whose state it is, this solution could be contradicted and rejected by those who consider themselves belonging to Catholic, Orthodox, Islam or other distinct religions along with atheists. Today, however, the problem of religion could be solved by secularisation (transforming religion from a matter of identity to a matter of culture) and stressing citizenship at the same time. In that case, everybody who is not Serb or Croat, including Yugoslavs and some others, could partake in this identification. One could conclude that the Moslem/Bosnian leadership faces, and is split by, a fateful dilemma, eventually calling for a separate state or deemphasising it in favour of what might define a common Bosnian identity: common territory, history etc. The present territorial integrity of Bosnia and Herzegovina declared in the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords can also be a component of societal security in the second case, but is threatened by the local Serb and Croat leaderships as well as by Muslims preferring the first option.
264 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia To the extent that a common Bosnian identity exists, it is also exposed to threats by nationalist political forces in Croatia and Serbia. If Bosnia and Herzegovina became somehow dominated by Serbs and Croats, a struggle for its division would begin between them which would not just threaten these two ethnic groups, but principally the Muslims or Bosniacs. 7.6.4 FR Yugoslavia (including Serbia (with Kosovo) and Montenegro) The threats and statements by the EU were considered imprudent as they focused on the actors, instead of the problems. When certain American politicians talked about sanctions, sending troops to the region and supported “independent Kosova”, there was even more reason for concern as “they spoke the language of power and violence, not of understanding and dialogue”. It was predicted that it was “likely to harm the KosovoAlbanians” (“Kosovo - What Can Be Done Now?”, 1997). In fact, the West has had a double voice: it has not supported the status quo option as well as independent Kosovo, repression as well as terrorism, but it has prevented the FRY from asserting its sovereign rights in Kosovo. As a precondition for lifting the outer wall of the sanctions, the international community was expecting the FRY to grant a high degree of autonomy to the Albanians, respecting their human rights. It is obvious that support for the territorial integrity of the FRY was probably motivated more by peacekeeping, which was aimed at Macedonia, than by supporting the Belgrade’s government stands in the Kosovo conflict (for more details see Isakovic, 1997c). If not, to a degree to which escalated conflicts would become devastating and long-lasting ones, the abilities of the sides’ identities could be prevented from reproducing themselves, and in that way escalation could be observed as threatening state security as well as national identity. The wars in the Second Yugoslavia as well as the sanctions and the war in the FRY generated relatively numerous situations in which one could detect threats whose nature was at least partly related to identity, and this will also be an eventual feature of future similar developments. It seems that the conflict in Kosovo has not been solved by the NATO bombardment and the arrival of KFOR as both sides do not seem to be satisfied with it. Since the Albanians have returned, most of the refugees have been Serbs and their allies Gypsies. Now, the Albanian side, considering itself as victorious, is not ready to share power to a greater degree with the remaining Serbs and their allies as well as with KFOR, particularly as long as it does not share the KLA’s idea of a future
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 265 independent Kosovo or attempt to keep its multiethnicity. The NATO intervention, which was intended to support the Albanian side, made the relationships between KFOR and KLA as one of the main present and future issues, while Serbia’s and FRY’s power will probably be marginalised. The Serbo-Albanian conflict will last as Albanians will try as much as possible to keep full control over “their” Kosovo, and Serbs could try to regain control over “their” Kosovo; the blood demands more blood, i.e. revenge. A platform adopted by the Montenegrin government in early August 1999 proposed a new name for the federation (“Association of the States of Montenegro and Serbia”) and included for Montenegro the possibility of having its own foreign ministry, defence minister and convertible currency. The federal government should be replaced by a “council of ministers”; the two-chamber federal parliament by a single house in which both republics would have an equal number of seats. Each republic would have its own military command, while recruits would serve in their own republic. If the proposal were rejected, Montenegro would have a referendum on independence (Associated Press and Reuters, 1999: 1 and 4). It is not known whether and to what degree the government will be ready to use the declaration and result of the referendum over that issue as a sort of means for political pressure on Milosevic or for achieving independence. In the second case, the possible future separation of Montenegro could lead Yugoslavia to another conflict escalation and in addition Montenegro to internal divisions between those who keep the tradition of Bjelasi, supported by Serbia, and those who prefer the Zelenasi political orientation allied with Albanians and the West. Similar divisions, relationships and developments could be expected in the event of separation of (parts of) Vojvodina and/or Sandzak unless (some of) these potential separatists managed to realise their goals in a way similar to that of Macedonia. Just as in the Kosovo case, NATO will probably need a new or old enemy to prove reasons for its existence again. And as with the previous Kosovo crisis, in this case parties need to establish a better view of what might be possible and reach and accommodate their goals and behaviours in order to make a compromise. In that case, both sides may well represent the compromise to show to their voters and supporters that they “have won”. It seems that possible future development of the existing differences in religion, culture and particularly state traditions between the Montenegrins and Serbs and their utilisation as the base for the occurrence of societal threats will mainly depend on political orientations and decisions in the
266 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia ongoing conflicting relationships between the Belgrade and Podgorica governments. If the struggle of Albanians from Kosovo, supported by the rest of them, results in establishing an independent state, it could serve as an another base for attempts toward realisation of similar goals in Macedonia, Montenegro and Greece. However, this is not likely to be supported by the West. The potential advantages of the FRY are relatively favourable geographic location in the middle course of the Danube and in the centre of the Balkans, exit to the sea through the Montenegrin coast, agricultural self-sufficiency, considerable raw material and energy resources, relatively developed but badly damaged infrastructure etc.,115 which in the conditions of serious commitment to the market and relative stabilisation of internal and external political circumstances could help in overcoming the present difficult political and economic situation for the next couple of decades. The tempo of progress in this direction will mainly depend on the developments of conflicts in Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia and Macedonia and other mentioned disputes and political problems and the crisis in general, pace internal political and economic changes, reconstruction, sanctions, relations with other neighbours, and renewal of relations with the EU, above all with Germany, which is traditionally among the most important trade partners of the country. It is uncertain what percentage of the refugees of nations from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Kosovo will return to their homes and when, if ever. This and several related phenomena could be the objects of future research efforts 7.6.5 Macedonia It seems that developments in Macedonia - as in Kosovo and other escalated conflicts within and between the Yugoslav successor states could follow the logic of securitization or the extreme version of politicisation, which occurs in the case of presentation of the politicised disputes between sides as the existential threat to one or both of them, and in the first place to their national identity justifying the utilisation of radical and violent means and behaviour (for more details see Buzan, Wsever and de Wilde, 1998: 23-9). As was theoretically determined, the process of securitization has three steps or components: existential threats, taking emergency action; and the effect on relations between units (Buzan, Wasver and de Wilde, 1998: 26).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 267 The development of the process could be facilitated at least partly by, and partly based on, the analogy “if the Albanians in the FRY, why not the Albanians in Macedonia and elsewhere?” However, with the eventual outbreak of war in Western Macedonia and/or in Kosovo again, escalated conflicts on one or both sides of the border could unite in a bilateral one, which could engage at least Macedonia and the FRY, on one side, and Albanians from Macedonia, Kosovo and Albania, on another. It is very hard to predict which side the West would take in that case. As well as in the case of the war in Kosovo, the eventual attempt at reaching any kind of ‘solution’ for the Albanian question (and also for other mentioned conflicts in the region) by use of massive force would bring all kinds of state and societal security risks for all the participants, the whole region and maybe particularly for Macedonia. As the escalation in these two conflicts could be accompanied by similar developments in those conflicts that Macedonia has with Greece and Bulgaria, the number of countries that could be engaged could include Turkey too. The success of any side in such a conflict might easily be a Pyrrhic victory and survival of the Macedonia could be seriously questioned. Wiberg considers that in cases of attempted resolution of conflicts (like the one in Kosovo or Macedonia) there are the following general underlying principles or questions. 1. Centralisation or geographic location of power (in cantons, republics and/or provinces or in the state). 2. The extent to which one should draw boundaries on an ethnic basis to make units almost ethnically pure and in that way make the state strong without “ethnic cleansing”. 3. A formula for power sharing: strict proportion without a threshold, which seems to be inadequate for a multiethnic society, or disproportion including even veto power for small ethnic communities. Some options could be conditionally viable if there is trust. For example, the minority could accept proportional or smaller representation if it trusts that it will not be misused, and the majority could accept over-representation or veto power of minority under the same condition. 4. Whether one should have a state religion. If there is such a religion, it would favour stronger groups; if not, weaker groups would be in that position. 5. As language cannot be regarded as a private matter (as religion can), the canton, republic or province should be bilingual.
268 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia 6. Voting should be organised. 7. The seventh question is related to actors and options of the resolution. Troebst considered that “to take out the steam of the Kosovo conflict by a carefully orchestrated carrot-and-stick policy towards Belgrade on behalf of the international community, resulting in a joint Serbian-Kosovo Albanian search for an interim solution and paralleled by a démocratisation of the FRY, is the recipe for defusing the Kosovo time bomb” (Troebst, 1998: 111-16). As both sides involved in the conflict have serious problems which would hardly be resolved with democracy, the recipe was imperfect, particularly during the period in which the Kosovo conflict escalated and even after the arrival of KFOR troops. For successful démocratisation, national unity is needed as an elementary precondition that could hardly be fulfilled because of ethnic conflict. Even in societies with long democratic traditions and considered as democratic ones, escalated ethnic conflicts led to a reduction in democratic principles, restrictions of democracy and a limitation of the power of democratic institutions and processes and human rights. These kinds of restrictions and suspensions in the Balkan states seem to be more durable and even more severe than in most of the other European states. Thus, ethnic conflicts, and particularly those escalated, make unfavourable impacts on democracy, and disable, at least partly, the process of democratization. The more conflicts one has, the harder one achieves democracy and even more difficult one experiences it (see de Nevers, 1993: 31-48). A fearful conflict situation one cannot observe as a stimulation to the improvement of democracy. The democracy that could occur within such conditions may be to some degree similar to that which used to exist in the certain old Greek city-states (reserved for the governing class of citizens, and not accessible for slaves). In the Balkans, there are no slaves any more, but there are national divisions. Within these conditions, external threats generating fears and the “rally-round-the-flag” effect - could be qualified as counterproductive for the realisation of the interests of actors whose goal might be the democratization within and outside the threatened states (more details Isakovic, 1999). Using other words, that what was said for influences of internal ethnic conflicts on démocratisation and protection of human rights could be in an analogous way applied on influences of international conflicts on the same phenomenon. The Balkan pattern of security is mostly based on a narrow interpretation of the principle si vis pacem para bellum or qui desiderat pacem, praeparet bellum (he who desires peace, let him prepare for war).
Conclusions and outlookfor the future 269 However, Macedonia seems to be too weak to use it in a way which would be similar with those practised in most of its neighbours as well as in many other states in the region (more details: Isakovic, 1997c: 13). Predictions within a peace scenario could contain a type of security rather similar with that mostly used by rather small European states. The type of security is very often featured by a rather rigorously neutral foreign politics at the first place regarding to the neighbours, weak armed forces compared with the forces in the neighbouring countries, and stabilised relations inside the multiethnic structure of the country. In this way, Macedonia and any of the neighbouring nations and countries could not control the entire geographic territory of Macedonia in a longer-lasting period. As one could say, nobody lost, nobody win, and the multiethnic country was bom. Eventually established ‘greater’ states of Bulgaria, Albania, Serbia, Greece, Macedonia, etc. would not provide more societal security for their populations (whatever their ethnic origins they have) or state security and power for their governments. However, it could be a start of new wars in the region (seen in the early 20th century), which in present conditions could make the Balkan states even more powerless, and their populations to suffer even more than the ones of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia or Kosovo. As Remington once has stressed, a wider Balkan war will endanger the transition to democracy throughout post-communist East Central Europe, engulf the former Western Europe with refugees endangering the projected integration under the Maastricht Treaty, increase neo-nazi fanatics in the united Germany and strengthen Zhirinovsky in Russia, and rewrite the imperatives of national security in Washington, Moscow and Brussels. One author tried to create an answer to the question is the ethnic complexity of East Europe really that different from West Europe? He noted that if one returns far enough, in history of West Europe can be found all kinds of ethnic groups. “The difference is that most West European monarchies had the political, military, economic, and cultural power to turn divergent ethnic groups into subordinate parts of their kingdoms, in time assimilating them and erasing their languages and cultures”. France was taken as the model for this kind of centralised and modem state. Spain, however, unable to turn its Catalans and Basques into Spaniards, experiences some of the East Europe’s problems, and particularly of Yugoslavia. It was concluded, “the point is that almost every country starts with or acquires ethnic groups. The stronger nation-states are able to control, dominate, and sometimes assimilate minority groups. The key is
270 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia political power, and in this the East European states have been much weaker than their European counterparts” (Roskin, 1991: 10-12). However, it seems that the very end of twentieth century as well as the next century will not be an appropriate time for national subordination, assimilation and erasing languages, cultures and other elements of identities. Particularly on the Balkans, it could be an attempt that could give even results that would be opposite of the aimed as it can make an existing conflict to escalate or a new conflict to be bom. Could be concluded that it seems that the states in the region could have a longer-lasting state security protecting itself by their relative military weaknesses, neutrality, and rather precisely regulated and stable relations within their multiethnic structures. The purpose of independence should be to link instead to divide their neighbours and in this way to make them mutually closer and more peace devoted. This is the way in which weaknesses could become strengths, softness - hardness, etc., and for Balkans to become a relatively prosperous and a peaceful region. In addition, this way of weak military defence would be cheaper and thus could stimulate development of their economies (that provide sources for defence as well as for other state expenses) and decreases political risks, strengthening some sort of “safety belts” for brave politicians (willing to tell the truth and survive politically afterwards) as well as for peace in the Balkans and Europe (see Remington, 1994a: 81-82). The economic and other potentials in observed region seem to be an adequate basis for relatively small armies, and the smaller they will be, the more will be viable an efficient civilian control over them. In that case, there would be little political and economic space for military selfpromotion and autonomy. Security must be maintained not only by armaments and soldiers, but also by diplomacy and the procedures associated with conflict resolution (see Wiberg, 1998: 178). Otherwise, the societies as well as the armies in the region could begin to follow the way and the unfortunate destiny of the Second Yugoslavia and its YPA, but in many cases, having poorer resources. Majority nations in mentioned Balkan countries will not be secure unless the human rights of the minorities will be protected to a necessary and realisable degree. In these conditions, minorities should be deprived only of the right to self-determination or right to secession116 (as that right is commonly interpreted on the Balkans117). One author has concluded, “as soon as minorities become majorities, new minorities appear. If the present number of nation-states is doubled, the number of minority problems may also be (roughly) doubled” (Eriksen, 1992: 221).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 271 Majorities should be deprived only of the ‘right’ to jeopardise and violate human rights of minorities that represent safeguards of minorities’ distinct identity and dignity.118 In this way, the states in the Balkans could protect their territorial integrity; and the Balkans will gradually drop its reputation of the European “powder keg”. For this reason, these countries basically need developed economies and stable systems of human rights protected by law along with traditional and other habits (more details Isakovic, 1994: 35). According to predictions based on statistics, in one or few decades some majority nations in this area could become minorities.119 Thus one could anticipate that the nations - building the minority human rights construction - are constructing own future ‘home’; they - securing minority nations identities now - obtain security for its own identity in the future and vice versa (more details Isakovic, 1994: 35-36). Minority populations’ identities will not be secure unless they will develop workable political, economic, cultural and other relationships with majority populations; minorities must come to see the majority’s position as own future. Identity and state security is mutual, nowadays and in future, and the roles could be exchanged. Could be concluded, as security exists for all or for nobody, the sides must come to see own security as a function depending of other’s side security. Major problems in the region could be considered also as a fight between the ethnic groups, or their political elites who wish to take or keep control over the same territories and resources by military means. This enables prediction that future of the post-communist democracies in the region will be depending of respecting democratic principles in the civilian sector, and its sufficient control over the military sector. Particularly within the environment in which soldiers and irregulars (try to) prove their patriotism by their national roots and identities, military leaders should urge upon professionalism (see Remington, 1994b: 21). According to the predominant current pattern of behaving and the actual state of affairs, there is no a genuine solution for Aegean, Vardar western and Pirin Macedonia, Cameria or Epirus, Kosovo, Sandzak, etc., that could be satisfactory for all involved parties. It seems that governments and minorities in the region are faced and taking part at the same time in a circulus vitiosus: on one side, the more a minority is far from being loyal to state in which it lives, the more it is repressed by the same state; on the other side, the more the minority is repressed the less likely that it will
272 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia become loyal and perceive the legal authority as legitimate, but perceives it as a sort of “plain domination”.120 Proposed solutions to the Macedonian as well as the Albanian question mostly “involve attempts to redraw Balkan maps in a way that will permit the formation of mature, modem, and peaceful states”, and thus “the sovereignty of states and peoples, either as a principle to be upheld or as a rule that must be compromised, has been central to most understandings of this process”. However, it seems that “sovereignty, and other modem political ideas, cannot provide a lasting solution to the Macedonian question” as well as for the Albanian and some other more or less similar questions (see Craft, 1996). The conclusion stresses a need for a postmodern and critical rethinking of international relations for their relevance to the Balkan experience. One of the chief features of the Second Yugoslavia was the crucial role of small power elites, at the time when the country’s unity did not depend as much on organic ties as on the elites’ political will and deals due to the multi-ethnic structure and semi-peripheral status. They failed to modernise timely, they did not advocate collective wisdom, which implies awareness of the conditions in which collective survival is possible. As the elites’ social profile, their authoritarian spirit and inability to compromise were in deep contrast to the society’s multi-ethnic structure, and they faced a general communist social crisis and the danger of overthrow, they turned to defending “endangered” national interests, to the “ethnification of the community and politics, as the last tool to hold on to power. The failure of other ideals to gain credibility turned aggressive nationalism into the only strong magnet capable of rallying national support, causing a strong feeling of loyalty to a great goal, homogenising society.” The success of process of mass intoxication by the “opium of nationalism” required a fundamental discontinuity in the composition of political elites. In the process the supranational elite (communist cadre from the Second World War) gave way to moderate nationalists, who were in turn replaced by militant nationalists, obsessed by the megalomania of the nationalistic ideals, for which no human price is too high to pay. In direct proportion in the composition of ruling elites a great change in the mood of the population took place: from a rather low degree of (hibernated) nationalistic feelings to the chauvinism embittered by hate. At the end of this cycle, together with the surfacing of Fathers of nations large scale popular support evolved” (see Pecujlic and Nakarada, 1995: 31). The divisions and disintegration seem to become common denominators, cause and result of political processes within the observed area regardless of their nature (ethnic conflicts, pure power struggles or
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 273 conflicts, etc.). Since 1981 or 1991 the disintegration has been moving from the south-east to north-west and central and back to the south-east of the Second Yugoslavia’s territory, but one can hardly predict is it going to return at least partly like a pendulum or change its path in some other direction. According to one presumption, “Macedonia actually may be an example of the logic of mature nation-states”, and “if the assumption of mature nation-state status did not bring peace to Western Europe we are foolish to ascribe Balkan problems to the immaturity of its nations”. The author concluded “therefore the answer may not be to force the Balkans into the black boxes of the modem state system”, and that “it is possible that peace will come to the Balkans only when they find a way to transcend the modem state”. He suggested “some insight might be gained from a more self-conscious analysis of recent developments leading to the EU. Very little has been done, however, to examine Western European identity and the decline of absolute state sovereignty from a critical perspective”. Some authors “seem to suggest that lasting peace in Western Europe has been accomplished not by mature, sovereign nation-states but by an erosion of traditional concepts like national sovereignty. Why should we expect the opposite outcome in Balkan politics?” However, option of membership in the EU is not considered as “a haven” for Balkan nations, and EU is rejected as a model for another Balkan confederation. The main reason is that the both options are “based on the idea that political community is an expression of common traits and a shared identity”. Thus, “either of these options would merely replicate the inside/outside dichotomy on a larger scale” (Craft, 1996). Craft’s alternative concept could be summarised in two points. It is needed, first, “to overcome political concepts which stress absolute sovereignty” and give less concern to state sovereignty in general. Secondly, instead of that, one should pay more attention to decentralised identities, which can allow the region’s residents to feel like members o f several different communities simultaneously, [implying that] communal identity is an all or nothing condition. [...] at the very least, it may be more than a bit naive or disingenuous to suggest that the proper future for the Balkans is full membership in the modem international community. Indeed it may be the attempt to create traditional, sovereign, nation-states which underlies much of the violence in Balkan politics [...] conflicts in the region are not likely to be resolved through a fixation on current standards like state sovereignty and
274 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia inviolable national territory. As in Western Europe the solution is more likely to be found in an attempt to transcend the confines of sovereign nation-states (Craft, 1996).
A possible solution was found in the example of the United Kingdom, which seems to have opened up the possibility for solutions to multiethnic divisions through Europeanisation expressed in the slogan “independence in Europe”. Namely, nationalism and separatism can be overcome using European civil society, i.e. by creating a “triple loyalty”, or divided economic, political, cultural faithfulness to the region, state and Europe. In the debate on European identity it was “assumed that political order ultimately rests on popular loyalty and affection (as in the nation-state). Sometimes it is further argued that loyalty is a question of identity, identity is a question of culture, and culture is created by disseminating symbols and propaganda” (Waever and Kelstrup, 1993: 66). One Yugoslav author predicted that perhaps in the not too distant future some other British provinces - staying within the framework of United Kingdom - will reach a special status that will enable them to have divided loyalty and active inclusion in national, regional and European streams (see Markovic, forthcoming). If one tried to create a similar solution for some of the successor states of the Second Yugoslavia, maybe the problem seems to be that these countries and nations do not want to become a “framework” and to divide the loyalty of citizens. In most cases, they want their state to be a sovereign nation-state as much as possible and its citizens to have single loyalty to the state, again as much as possible. Craft, whose proposal on getting rid of the fixation on standards of state sovereignty and inviolable national territory and to replace them by transcending the confines of sovereign nation-states, considers “before we in the outside world can attempt to mediate and help resolve the Balkan conflict, we must first make sure that we understand it. We must also be more aware of our own history and experience”. A sort of “selective amnesia” allows one to view the Balkans “as unusually violent and tribal, while comforting for those in the West”. However, it “can hardly supply any useful insights into the real problems of the Balkan peoples. It also blinds us to the fact that the Balkan condition is not a separate case clearly distinguishable from our own.” Craft concludes, “the stark inside/outside process clearly visible in Balkan politics should be seen for what it is - a reflection of our own ideas about political community. We will not be able to help solve their problems until we realize that, to a certain extent, we are them” (Craft, 1996).
Conclusions and outlookfo r the future 275 It seems that an eventual attempt to realise the pattern of shared or decentralised identity and loyalty based on that identity in the Yugoslav successor states would be an ambitious and challenging endeavour, which could be faced with several serious challenges and obstacles. It would be a demanding effort in many regards for majority as well as for minority populations, in which they could hardly be successful without support from other parts of Europe and the world. Support is needed to develop the knowledge and methodology adapted to local conditions which could make this “human engineering” attempt work within an unfavourable milieu that overflows with ethnic hatreds and animosities - identity, state security and other threats and poverty in most areas in comparison with the conditions which existed during the Second Yugoslavia and with West European conditions. An attempt to build a decentralised identity could be a cheaper and better political, cultural and economic investment than the expenditure needed for new wars, interventions, preventive deployment, peaceenforcement, peace-keeping, humanitarian missions, receiving refugees etc. One of the open questions would be: will it work in a satisfactory way, and most importantly would it help to eliminate existing conflicts, state security threats and prevent new ones as well as identity threats and fears? As Craft comments: “[Yet] western responses to the Balkan conflict seem to betray a remarkable absence of memory. When radical Balkan groups demand a single state for their people, western observers tend to look for ways to (yet again) redraw the map of the region to accommodate various incompatible nationalisms” (Craft, 1996). Redrawing the maps has not and probably will not improve security in the region, and although not all authors agree with this conclusion, it seems that there is no European security as well as security of the West without security for the peoples of the Balkans. This conclusion is based in the first place on present-day fact and on a future assumption that insecurity in the Balkans will result in inflows of refugees, who will at least to some degree influence important components of the societal and state security121 situation in Europe and the West (see Heisler and Layton-Henry, 1993; Carlton, 1993). As Remington concludes, security in the post-Communist period requires a political solution to the Yugoslav wars of secession as well as Western investments and trade policies that “level the playing field for Balkan exports rather than ducking the expanded competition of emerging market economies” (1994b: 20-1). Ottawa, May 2000
Notes 1 2
3
The Columbia Dictionary o f Quotations, N ew York: Columbia University Press, 1995 (quoted in M icrosoft Bookshelf 1996-97). Maybe the best-known definition o f nation is that o f Max Weber, which says that it is a community o f sentiment, which normally tends to produce a state on its own (for more details see 1972: 20-3). Smith considers that nation is a named human population, sharing a historic territory, common myths and historical memories, a mass, public culture, a common economy as well as common legal rights and duties for all members (see for example, 1996: 447). For Eriksen nation represents an ethnic group whose leaders have either achieved, or aspire to achieve, a state where its cultural group is hegemonistic depending on ideologies that stress horizontal solidarity between members (justified with reference to common descent and ‘blood ties’) and that limit the compass o f that solidarity to that group (1992: 220). Waever creating the concept o f societal security - defined nation as “a special case o f society characterized by: (a) affiliation to a territory, (b) a combination o f present-time community with a continuity across time, linking past members to current and future members, and (c) a feeling o f being one o f the units o f which the global society consists, i.e. with a natural right to demand a nation state, even if this right is not necessary exercised” (1993: 21). Wiberg, making an analysis o f various definitions o f nation, concluded that there are a number o f types. First, according to “state” definitions, a nation is the totality o f persons bom or naturalized in a country and living under a single government. This definition, however, creates a tautological relationship between “state” and “nation”, but political boundaries o f states are always sharp, and boundaries between nations are sharp only in special cases. Secondly, “objective” definitions assume that a nation consists o f people who share the same language, religion, ancestral myths etc., but perceptions as well as classifications (o f languages, religions and sometimes myths) may change through time and space. Thirdly, according to the “subjective” type o f definitions a nation consists o f those people who consider themselves belonging to it. However it is often difficult to predict whether and when an “ethnic group” will cross the line to become a “nation” in the narrower sense, and one cannot be sure what each person’s answer will be tomorrow (for more details see 1996a: 28-30). Probably having in mind the abovementioned and other existing differences, i.e. difficulties in defining nation, James Kellas, in a lecture held at the DIIA in Copenhagen in 1977, concluded that it is impossible to define nation. In most post-communist cases such movements have rather tended to look across the boundaries o f their state: at co-nationals in other states, with irredentism as the strongest version, or by seeing neighbouring states as big and threatening, in each case calling for internal national unity. Cleavages o f a more regional character have sometimes played a role o f their own, sometimes interacted or merged with ethnonationally defined ones (Wiberg, 1995b: 96).
276
Notes 211 4
5
6
7
8
9
10
11
After taking western Slavonia on 1 May 1995 the Croat army attacked the Serbian Republic Krajina in August 1995, and, as a result, some 150,000-200,000 Serbs escaped, mostly to the Third Yugoslavia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Second Yugoslavia was also populated by the following state-carrying South Slav peoples: Montenegrins, Macedonians, Slovenes and Yugoslavs, and by the groups defined by the 1994 constitution as “nationalities” (minorities): Albanians, Hungarians, Italians, Bulgarians, Romanians, Ruthenians and Slovaks. In addition, it was inhabited by the members o f “ethnic groups” Greeks, Germans, Gypsies, Poles, Wallachians and by those who did not define themselves at all. Some examples: Korean is the majority language in two states and a minority language in a few others; Vietnamese used to be the majority language in two states; German is the majority language in (previously divided) Germany, Austria, Switzerland, Liechtenstein and (in a way) Luxembourg. Spanish is the majority language in Spain and several American states. Contrasting the two former cases with the two latter, one sees that common language may or may not be sufficient to make people define themselves as a common nation. Conflict in general could be defined as meaning a dynamic and manifest conflict process consisting o f certain phases. In this volume, the term conflict will be used in a more specific meaning: a political process (dynamic situation) in which engaged parties have incompatible attitudes and behaving. Conflict in this sense has three inter-related components: (1) the conflict situation, manifested in expressing various political aims, which cannot be simultaneously achieved and for that reason could be qualified as mutually exclusive; (2) the conflict behaviour (in the first place aiming to achieve the mentioned political aims); and (3) the conflicting attitudes and perceptions having an emotional dimension (feelings o f anger, mistrust, fear, scorn, hatred etc.) and the cognitive dimension (maintenance o f certain stereotypes and beliefs regarding the opposite side) (see Michell, 1981: 29). One can notice that societal insecurity seems to be incoprorated into this definition o f conflict, especially in both parts o f its third element as well as its second part (see Wiberg, 1998). This is the conclusion, for the period 1820-1949, in Lewis Fry Richardson’s Statistics o f D eadly Quarrels (1990 - Rem. Z.I.). There is also little ground for optimism today, given that the main cases combining a majority o f one with a big, or locally predominant, minority o f the other include the Philippines, Lebanon, Cyprus, Azerbeijan, Bosnia and Herzegovina, FRY, Macedonia, Albania and Bulgaria, plus several African states, the worst cases being the Sudan, Ethiopia, Nigeria and Uganda. And may have gone even more wrong by international attempts at intervention, no matter what were the professed aims o f these attempts. The case o f Ex-Yugoslavia is analysed from this point o f view in Wiberg, 1994a. Speech by the President o f the Republic o f Slovenia, Milan Kucan at the Celebratory Academy on the 50th Anniversary o f the End o f the Second World War, Ljubljana, Cankarjev dom, 13 May 1995. Within the Second Yugoslavia there were attempts at interregional economic equalization, but the income p e r capita ratio between Slovenia and Kosovo grew from three in 1947 to five in 1965 and eight in 1989. “Transfers were sharply reduced after 1965, but all parties complained: Slovenia and Croatia about spending too much on the poor and inefficient south; Serbia about being a contributor rather than the receiver it should be according to statistics; the others about receiving too little and about falling behind more developed parts. Serbia was also accused o f siphoning o ff
278 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
12
13
14 15 16
17 18
19
20
21
22
some o f the aid on its way. Here, and in other issues, everybody felt cheated.” At the same time, trade between the republics was falling, and was increasingly going within a republic or into international trade, in the first place to southern Germany and northern Italy (Wiberg, 1993: 95 and 97). Wiberg concluded that “no other state had been through as long and deep an economic crisis by 1990; the average Yugoslav lost about half his real income in the eighties” (1995b: 97). Slovenia (and Croatia) expected the advantages from an EC membership soon after separation if Serbia rejected their call for becoming independent states in a loose confederal scheme (see Wiberg, 1994a: 235). However, Italy was blocking negotiations between the EU and Slovenia on a so-called European agreement for almost a year (see Hansen, 1996: 489). Articles 61 and 62 o f the Constitution o f the Republic o f Slovenia. On the protection o f the Slovenian minority in Austria, Italy and Hungary there is a great deal o f literature. See Narodne manjsine..., 1990; Narodne manjsine 2..., 1991. According to data given by a Protection Officer, The UNHCR Branch Office, Ljubljana, out o f the estimated 70,000 refugees from Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia in 1993, there were approximately 9,400 left as o f the end o f May 1997. Some 7,400 o f them enjoyed temporary protection, while an estimated 2,000 persons were not registered. About three-quarters o f them were Bosnian Muslims, most o f the rest were Bosnian Croats and only a small proportion were Bosnian Serbs. More than half o f all refugees originated from Republika Srpska (see also Pagon and Kos, 1998). The name Dalmatia came from the name o f the Delmata, an Illyrian tribe who invaded the north-west o f the Balkans since 1000 BC (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). In both the 1941-45 and 1991-95 wars Krajina was one o f the main battlefields. According to some estimates, from 1991 to 1996, around 400,000 Serbs had fled Croatia. As a result, the Serbian population in Croatia decreased from the pre-war 12.5% to less than 5% in 1995 (Simic, 1994). For instance, by the Treaty o f London, secretly created in April 1915, Istria and large areas o f Slovenia and Dalmatia were promised to Italy for its participation in the First World War on the Allied side. One year before the coup few Croat deputies (including the leader Stjepan Radic, the leader o f the Croatian Peasant Party) were assassinated by a Serbian King’s agentdeputy in central Parliament (see Wiberg, 1993: 97). According to one author, Radic stated in parliament that “the Croats were not slaves under the Habsburg monarchy”, and that the Serbs “were never their liberators” (quoted in Bogdan, 1989: 206). In 1933 the King was assassinated during his official visit to France by Croat and Macedonian nationalists (supported by the governments o f Hungary and Italy). Initially it seemed that almost simultaneous death o f the King’s host - Louis Barthou, French Foreign Affairs Minister - was an accidental event, but, according to later assumptions, he was also intentionally killed because o f his anti-German foreign policy (Dimitrijevic and Stojanovic, 1988: 367; Friedman, 1996: 103). Wiberg concluded that “no other state had been through as long and deep an economic crisis by 1990; the average Yugoslav lost about half his real income in the eighties” (1995b: 97). The data about the territorial distribution o f the Serbian population in Croatia is taken from Pajic, 1988.
Notes 279 23
24
25
26
27
28 29
30
31
Roksandic proposed that as an expression o f a truly intended joint living with the Serbs in the sovereign state, Serbian cultural centres be established in Zagreb and in other places, within which Orthodox churches would be built. Special activities o f socialization and preparation for the new situation would need to be conducted in less urban and undeveloped regions that represented potential sources o f conflicts (see 1990). In Remingon’s opinion, the Croatian leadership besieged YPA barracks in Croatia and then attacked them in a desperate attempt to provoke Germany into keeping its promise - as Zagreb saw it - to recognize Croatia if Serb rebels and their YPA allies continued to bombard Croatian towns. Although the German statements relating to the EU peace conference (Cf. The New York Times, 6 September 1991) were allegedly intended to frighten Serb forces in the YPA, the Croatian leadership assumed these were not threats, but promises (1994a: 76-7; 1996: 165). In this way, the Croatian government sacrificed the Croatian cities and civilians in the name o f independence. “A mediator may take suggestions o f his own and may press for them arguments or, at a high level o f intrusiveness, by promising positive sanctions and threatening or actually implementing negative sanctions. Even so, decisions about solutions ultimately rest with the parties” (Wiberg, 1994a: 240). During the second part o f 1991 the EC “gradually moved up the ladder o f intrusiveness by taking a number o f substantive stands on the resolution o f the conflicts and making these stands not only mediator’s suggestions but established principles o f the EC. That made its role increasingly hazy: it had been accepted as a mediator, but not arbitrator - arbitration meaning that the parties have agreed to let the third party award a solution to the conflict. Nor did it have any authorization to engage in adjudication.” Wiberg concluded that “this would have required that the EC as the third party were authorized in advance whether by generalised obligations previously entered by the parties or by somebody else than the parties, to decide on the solution o f the conflict after having heard the parties - and perhaps even enforce this solution” (1994a: 240). UNTAES was exercising its authority over this region through a basic agreement o f 12 November 1995 and through UN Security Council resolutions 1037 o f 15 January 1996 and 1120 o f 11 July 1997, and the mandate ended on 15 January 1998. The ballot paper included this clause. In this regard the greatest problem seems to be that “practically all the literature is treated and often taught literally, as history, without much effort to separate poetic license from true events”, and “the negative stereotypes o f Turks and other foreigners, the cult o f revenge, the self-pity and self-praise - all are left unchallenged. Occasionally, glimpses o f folk wit deflate boastful posturing, concede courage to the enemy, and allow that domestic oppressors can be worse than foreign ones. But educators in Yugoslav schools rarely if ever use such glimpses” (Job, 1993: 65). Some Krajina Serbs leaders and other Serbian politicians considered that if Serbs formed a majority o f the population in a given area, or if a given area used to be historically composed o f a majority Serbian population (particularly before the genocide executed by the Ustashi during the Second World War), then Serbs or Serbia have a right to it today. An additional reason could be the military need. See Zvonarevic, 1976: 720-4; Isakovic, 1991: 222-7.
280 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia 32
33
34 35
36
37
38
The TFF asked by the United Nation Transitional Administration (UNTAES) to analyse the situation and to conduct a conflict-mitigation mission to the schools in the UNTAES region sector in Eastern Slavonia. The Muslims were those parts o f the population o f Bosnia and Herzegovina who defined them as such during the 1991 census. It seems that in 1993 and later most o f them were redefined by several state and other acts (including the 1995 Dayton-Paris Accords) as Bosniacs. However, it seems these two identifications do not necessarily match (bearing in mind particularly the fact that some Sarajevo government rhetoric include the Bosniacs and also Yugoslavs etc.) and one can not assume to what degree they do not match as long as a new census may be held. However, because o f large changes within the population o f the country during the 1992-95 war, one can assume that even the census would not provide completely accurate indicators. “It is said that if one ironed out the Bosnia and Herzegovina, this region alone would be as large as all the Europe” (Fine, 1983: 1). For a succinct presentation o f the Croatian case for control over Bosnia and Herzegovina based on historical and geographical factors, see Guldescu, 1972: 11-15. Knezevic also implied historical Croatian domination o f Bosnia and Herzegovina when he wrote that from the time o f Prince Branimir the Croats always “allied with the Western Church and culture - with the exception o f the population o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, which, with the coming o f the Ottomans, largely accepted Islam” (Knezevic, 1989: 14). Mellor stated that Hungarian historians “look at Bosnia as the original core o f the Croat kingdom’ (1975: 48). On the other hand, Sima Cirkovic forcefully argued that Bosnian lands belong to the Serbs (Cirkovic, 1964). Redzic, 1970: 459. In that source Redzic also mentioned the diffusion o f Islam throughout the area as a factor that led some to confuse Bosnian Muslims with other Yugoslav Muslims - a fallacy, in his opinion. One author stressed the fact that the Habsburg dynasty’s navy, in comparison with other imperial powers, was too weak for overseas expansion as well as the fact that it was not able to get any property from the unified and strengthened Germany. It was concluded that the Austro-Hungarian monarchy expanded to the Balkans, i.e. Bosnia and Herzegovina, in order to provide markets as well as to prevent the spreading o f Russia’s influence. “Finally the Habsburgs hoped to gain influence in the newly independent Serbia, in part for economic advantage but also to prevent Serbia’s annexation o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, which could lead to the creation o f a South Slav state that would attract Austria-Hungary’s Slavic inhabitants.” It was also mentioned that the Serbian ruler Prince Milan Obrenovic had to sign agreements with the Habsburgs without the knowledge o f his government (Jankovic, 1988: 91-92). “He virtually renounced Serbian claims to Bosnia and Herzegovina to permit no Serbian intrigues against the Dual monarchy. In return, Austria-Hungary pledged to support the Obrenovic dynasty and Prince Milan’s proclamation o f his kingship in Serbia” (Friedman, 1996: 57-8, 80-81n2). Archduke Ferdinand, successor to the Hapsburg throne, was assassinated by Gavrilo Princip and his friends from the Bosnian Serbs organization “Young Bosnia”. Assassins were armed and trained by a secret organization from Serbia (called the “Black Hand”) whose credo was Unification or Death, having in mind unification with the rest o f Serbs and other Southern Slavs living outside Serbia (for more details see Doder, 1993: 5-7).
Notes 281 39
40
41
42
43
44
Nationalism “offers a particularly attractive mode in times o f crises and depression since the link to a glorious past ... donates immediate relief, pride and [a] shield against shame” (Waever, 1993: 21). “Some commentators have argued that nationalist sentiment was somehow deep-frozen by the communist years, and has now reemerged in a pristine form. Others assert that even if the new nationalism has its excesses, this is only a natural overreaction to its long period o f suppression, a boisterous working out in accelerated time o f the stages o f national development that Western Europe has passed through.” In the Second World War was reached extreme o f national polarisation in Yugoslavia, when the Ustashi regime in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina (which was part o f Croatia) slaughtered Serbs, Jews, Roma, and ‘disloyal’ Croats. The Chetniks murdered Croats, Muslims and ‘disloyal’ Serbs. Muslim fascists killed Serbs and ‘disloyal’ Muslims. “The communists were able to play on this, exploiting the memories and historical-bases o f these ugly sentiments and atrocities for the purpose o f proving their success in overcoming them. But in terms o f feeding the vision o f violent and irreconcilable nationalisms lurking just beneath daily life. The consequence was the same” (Licht and Kaldor, 1992b: 141). It seems that the case o f the Second Yugoslavia’s disintegration proved Erich Fromm’s conclusion that for a social budget fostering group narcissism is very cheap in comparison with the social expense required to raise the population living standard. One is supposed to fund ideologists (social functionaries like schoolteachers, journalists, ministers, professors, etc.) who formulate the slogans that generate social narcissism. Many o f them participate even without any financial compensation: their reward is their sense o f pride and satisfaction for serving “such a worthy cause - and through enhanced prestige and promotion” (Fromm, 1973: 204). In Bosnia and Herzegovina national parties’ (SDA, SDP, and HDU) candidates, who won elections, together scored some three-quarters o f the votes. In addition, the 1990 collective Presidency o f Republic Bosnia and Herzegovina was composed o f two Muslims, two Serbs, two Croats and one representative o f others. The President o f this Presidency was supposed to rotate annually. Within the Assembly negotiations were held to elect a multiparty government, but as long as peace lasted (until April 1992) not a single law had been passed. David Binder’s analysis in The New York Times, 29 August 1993, quotes former US Ambassador to Yugoslavia Warren Zimmerman as saying that these days that agreement does not look so bad. It was stressed that “twice in 1991 before the outbreak o f the war, Tudjman had tried to cut a deal with M ilosevic to partition Bosnia between Serbia and Croatia. Tudjman’s aides showed proposed maps to journalists. In an effort to stabilize the Bosnian situation and prevent its partition, the UN decided to locate its Protection Force headquarters in the Bosnian capital o f Sarajevo. For the same reasons, the United States and the EC recognized Bosnia and Herzegovina as a new country an April 1992” (Doder, 1993: 19). The Yugoslav People’s Army, during the Cold War among the strongest in Europe, was designed and equipped to confront with foreign invasion, and Bosnia and Herzegovina was a place where armament was mostly produced and stored. According to some estimates, after the recognition o f Bosnia and Herzegovina and the outbreak o f the war, Serb forces took most armaments, and other sides established their own military forces too. Thus it became visible how it could happen that those who tried to ensure peace by preparing for war may not get what they wanted, but
282 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
45
46
47
48
49 50
what they prepared for. Wars like those in ex-Yugoslavia also provide a basis for the conclusion that more soldiers and armaments could not always bring more security. From 30 August 1995, for two weeks, some 3,000 NATO sorties bombed out the Bosnian Serb infrastructure principally to enable the armed forces o f Croatia, Croats from Bosnia and Herzegovina and also Bosniacs forces to make territorial gains from the Serbs. Responsibilities, which are not expressly assigned by the Constitution to the institutions o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, shall belong to the Entities. The following responsibilities are exclusively held by the Entities: establishing special parallel relationships with neighbouring states consistent with the sovereignty and territorial integrity o f the Republic; providing assistance to the government o f the Republic needed to honour its international obligations; providing a safe and secure environment for all persons in their respective jurisdiction; and entering into agreements with states and international organizations with the consent o f the parliament (Annex 4 - Constitution o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, Article III/2). In addition, as each o f the three ethnic parties have a veto right against any proposed legislation, the political decision-making process in the Republic o f Bosnia and Herzegovina regulated by the Accords may be described as government by consensus. “As in former Yugoslavia, it will probably prove impossible in the long term in view o f the complicated federal constitution to hold the federal state together from within the central authority if the constituent republics strive for independence. The Yugoslav federal government, with its equal representation from the constituent republics, was, as a rule, unable to take action. Resolutions recurrently failed due to irreconcilable clashes o f interests inside the multinational state. The situation will be very much the same in Bosnia-Herzegovina. Indeed, after four years o f war such a constitution will have even less chance o f success. The country’s often praised multiculturality, which could provide such a basis, ceased to exist a long time ago” (for more details see Calic, 1996: 132-3). In autumn 1993, when the majority o f the Presidential Council (all six Serbs and Croats, plus the Muslim Fikret Abdic) called for negotiating on the basis o f the further concessions made in what the Serbs and Croats had agreed to give beyond the original plan after hard external pressure after the Owen-Stoltenberg Plan, but were disregarded by Izetbegovic. Abdic then proclaimed the Autonomous Province o f Western Bosnia, which immediately led to the M uslim-Muslim or Bosnian-Bosnian war in the Bihac area (see Wiberg, 1995b: 104). Finally, as some brigades became loyal to each o f the two competitors, the armed forces in the enclave broke up. Thus Izetbegovic could get at him by air transport only, but in the last phase - once Abdic had become a clear Serb ally - the Croats may have assisted him. The Western part o f the Republika Srpska is connected with its Eastern part by a narrow corridor which has been a disputed issue between Serbs and Bosniacs as to what is to be arbitrated by the international arbitration: the Serb position has been that it is only the exact boundaries around the corridor that are up for arbitration, and the Moslem position has been that it is the corridor as a whole. As some experts considered that eventual arbitration’s decision in favour o f the Federation o f Bosnia and Herzegovina could make o f the Western part o f the Republika Srpska an incoherent and militarily indefensible territory, the Serb position made the issue o f defensibility one for discussion. According to a decision by Roberts B. Owen, who was entitled to make a decision since the two parties did not agree on the selection o f
Notes 283
51
52
53
54
55 56
57
the third arbiter who was supposed to serve as presiding officer o f the arbitral tribunal, Brcko will be a new demilitarized district or some kind o f third Entity o f Bosnia and Herzegovina beyond the jurisdiction o f both Republika Srpska and the Federation o f Bosnia and Herzegovina. The district will be directly under the jurisdiction o f the Presidential Council o f the Republic o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, and will have its own government, courts, assembly, parliament, police, system o f taxation etc. As one could read the mandate o f the arbitration commission, however, the content o f the decision went beyond the commission’s mandate, which was determined by the agreement o f the Parties “to binding arbitration o f the disputed portion o f the InterEntity Boundary Line in the Brcko area indicated on the map attached at the Appendix” (Article V), and not to decide about the entire corridor (see “The General Framework Agreement...”, 1999). It was possible to guess the nationality o f the owner and often the driver o f a car by looking at its registration plates. Because o f the maltreatment o f drivers practised by local police, according to a solution at the end o f January 1998, the plates were unified and written by letters that are common to the Latin and Cyrillic alphabet only. In June 1986 Kurt Waldheim won the election to the Austrian presidency although his candidacy became controversial when some discovered documents showed that during the Second World War he had been engaged in German army units in Yugoslavia and Greece. An independent committee o f historians pointed out in its report that Waldheim had not mentioned this period in his earlier CVs, and that he would presumably have been knowledgeable about some o f the atrocities going on (without any evidence that he had personally had anything to do with them). Thanks to that fact he became an isolated figure on the international scene, but was elected with a good margin, and lot o f Austrians obviously thought that nobody had the right to intervene in whom they elected for President. “During 1996, IFOR refused to undertake any policing tasks and the local police were responsive only to local political parties not to the rule o f law. This led to embarrassing scenes o f IFOR troops as passive witnesses to blatant harassment o f minorities”, while 1,700 IPTF personnel “were not armed and did not venture out after dark” (Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 7-8). IPTF’s task is to supervise and assist local police forces, and it does not have police functions o f its own, but will depend entirely on the cooperation o f the local police forces. Reportedly, citizens o f the Third Yugoslavia who have a non-Serbian name/sumame or whose parents have such a name/sumame needed a visa and/or had to pay a tax entering to Republika Srpska (going there or transiting to Federation o f Bosnia and Herzegovina). Refugees from the Republika Srpska, who were living in Macedonia, needed Republika Srpska’s visa to enter its territory. Without a house or other real estate it is more difficult to get a citizenship, and without the citizenship it is more difficult to purchase the real estate. According to the Dayton-Paris Accords, the Entities were supposed to concentrate weapons and troops, and to demobilize other forces (except police) through April 1996. According to an expert’s opinion, demobilization was likely to mean either that all non-army forces are renamed police forces (which is forbidden by the agreement) or that some 150,000 armed young men are suddenly unemployed, with various mafias as the primary employment option. These matters are in charge o f the Commission (whose four members come from the Federation o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, two from the Republika Srpska and three
284 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
58 59
60
61
62 63
64 65 66 67
68
members are foreigners) and the Fund, which is supposed to be established in the National Bank o f Bosnia and Herzegovina. The Bank seems to be very poor, and in 1996 a key obstacle for aid projects’ implementation was the “enormous opportunities for corruption among the recipients”. Far from being cooperative, these men and women have repeatedly proved obstructionist, evasive and on many occasions downright dishonest (see Sharp and Clarke, 1996: 1). The meeting was held at the Inter-University Center, Dubrovnik, 2 6 -8 September 1996. According to Annex 8 o f the Dayton-Paris Peace Accords, the Commissions should be established to preserve national monuments or property having cultural, historic, religious or ethnic importance or whatever is left o f those that still exist in areas under military control o f another side. Kosovo is the Serbian name; Kosova is the name used by Albanians from the province (the difference between Kosovo and Kosova is similar to that between Catalonia and Catalunya); and Kosove is used by Albanians from Albania. According to the 1981 cen su s, the population o f Kosovo was 1,584,000 o f whom 77% were Albanians, 13% Serbs and others (Montenegrins, Turks, Muslims, Croats, Goranci, Romani...). The census o f 1991 (boycotted by the Albanians) stipulated 1,965,000 o f whom 82% were Albanians. According to some estimates, in August 1999 Kosovo was 99% Albanian. During the Second Yugoslavia, Yugoslavs constituted 1.7% o f its population in 1961, 1.3% in 1971, 5.4% in 1981, and 3% in 1991. Their name has its origin in the name Albania, derived from the name o f the Albanoi tribe, which inhabited present-day central Albania and was first mentioned in the second century a d by Ptolemy o f Alexandria as Arbéri. The origin o f Shqipéria (the Albanians’ own name for Albania) was probably derived from shqipe (eagle), which changed into shqipéria - became “the land o f the eagle” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). According to one author, “the Serbo-Croat ... context also includes the name ‘Siptar’ derived from ‘Shqiptar’ and used to designate Albanians in Yugoslavia”. Its use relates to ethnic and tribal origin. “Albanian” in Kosovo indicates affiliation to Albania since 1968, denoting a link with Albania and the national establishment o f the community (Dogo, 1992: 332, 333, quoted after: Janie, 1994: 119). The Sorbs’ origin is in the Luzici and Milcani tribes (Wends or Lusatians, living in the area between the Oder and Elbe rivers) (Encyclopaedia Británica, 1998). “Serb” in the Slav tongue meant “man from the same tribe, relative, ally” (Cirkovic, 1981: 144). Founded by Dardanus, the son o f Zeus and the Pleiad Electra and the ancestor o f the Dardans o f the Troad and o f the Romans (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In the beginning o f the ninth century, Albania was dominated by Bulgarians, Norman crusaders, the Angevins o f Southern Italy, Serbs, and Venetians. The Albanians did not create “any structure resembling a state” until the fifteenth century (see Fine 1987: 51); emigration was caused by the Serb occupation in 1347 (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). The name “Montenegrin” (Cmogorac meaning Man o f Black Mountain in SerboCroatian language) comes from the name o f Montenegro, which is the Venetian expression based on the Italian translation o f the Serbo-Croatian name Cma Gora (Monte Nero). The name Black Mountain was created from the dense woods covering the area (Enciklopedija Jugoslavije, 1956: 398).
Notes 285 69
70
71
72 73
74
75
He was converted to Islam, but readopted Christianity, becoming an Albanian national hero to some degree comparable with the hero Marko Kraljevic, a chieftain o f the present-day Macedonian town o f Prilep. One can find colourful details about him in Serbian, Bulgarian, Romanian and Albanian folk poetry and songs. According to historical evidence, after his father was killed in a battle in 1371, Marko replaced him as a sultan’s vassal (see Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1998). In that time, for example, when cases in which an Albanian man raped a Serbian woman were frequently mentioned in the press, new criminal proceedings were introduced if the rape involved individuals o f different nationalities. Results o f a research in Kosovo indicated that as o f 1987, there was not a single such case o f interethnic rape; the rate o f such sexual assaults in Kosovo was the lowest compared with other Yugoslav republics; the greatest number o f rapes happened within the ethnic groups (see Pesie, 1990: 47). It means “an attempt to facilitate conflict resolution by providing channels o f communication, meeting places, etcetera for parties who would have great difficulties in establishing these by themselves. It includes no other form o f intervention” (Wiberg, 1994a: 239). For an example o f this perspective emerging in the Western press which is usually very insensitive to Serb sentiments, see “Despite Violent Im age...” (1992). During their history Montenegrin tribes were transformed into clans (groups o f families genealogically related through the male line, which once used to maintain traditional tribal identities). Although integration within Yugoslavia largely decreased their autonomy, clans are still an important phenomenon in Montenegro, and clan nepotism is particularly important in the staffing o f the state administration. Thanks to the fact that Montenegrins used to be threatened by the Turkish army and competitive domestic groups for a long period, they have customarily stressed personal courage as a major virtue. Thanks to that and to the poor economic conditions in their republic, Montenegrins along with Serbs, Yugoslavs and Macedonians used to be overrepresented in YPA officer corps, while Croats, Muslims, Slovenes, Albanians, Hungarians and others were underrepresented according to their numerical strength in the population o f the Second Yugoslavia before the secessions (see Remington, 1995: 167; Friedman, 1996: 184). According to data presented by Bebler, in 1990 the Serbs, Montenegrins and Yugoslavs represented about 70% o f active generals, 81% o f colonels (Serbs and Montenegrins alone 76%), 77% among lieutenant-colonels etc. (1992: 15). Before the First World War Serbs from Vojvodina demanded unification with its motherland, although Serbia - in comparison with European conditions - was an underdeveloped and often authoritarian state. Now some political parties in Vojvodina have demanded recovering its autonomy or even separation. Seselj has been arguing for establishing a Greater Serbia that would be extended to the West along the Karlobag-Ogulin-Karlovac-Virovitica line, reclaiming the Serbian Catholics in Southern Dalmatia, the Serbian city o f Dubrovnik, Serbian Krajina and Slavonia, the Islamized Serbs o f Bosnia and Herzegovina, and “Serbian Macedonia” or “Southern Serbia”, i.e. present-day Macedonia. Such attempt should include resettling o f Serbs in Zagreb and other Croatian cities, Muslim inhabitants o f Bosnia and Herzegovina should be deported to Anatolia, and people living within a 50 km zone close to the border with Albania should be moved out so that a state o f war could be declared in Kosovo (for more details see Hislope and College, 1997: 4 82-5
286 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
76
77
78 79
80
81
82
and quoted and mentioned sources there). During the campaign for the 1997 presidential elections in Serbia, Seselj expressed his wish that a Greater Germany and a Greater Serbia could become neighbouring countries in a Belgrade TV programme. Besides the FRY, larger groups o f Albanians live in M aced on ia and G reece (around 5 0 ,0 0 0 and around 4 0 0 ,0 0 0 im m igrant w orkers). The statem ent w a s g iv e n in an interview w ith D e r S p ie g e l (published on 6 July 1998). On 11 July 1998 a lo ca l n ew spaper (K oh a D ito re ) p ublished Krasniqi’s statem ent that the previou s statem ent m ay have been m isinterpreted or not properly understand {K o so vo ’s Long Hot Summer..., 1998; see also “The Kosovo war... ”, 1998). The national wealth loss, excluding damaged natural resources, i.e. the loss o f capital in non-economic and economic areas and destroyed infrastructure was estimated to be around $4.1 billion. Human capital loss (excluding Albanians) was estimated to be an additional $2.3 billion. The remaining $23.2 billion were considered opportunity costs for the entire economy, in a form o f the present value o f the lost part o f GDP (excluding the zone o f the “shadow economy”), which was not a direct result o f the physical destruction o f the capital, under the assumption that negative war effects would be felt for the next 10 years. In 1999, industrial production o f the country would be decreased by 44.4% in comparison with 1998, and a significant fall o f activity was predicted for other economic activities including agriculture. Exports would be decreased by around 55%, and imports by 58%. Between 200,000 and 250,000 people would become jobless, and unemployment rate would be increased from 25.1% in 1998 to around 32.6% in 1999 except if the government o f Serbia decided to treat them formally as still employed (see Group 17, 1999: 8-10). The technique o f painting on moist plaster with limewater or a mixture o f colours ground in water (Random House W ebster’s Electronic Dictionary..., 1993). In Ottoman society “levels o f literacy remained low for the indigenous peoples. A few knew a little Greek - the lingua franca o f trade - and knowledge o f Old Church Slavonic was mostly confined to the clergy. Culturally, therefore, the population remained highly differentiated, living most o f their lives within the confines o f local peasant communities, with their own dialects - the vehicle for folk songs and poetry dress, and customs” (Encyclopaedia Britannica, 1995). There is something clear in being Orthodox, using the Cyrillic alphabet, having been under the Ottomans, being further to the East, having been anti-German during the Second World War and having had the capital o f what was once a Communist country. The corresponding list for the Croats (Catholic, Latin, Habsburg, to the West, pro-German, not having the capital) makes for easier identification for Western media. The troublesome cognitive, dissonance in “pro-German” can be handled in the usual way, by denial or neglect. For instance, in July 1876 Count Andrassy met with his Russian counterpart Gorchakov in Bohemia, and two diplomats worked out a division o f the Balkans: the west would go to Habsburg Empire, and the east would become Russia’s. The author stressed that, first, a compromise was made in regard to the final goal o f the uprising: Macedonia was to be “self-governed” territory within the Ottoman state, and under collective international control. Secondly, rebellion leadership respected the norms o f the international war humanitarian law. Thirdly, intensive “para-diplomatic” relations were developed with many states and public institutions, trying to obtain its
Notes 287
83
84
85
86 87 88 89
90
91
92 93
94
95
right to represent Macedonia in international relations (for more details see Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1998a: 7). See Kaplan, 1991: 94-104. Control over Macedonia was a key issue in the First and Second Balkan Wars and it can explain Bulgaria’s motivations in both world wars as well. The nationalism drew on deeper traits o f character inherited, presumably, from a distant tribal past, a tendency to view the outsider, generally, with dark suspicion, and to see the political-military opponent, principally, “as a fearful and implacable enemy to be rendered harmless only by total and unpitying destruction. And so it remains today. ... In the face o f extreme nationalistic self-admiration and suspicion o f every neighbour, there was little room for anything resembling conciliation” (Kennan, 1993). It was concluded that in addition the oppressive behaving o f the Bulgarians during the occupation o f Macedonia in the Second World War contributed to a growing sense o f a separate Macedonian identity (Kaplan, 1991: 102). In 1956 over 63% o f the Pirin Macedonia population declared as Macedonians. In 1985 Stanko Todorov, a member o f Bulgarian communist party Politburo, declared Bulgaria as a single-nation country (see Stanovcic, 1988: 88). Published in the journal Vecer and Skopje TV, transmitted by the Belgrade journal Politika and some others 11-15 November 1993. During the 1998 election campaign, to one piece o f graffiti created in the city o f Skopje, which represented the IMRO slogan “Sense in head, Macedonia in heart”, somebody added “Bulgaria in heart”. In 1995 Macedonia became a member o f the Program Partnership for Peace, as the first ex-Yugoslav republic after Slovenia, and the second strategy is related to membership in military alliances (for example, in NATO). Macedonians are the majority, and the percentage o f Albanians has increased from 7.5% in 1992 to 26.5% by the end o f 1993. It could be that in 1992 Albanians were avoiding taking part in the war in Bosnia. The increase indicates that they have either decided to recognize Macedonia’s statehood or seek to infiltrate the army (see Troebst, 1994: 20; more details on ethnicity in Macedonian army see VankovskaCvetkovska, 1996: 10-15). The name o f the sect or movement originates from the name o f its founder, the Bulgarian monk Bogomil. Some authors also call it Patarenes, Cathars, or Manichees. Allegedly, Tito made a deal with the patriarch o f the Serbian Orthodox Church German that what is the present-day Macedonian Orthodox Church should be given some autonomy within the Serbian Church. In 1993, it was noted that the Macedonian Church had a separate identity a generation earlier, but it was still under the Serb patriarchate in Nis. In addition, the Serb, Bulgarian and Greek churches informed the Russian Church that they would not attend its millennium in 1987 if the Macedonian Church was invited on a par with them (see Wiberg, 1993: 107). The patriarch o f the Serbian Orthodox Church Pavle is respected within the Macedonian Church as a wise priest and man, but not as the leader o f the Macedonian Church. Alter considers that groups tend to define their national identity and consciousness in negative terms as being distinct from and in comparison with neighbours. Encounters with the “alien”, other forms o f language, religion, customs and political systems make people aware o f their close ties, shared values and common grounds that render
288 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
96
97
98
99
100
101
communication with their own kind so much easier than with outsiders (see Alter, 1994: 12). As Wiberg has stressed, in the time when the Yugoslav conflicts reoccurred some important motives had little to do with Yugoslavia as such, but resulted from the configuration o f international relations that were in maximal flux (largely due to the dissolution o f the Soviet Union). “A ‘N ew World Order’ had been coined as a phrase, but with little clear content: it might mean American hegemonic leadership or an American position as primus inter p a res, but in either cases it remained unclear when and how the United States was desired and inclined to act in ‘European affairs.’ (Russia was initially treated as largely negligible, but later become more assertive about its own national interests in Europe)” (Wiberg, 1994a: 237). The distinction between weak and strong states used in this volume refers in the first place to the degree o f socio-political cohesion (for more details on this classification, see Buzan, 1991: 94-107). According to Uzunova and Vydrin, in a 1991 opinion poll in post-communist Russia, “a mere 10 percent o f respondents adequately understand what a democratic society is. Another 11 percent support the idea o f democracy, but understand it in an egalitarian or a liberal sense. The absolute majority o f respondents is formed by the 47 percent who have no idea o f what a democracy is and the 23 percent who defined it in a totalitarian, authoritarian or anarchistic sense” (1995: 44-5). For example, according to Zakosek (1992), the outcome o f the first multiparty elections in Croatia “led the HDZ to portray itself as a national liberation movement, rather than as a parliamentary party with a limited mandate to govern. This dangerous claim implies that the HDZ is the sole representative o f Croatia, and that other parties are, as President Franjo Tudjman once stated, ‘political amateurs and dilettantes.’” Zakosek concluded that the problem further underlined the fact the “HDZ is the only Croatian national party in Bosnia” (Zakosek, 1992: 22). Morgenthau presented the relations between politics, ideology and rule stating that the characteristic aspect o f both domestic and international policy is that their chief manifestations are often not represented in the way which reflects that they really are manifestations o f power struggle. The power element (as the direct goal urged by a policy) is frequently explained in ethnic, legal or biological ways. This means that ideological justifications and rationalisations cover up the true nature o f politics. The constant tendency o f politicians is to conceal that their policies are directed towards power; they tend to present them as principles o f an ethnic and legal nature or biological necessities. Morgenthau concluded that - while power is the goal o f all policies - the purpose o f ideologies is to ensure that participation in that race for power becomes psychologically and morally acceptable to the actors and their audience (1967: 83-4). This conclusion could be confirmed by the fact that relatively intensive power struggles were continued within the successor states after the dissolution o f the Second Yugoslavia. Yugoslavia is “a country where the collective subconscious o f the three major actors, Croats, Serbs and Bosniaks, has become collective and individual conscious: what are deeper myths and traumas to other peoples, repressed and/or forgotten, are here on the surface, come out readily, and are easily mobilized by leaders whether to promote their own interest or the interests o f their nation. Or both, since the ‘instrumentalization o f the conflict by cynical leaders’ hypothesis is used by media
Notes 289
102
103
104
105
106
107
108 109
and politicians a reminder may be needed: there has to be something to build upon in the nation for leaders to unleash that much violence” (Galtung, 1996: 2 i 30). The success o f the process o f mass intoxication by the “opium o f nationalism” required a fundamental discontinuity in the composition o f political elites. In the process the supranational elite (communist cadre from the National Liberation War) gave way to moderate nationalists, who were in turn replaced by militant nationalist hawks, obsessed by the megalomania o f the nationalistic ideal, for which no human price is too high to pay. In direct proportion in the composition o f ruling elites a great change in the mood o f the population took place: “from a rather low degree o f (hibernated) nationalistic feelings to the chauvinism embittered by hate. At the end o f this cycle, together with the surfacing o f Fathers o f nations large scale popular support evolved” (see Pecujlic and Nakarada, 1995: 31). According to diplomats who used to be active during the Cold War and at a time when the Non-Aligned Movement was at the peak o f its power, countries that had a proposal or request to be adopted by a UN or some other international organisation, forum or conference, had three major obstacles (i.e. permits) in having it passed: the West, the East and the Movement’s most prominent members including obviously Yugoslavia. Portparole o f KLA Jakup Krasniqi, in an interview for D er Spiegel 6 July 1998, said KLA’s goal was to unify all Albanians in the Balkans. On 11 July 1998 in a local newspaper Koha D itore he stated that the earlier statement may have been not properly understand or misinterpreted (“Kosovo’s Long Hot Summer: Briefing on Military, Humanitarian and Political Developments in Kosovo”, 1998). “A very weak state may be defined more as a gap between its neighbours with little o f political substance underlying the façade o f internationally recognized statehood” (Buzan, 1991: 103). In countries o f Central and Eastern Europe differences begin to emerge in the positions held by the police and the military. In extreme cases the latter - previously often considered as the “crown jew el o f sovereignty” - is acquiring an almost extremely unfavourable social position and is becoming only a mere “decoration o f statehood”, while at the same time, due to the emergence o f ethnic conflicts and the struggle for power, the police are acquiring a privileged position (see a study o f Macedonia’s case Vankovska-Cvetkovska, 1996). More or less similar conclusions could refer to the other successor states, with the exception o f Slovenia. “Territorial loses do not necessarily, or even usually threaten the state with extinction” as states in some historical cases have lost substantial territories without disrupting their historical continuity (Buzan, 1991: 97). To live honestly, not to offend anyone, to give each his own. The three groups o f authors who belong to the main nations in Bosnia and Herzegovina have their own mentioned different theories or hypotheses on the religious and later national origin o f the Muslims or Bosniacs in Bosnia and Herzegovina. If members o f that nation - regardless o f what really happened before the Turks came - are convinced o f the correctness o f the hypothesis that they are descendants o f Bogomils, they can perceive two other theories as some sort o f identity threats. It could happen in the first place because o f their opinion that their historical national roots are unrecognised and in that way denied within the circumstances o f the old and new conflicts and state or “state” security threats that have been existing in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Again almost regardless o f arguments used by those who
290 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia
110
111
112
113
114
115
116
117
118
119
support a different version o f the story, what people believe happened or what they are convinced happened, could be more important than what actually happened. One should bear in mind that - as Roe concluded - “this idea o f defending culture with culture may manifest itself in nationalism. Nationalism can often produce an intense feeling o f self-identification: it will often emphasise the various commonalities such as language, religion, and history, and downplay other ties which may detract from its unity” (Roe, 1997b: 12). “Since, by definition, wars are lost almost as often as won, the art o f prediction must be less than perfect even among the military experts” and, in addition, “the very term ‘w in’ is difficult to define in the case o f nuclear war” (Wiberg, 1983: 163). Only in humans can defensive aggression occur through brainwashing techniques. “In order to persuade people that they are threatened, one needs, above all, the medium o f language; without this, most suggestion would be impossible.” What is needed in addition is a social structure supplying a social foundation for brainwashing. “By and large the power o f suggestion exercised by a ruling group is in proportion to the group’s power over the ruled and/or capacity o f the rulers to use an elaborate ideological system to reduce the faculty o f critical and independent thinking” (Fromm, 1973: 197). As man’s range o f vital interests is much wider than that o f an animal, and as he must survive physically as well as psychically, he is consequently trying to preserve his frame o f orientation and objects o f devotion. When it comes to needs beyond animal needs, it is not easy to define and determine the needs. Wiberg once put it that there were two kind o f madness in the Yugoslav crisis: one within the Second Yugoslavia, and another doing outside it all the things that were predicted by serious analysts to have exactly the opposite effects o f those intended (for more details see Isakovic, 1997a: 26-7). “The combined effects o f the sanctions and the destruction o f the principal industrial infrastructure o f the country, if continued in the absence o f a peace agreement, will soon bring about a situation where FRY will represent a complex humanitarian crisis affecting the entire population, but hitting hardest the most vulnerable members o f society.. (“Briefing to the Security Council...”, 1999: 6). Glenny suggested that maybe a solution could be found within the scope o f the principle “all rights to minorities, excluding the right to secession” (see Glenny, 1995: 57). Hannum concluded that the “so-called ethnic principle o f self-determination has never been seriously considered by the international community to be the sole, or even primary, factor in assessing claims to statehood. Nevertheless, the rhetoric o f ‘one people, one state’ echoes in the speeches o f every dissatisfied minority” (Hannum, 1990: 7). As the Balkan region has a long and extensive tradition o f minority problems, Remington stressed the question how can political parties, attempting to bridge ethnic cleavages, find a common denominator o f national security that will satisfy the Bulgarian majority and Turkish minority in Bulgaria; Romanians and the Hungarians minority in Transylvania; Serbs, Croats, Muslims, and Albanians in the former Yugoslavia? (1994b: 71). An analogous event was predicted in the Soviet Union when birth rates in Central Asian republics became some three times higher than the ones in regions with mostly Slavic and Baltic population. Thus, planners in Moscow anticipated a decrease in the
Notes 291
120
121
share o f Russian population in the Soviet population from 52 percent in 1980 to 48 percent in 1990. That meant that for the first time in history Russians were not going to be an absolute majority within the Soviet population any more (more details Kennedy, 1989: 641-3). “Power ... is always regarded as something ‘legitimate,’ to a greater or lesser degree, meaning that we find it more or less natural to obey it. On the contrary, plain domination appears only to be the result o f our inability to resist its pressure; we obey because we cannot physically do otherwise. But power is obeyed because we think that we ought to do so, because we believe that it is legitimate to obey” (Duverger, 1972: 18). State security threats occur partly as the effects o f some acts and actions that generate societal security threats (for instance, terrorist acts), and partly as the effects o f some others. One could mention violent clashes between groups o f members o f refugee populations o f different nations or with different political orientations, while actions necessary to prevent or stop the clashes could erode civil liberates and liberal selfperceptions within Europe itself.
Bibliography Aldis, Brian W. (1966), Cities and Stones: A T raveller's Yugoslavia , London: Faber and Faber. Alter, P. (1994), N ationalism , London: Edward Arnold. Bakic-Hayden, Milica and Robert M. Hayden (1992), “Orientalist Variations on the Theme ‘Balkans’: Symbolic Geography in Recent Yugoslav Cultural Politics”, Slavic R eview 51, No. 1. Baldwin, David A. (1985), Econom ic Statecraft , Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press. Banac, Ivo (1984), The N ational Question in Yugoslavia: O rigins, H istory, P o litics , Ithaca: Cornell University Press. Bartlett, C. N. O. (1980), The Turkish M inority in Yugoslavia , Bradford, West Yorkshire: Postgraduate School of Yugoslav Studies, University of Bradford. Basic, Goran (1996), “The Post-Communist National State and Ethnic Minorities The Case o f the Second Yugoslavia”, M ünchner zeitschraft f u r Balkankunde , München: Slavica Verlag. Bebler, Anton (1990), “US Strategy and Yugoslavia’s Security”, in William Richey & Predrag Simic (eds), Am erican and Yugoslav Views on 1990s , Belgrade: Institute of International Politics and Economics. Bebler, Anton (1992), “The Yugoslav Crisis and the ‘Yugoslav People’s Army’”, Zürcher Beiträge zur Sicherheitspolitik und Konfliktforschung, Heft Nr. 23. Bjelica, Mihajlo (1983), Stampa i drustvo - Istrazivanje istorije novinarstva (Press and the Society - A Research of History of Journalism), Zavod za udzbenike i nastavna sredstva i Jugoslovenski institut za novinarstvo, Belgrade. Blunden, Margaret (1996), “Bezbednost posle hladnog rata” (Security after the Cold War), M edjunarodna politika (Review of International Affairs), Belgrade, No. 1042. Bogdan, Henry (1989), From W arsaw to Sofia: H istory o f Eastern Europe, Santa Fe, New Mexico: Pro Libertate Publishing. Burg, Steven L. (1983), “The Political Integration of Yugoslavia’s Muslims: Determinants of Success and Failure”, Pittsburgh: Carl Beck Papers in Russian and East European Studies, University of Pittsburgh. Buzan, Barry (1991), People, States and Fear: An Agenda f o r International Security Studies in the P ost-C old War E ra , second edition, London: Harvester Wheatsheaf. Buzan, Barry (1993a), “Societal security and European security”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security Agenda in E urope , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. 292
B ib lio g r a p h y
293
Buzan, Barry (1993b), “Societal security, state security and internationalisation”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security Agenda in E urope , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Buzan, Barry (1993c), “The changing security agenda in Europe”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security Agenda in Europe , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Buzan, Barry, Morten Kelstrup, Pierre Lemaitre, Elzbieta Tromer and Ole Waever, (1990), The European Security O rder Recast: Scenarios f o r the P o st-C o ld War E ra , London: Pinter. Buzan, Barry and B. A. Robertson (1993), “Europe and the Middle East: drifting towards societal cold war”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security Agenda in E urope , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Buzan, Barry and Ole Waever (1997), “Slippery, Contradictory? Sociologically Untenable: The Copenhagen School Replies”, Review o f International Studies , No. 23. Buzan, Barry, Ole Waever and Jaap de Wilde (1998), Security: A N ew F ram ew ork f o r A n alysis , Boulder and London: Lynne Rienner. Calic, Marie-Janine (1996), “Bosnia-Hercegovina after Dayton Opportunities and Risks for Peace”, A ussenpolitik , No. 11. Campbell, David (1992), W riting Security , Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Carlton, David (1993), “Civil war, ‘terrorism’ and public order in Europe”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security A genda in E urope , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Ceric, Salim (1968), M uslim ani srpskohrvatskog jezik a (Muslims of SerboCroatian Language), Sarajevo: Svjetlost. Chirot, Daniel (1995), “Natioanl Liberations and Nationalist Nightmares: The Consequences of the End of Empires in the Twentieth Century” in Beverly Crawford (ed.), M arkets, States, and D em ocracy. The P olitica l Econom y o f Post-C om m unist Transformation , Boulder: Westview Press. Cirkovic, Sima (1964), Istorija srednjovekovne bosanske drzave, Istorija srpskog naroda (The History of Medieval Bosnian State, History o f Serbian People), Vol. 1: O d najstarijih vrem ena do m aricke bitke (1371) (From Oldest Times to the Battle of Marica, 1371), Belgrade: Srpska knjizevna zadruga. Cirkovic, Sima (1981), “Obrazovanje srpske drzave” (Establishing of the Serbian State), Istorija srpskog naroda (History of Serbian People), Vol. I, Belgrade: Srpska knjizevna zadruga. Cohen, Lenard J. (1995), Broken Bonds - Y ugoslavia’s D isintegration and Balkan P olitics in Transition , Boulder: Westview Press.
294 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Craft, Graham (1996), “Searching for Answers to the Macedonian Question: Identity Politics in the Balkans”, Journal o f Public and International Affairs , July, www.wws.princeton.edu/~jpia/July96/craft.html, 29 August 1999. Danilovic, Jelena (1972), “Vojna krajina” (Military Border), in Istorija drzave i p ra v a jugoslovenskih naroda (History of the State and Law of the South Slav Peoples), Belgrade: Naucna knjiga. Danopoulos, Andrew C. and Constantine P. Danopoulos with Filip Kovacevic (1999), “Environmental Policy in the Balkans: The Albanian Experience”, The Carson Environm ental H istory Research Journal , History Department, San Jose State University, Vol. 1, Fall. Danopoulos, Constantine and Adem Chopani (1997), “Albanian Nationalism and Prospects for Greater Albania”, in Constantine Danopoulos (ed.), Crises in the Balkans: Views From the P articipan ts , Boulder: Westview Press. Danopoulos, Constantine and Emilia Ianeva (1999), “Policy-Making - Poverty in the Balkans and the Issue of Reconstruction: Bulgaria and Yugoslavia Compared”, Journal o f Southern Europe and the Balkans , Vol. 1, No. 2. de Nevers, Renee (1997), “Democratization and Ethnic Conflict”, Survival , Vol. 35, No. 2, Summer. Devetak, Silvo (1997), “Razvoj zastite manjina u Evropi s posebnim osvrtom na Sloveniju” (The Development of the Minority Protection in Europe with Special Review on Slovenia), in Srbi u Sloveniji (Serbs in Slovenia), Belgrade: Institut srpskog naroda. Dimitrijevic, Vojin (1980), “Delotvomost medjunarodnih sankcija” (Efficacy of International Sanctions), M edjunarodna politika (Review of International Affairs), No. 722. Dimitrijevic, Vojin (1992a), “Burkina Faso na Drini i Savi” (Burkina Faso on the Drina and the Sava), B orba , Belgrade, 30-31 May. Dimitrijevic, Vojin (1992b), “Upotreba ljudskih prava” (Use of Human rights), in Radmila Nakarada, Lidija Basta-Posavec and Slobodan Samardzic (eds), R aspad Jugoslavije - P roduzetak ili kraj agonije (Disintegration of Yugoslavia - Continuation of or End to Agony), Belgrade: Institut za evropske studije. Dimitrijevic, Vojin (1993), N eizvesnost ljudskih p ra va (Uncertainty of Human Rights), Sremski Karlovci: Zoran Stojanovic’s publishing company. Dimitrijevic, Vojin (1995), “The 1974 Constitution and Constitutional Process as a Factor in the Collapse of Yugoslavia”, in Payam Akhavan i Robert Howse (eds), Yugoslavia the F orm er and Future - Reflections by Scholars fro m the R egion , Washington and Geneva: The Brookings Institution and The UN Research Institute for Social Development. Dimitrijevic, Vojin (1996), “Medjunarodna zajednica i jugoslovenska kriza”, R epublika , No. 133-134, February. Dimitrijevic, Vojin and Jelena Pejic (1996), “UN Sanctions Against Yugoslavia: Two Years Later”, Dimitris Boumantonis and Jarrod Wiener (eds), The United N ations in the N ew W orld O rder - The W orld Organization at Fifty , London: Macmillan.
Bibliography 295 Dimitrijevic, Vojin and Radoslav Stojanovic (1988), M edjunarodni odnosi O snovi opste teorije (International Relations - Foundations of the General Theory), Centar za publikacije Pravnog fakulteta, Belgrade. Djilas, Aleksa (1991), The C ontested Country. Yugoslav Unity and Communist R evolution , Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press. Djilas, Milovan (1962), Conversations with Stalin , London: Rupert Hart-Davis. Doder, Dusko (1993), “Yugoslavia: New War, Old Hatreds”, Foreign P o licy , No. 91, Summer. Dogo, Marco (1992), K osovo. A lbanesi e Serbi: L e radici d el conflicto , Marco: Lungaro. Doxey, Margaret P. (1971), Econom ic Sanctions and International Enforcem ent , Oxford: Oxford University Press. Drzar-Murko, Mojca (1996), “Odnosi z Italijo - klucni problem zunanje politike Slovenije po neodvisnosti” (Relations with Italia - The Key Problem of Slovenia’s Foreign Policy after the Independence), Teorija in p ra k sa , No. 4, July-August. Duverger, Maurice (1972), The Study o f P olitics , New York: Thomas Y. Crowell Company. Filli, Boris (1994), D a ne bi pozabili. Slovenija ni nikomur nié dolzna (One Should not Forget. Slovenia Does not Owes Anything to Anybody), Koper: Zalozba Lipa. Fine, John V. A., Jr. (1975), The Bosnian Church , A N ew Interpretation: A Study o f the Bosnian Church and Its P lace in State and Society fro m the 13th to the 15th C entury , Boulder: East European Quarterly. Fine, John V. A., Jr. (1983), The E arly M edieval Balkans - A C ritical Survey fro m the Sixth to the L ate Twelfth Century , Ann Arbor: The University o f Michigan
Press. Fine, John V. A., Jr. (1987), The L ate M edieval Balkans - A C ritical Survey fro m the L ate Twelfth Century to the Ottoman Conquest , Ann Arbor: The University o f Michigan Press. Fleiner-Gerster, Thomas (1994), “Europe and the Right to Self-Determination”, in Radmila Nakarada (ed.), Europe and D isintegration o f Yugoslavia , Belgrade: Institute for European Studies. Franzius, Enno (1967), H istory o f the Byzantine Empire: M other o f N ations, New York: Funk and Wagnalls. Friedman, Francine (1996), The Bosnian M uslims - D enial o f a N ation , Boulder: Westview Press. Fromm, Erich (1973), The Anatom y o f Human D estructiveness , New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. Fubini, Federico (1996), “Quando Fini sognava Istria e Dalmazia, v Limes”, R ivista Italiana d i g eopolitica , gennaio-marzo. Galtung, Johan (1967), “On the Effects of International Economic Sanctions: With Examples from the Case of Rhodesia”, W orld P o litics , Vol. XIX, April.
296 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Galtung, Johan (1980), P eace P roblem s: Some Case Studies, E ssays in P eace R esearch, Vol. V, Copenhagen: Christian Ejlers. Galtung, Johan (1994), “Ex-Yugoslavia: Some Remarks on Diagnosis, Prognosis and Therapy”, in Radmila Nakarada (ed.), Europe and D isintegration o f Yugoslavia , Belgrade: Institute for European Studies. Galtung, Johan (1996), “Geopolitcal Strategies and the Conflict over and in Yugoslavia”, paper presented at the IPRA XVI General Conference C reating N onviolent Futures, Brisbane, Australia, 8-12 July. Garczynsky, S. (1973), B lad - zrodla - unikanie , Warsawa: Nasza ksi^gamia. Glenny, Misha (1992), “The Massacre of Yugoslavia”, The N ew York R eview o f B ooks , January 30, Vol. XXXIX, No. 3. Glenny, Misha (1995), “The Yugoslav Nightmare”, The N ew York R eview o f B ooks , March 23, Vol. XLII, No. 5. Glusac, Vaso (1945), Istina o bogum ilim a (The Truth on the Bogomils), Belgrade: Luc. Gow, James (1992), Legitim acy and the M ilitary , London: Printer Publishers. Grizold, Anton (1994), “Solving the Refugee Problem in Slovenia”, Journal o f International R elations , Vol. 1, No. 1. Group 17 (1999), Econom ic Consequences o f NATO Bombing: Estim ates o f D am age and Finances R equired f o r Econom ic Reconstruction o f Yugoslavia , Belgrade: “Stubovi kulture”. Guldescu, Stanko (1972), “Bosnia and Herzegovina in Medieval and Modem Times”, Balkania 6, October. Hadzijahic, Muhamed (1990), Porijeklo bosanskih muslimana (Origin of the Bosnia Muslims), Sarajevo: Svjetlost. Hansen, Lene (1993), “Slovenian Identity: State Building on the Balkan Border”, W orking P apers, No. 14, Copenhagen: Centre for Peace and Conflict Research. Hansen, Lene (1996), “Slovenian Identity: State-Building on the Balkan Border”, A lternatives, No. 21. Hannum, Hurst (1990), Autonomy, Sovereignty, and Self-D eterm ination - The A ccom m odation o f Conflicting Rights, Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press. Hay, Denys (1968), Europe: The Em ergence o f an Idea, Edinburgh: Edinburgh University Press. Heisler, Martin O. and Zig Layton-Henry (1993), “Migration and the links between social and societal security”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security Agenda in E urope, London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Herring, Eric (1994), “International Security and Democratization in Eastern Europe”, in Geoffrey Pridham, Eric Herring and George Stanford (eds),
B uilding D em ocracy? The International D im ensions o f D em ocratization in Eastern Europe, London: Leiccester University Press. Hinic, Branko (1992), An A nalysis o f Interrepublican Trade, Belgrade: Institute of
Economic Sciences.
Bibliography 297 Hislope, Robert (1997), “Intra-Ethnic Conflict in Croatia and Serbia: Flanking and Consequences for Democracy”, E ast European Q uarterly , XXX, No. 4, January. Holm, Ulla (1996), “The French Garden is no longer what it has been”, C O PR I W orking P apers, No. 10, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Holsti, Kalevi J. (1996), War, State and the State o f War, Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. Huntington, Samuel P. (1968), P olitical O rder in Changing Societies, New Haven: Yale University Press. Huntington, Samuel P. (1993), “The Clash of Civilizations?”, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 72, No. 3, Summer. Hylland Eriksen, Thomas (1992), “Ethnicity and Nationalism: Definitions and Critical Reflections”, Bulletin o f P eace P roposals, Vol. 23, No. 2. Ignatieff, M. (1993), B lood and Belonging, London: Chatto & Windus. Isakovic, Zlatko (1987), “Osnovne karakteristike medjunarodnog polozaja Albanije i interesa velikih sila u odnosu na nju” (Basic Characteristics of Albania’s International Position and Great Powers’ Interests In Respect to Albania), Ideje (Ideas), No. 4-6, Belgrade. Isakovic, Zlatko (1991), U vod u propagandu (Introduction to Propaganda), Belgrade: Zavod za udzbenike i nastavna sredstva. Isakovic, Zlatko (1994), “Polozaj Makedonije u balkanskom okruzenju” (Macedonia on the Balkans), M edjunarodna politika (Review of International Affairs), No. 1024, Belgrade. Isakovic, Zlatko (1995), “Macedonia, Its Neighbours and Balkan Security”, A nalysis o f Current Events, Association for the Study of Nationalities (Eastern Europe and ex-USSR), Year 6, No. 10, History Department, City College of New York, 2 May. Isakovic, Zlatko (1996a), “Politischeskie i etno-religioznye aspecty yugoslavskogo konflikta” (Political and Ethno-Religious Aspects o f Yugoslav Conflict), Sociologiceskie Issledovaniya, Vol. 5, May. Isakovic, Zlatko (1996b), “Satellites, Media and Democratic Security”, Romanian Journal o f International Affairs, Vol. II. Isakovic, Zlatko (1997a), “Erich Fromm’s Concept of Aggression and the ‘Missing Element’ o f Ethnonational Mobilisation in the Second Yugoslavia”, C O PR I W orking P apers, No. 8 Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Isakovic, Zlatko (1997b), “Expansion of NATO, Conflicts in the Balkans and the Security o f FR Yugoslavia”, CSS Survey, No. 21. Isakovic, Zlatko (1997c), “Medjunarodni polozaj Makedonije” (International Position o f Macedonia), in Momir Stojkovic and Ana Damian (eds), Savrem eni p ro c e si i odnosi na Balkanu (Modem Processes and Relations on the Balkans), Belgrade: Institute for International Politics and Economics and Center for International Studies of the Faculty of Political Sciences.
298 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Isakovic, Zlatko (1997d), “International Position of Macedonia and Balkan Security”, C O P R I Working P a p ers, No. 9, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Isakovic, Zlatko (1998), “Sirenje NATO i bezbednost Jugoslavije” (Expansion of NATO and the Security of FR Yugoslavia), M edjunarodni p ro b lem i (International Problems), Vol. L, No. 1. Isakovic, Zlatko (1999), “Diplomacy and the Conflict in Kosovo - Notes on Threats and Fears”, C O PR I Working P apers, No. 10, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute, http://www.ciaonet.org/, 4 April, 2000. Isakovic, Zlatko (forthcoming), Introduction to a Theory o f P o litica l P o w er in International R elations , Aldershot: Ashgate. Isakovic, Zlatko and Constantine P. Danopoulos (1995), “In Search of Identity: Civil-Military Relations and the Nationhood in the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia (FYROM)”, in Constantine P. Danopoulos and Daniel Zirker (eds), C ivil-M ilitary R elations in Soviet and Yugoslav Successor S tates, Boulder: Westview Press. Ivic, Pavle (1981), “Jezik i njegov razvoj do druge polovine XII veka” (The Language and Its Development to the Second Half of the 12th Century), Istorija srpskog naroda (History of the Serbian People), Vol. 1: O d najstarijih vremena do m aricke bitke (1371) (From Oldest Times to the Battle of Maritsa, 1371), Belgrade: Srpska knjizevna zadruga. Jankovic, Branimir M. (1988), The Balkans in International R elations , New York: St. Martin’s Press. Jankovic, Dragoslav (1972), “Postanak i organizacija jugoslovenskih ranofeudalnih drzava” (The Becoming and Organisation of the Yugoslav Early Feudal States), in Istorija drzave i p ra va jugoslovenskih naroda (History of state and Law of South Slav Peoples), Belgrade: Naucna knjiga. Jelavich, Charles, Barbara Jelavich (1965), The Balkans , Englewood Cliffs: Prentice Hall. Jelavich, Charles, Barbara Jelavich (1977), The Establishm ent o f the Balkan N ational States (1804-1920), Seattle: University of Washington Press. Job, Cvijeto (1993), “Yugoslavia’s Ethnic Furies”, Foreign P olicy, No. 92, Fall. Joenniemi, Pertii (1999), “Toward Postmodern Peace Movements”, P ea ce Work f o r the N ext M illennium, Mariehamn: The Aland Islands Peace Institute. Kaldor, Mary (1990), The Im aginary War: Understanding the E ast-W est Conflict, Oxford: Blackwell. Kaplan, Robert (1991), “History’s Cauldron”, The A tlantic M onthly, June. Kennan, George F. (1993), “The Balkan Crisis 1913 & 1993”, The N ew York R eview o f Books, Vol. XL, No. 13, July. Kennedy, Paul (1989), The R ise and F all o f the G reat P ow ers - Econom ic Change and M ilitary Conflict from 1500 to 2000, London: Fontana Press. Klaic, Nada (1989), Srednjovekovna Bosna: P oliticki p o lo za j bosanskih vladara do Tvrtkove krunidbe (1377. g.) (Medieval Bosnia: Political Position of Bosnian Rulers until the Tvrtko’s Coronation, 1337), Zagreb: Graficki zavod Hrvatske.
Bibliography 299 Klemencic, Mladen (1996), “Croatia rediviva”, in F. W. Carter and H. T. Norris (eds), The Changing Shape o f the Balkans, London: University College London Press. Knezevic, Anthony (1989), A Short H istory o f Croatian N ation , Philadelphia: Croatian Catholic Union. Koch, Koen (1992), “Conflicting Visions of State and Society in Present-Day Yugoslavia”, in Martin van den Heuvel & Jan G. Siccama (eds), The D isintegration o f Yugoslavia, Amsterdam, Atlanta: Rodopi. Kovacevic, Filip (1998), “The Formation of the Albanian Nation: Two Theories”, paper presented at the Central Slavic Conference, Shawnee, Oklahoma, April 24-25. Krunic, Zoran (1997), S trategy a posredn ega nastopanja (Strategy of Indirect Approach), Unigraf: Ljubljana. Laponce, J. A (1996), “The Institutional Options of the Multi-Ethnic State”, P eace and the Sciences , June. Laux, Jeanne Kirk (2000), “The Return to Europe: The Future Political Economy of Eastern Europe”, in Richard Stubbs and Geoffrey R. D. Underhill (eds), P o litica l Econom y and the Changing G lobal O rder, 2nd edition, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Lavrin, Janko (1929), “The Bogomils and Bogomilism”, Slavonic R eview , 8. Lazic, Mladen (1994), Sistem i slom (System and Breakdown), Belgrade: Filip Visnjic. Lewis, Bernard (1976), “The Return to Islam”, Commentary 61, January. Licht Sonja and Mary Kaldor (1992a), “Nationalism and War, Civil Society and Peace”, in Breakdown - War & Reconstruction in Yugoslavia, London: Institute for War and Peace Reporting. Licht, Sonja and Mary Kaldor (1992b), “Nationalism and War, Civil Society and Peace - The Yugoslav Case”, M edjunarodni problem i (International Problems), No. 1-2. Lutovac, Zoran (1997), “Options for Solution of the Problem of Kosovo”, R eview o f International Affairs (Belgrade), Vol. XLVIII, No. 1056. MacKenzie, David (1982), “Serbian Nationalist and Military Organizations and the Piedmont Idea, 1884-1914”, E ast European Q uarterly 15. MacKenzie, David (1985), Ilija Garasanin, Balkan Bism arc, Boulder: East European Monographs. Malesic, Marjan (ed.) (1993), The R ole o f M ass M edia in the Serbian-C roatian Conflict, Stockholm: Styrelsen for psykologiskt forsvar (Rapport nr. 164). Markotich, Stan (1994), “Slovenia”, RFE/RL Research Report, Vol. 3, No. 16, 1994. Markovic, Brana (forthcoming), “Asimetricno drzavno ustrojstvo - resenje za nacionalne probleme u Velikoj Britaniji” (Asymmetric State Organisation - A Solution for National Problems in Great Britain), Belgrade: IMPP.
300 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Maull, Hanns W. (1995-6), “Germany in the Yugoslav Crisis”, Survival, Vol. 37, No. 4, Winter, London: International Institute for Strategic Studies. Melino, Jacques (1993), L es veerties Yougoslaves no sont p a s toutes bonnes a dire, Paris: Alboin Michel. Mellor, Roy E. H. (1975), Eastern Europe: A G eography o f Comecon Countries, New York: Columbia University Press. Michell, C. R. (1981), The Structure o f International Conflict , New York: St. Martin’s Press. Milinkovic, Branko (1992), “Hate Speech - International Legal Prohibition and Yugoslav Practice”, Jugoslovenska revija za m edjunarodno p ra v o (Yugoslav Review for International Law), No. 2-3. Miljkovic, Ema (1995), “Muslimanstvo i bogumilstvo u istoriografiji” (Muslimism and Bogomilism in Historiography), Anthology of Papers Bosna i H ercegovina o d sredn jeg veka do novijeg vrem ena (Bosnia and Herzegovina from Meddle Age to Newer Time), Belgrade: Historical Institute of Serbian Academy of Sciences and Arts. Mirkovic, Mirko (1972), “Jugoslovenske zemlje pod turskom vlascu” (Yugoslav Countries Under the Turkish Rule) in Istorija drzave i p ra v a ju goslovenskih naroda (History of state and Law of South Slav Peoples), Belgrade: Naucna knjiga. Mitrovic, Andrej (1981), P rodor na Balkan - Srbija u P lanovim a A ustro-U garske i N em acke 1908-1918 (Serbia in Plans of Austria-Hungary and Germany 1908 1918), Belgrade: Nolit. Moller, Bjorn (1993), Security Concepts: N ew Challenges and Risks, C O PR I Working Papers, No. 18, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Moller, Bjorn (1997), The P o st-C o ld War (Ir)relevance o f Non-O ffensive Defence, C O P R I Working P apers, No. 7, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Moller, Bjorn, (1998), “Editorial: NATO, Quo Vadis?”, N O D & Conversion International R esearch N ew sletter, No. 47, December. Morgenthau, Hans J. (1967), P olitics Am ong Nations, New York: Knopf. Murdzeva-Skarik, Olga and Svetomir Skarik (1996), “Peace and UNPREDEP in Macedonia”, paper presented at the XVI IPRA General Conference C reating N onviolent Futures, Brisbane, Australia, 8-12 July. N arodne m anjsine 2, P olozaj hrvaske, slovenske in srbske m anjsine na m adzarskem (Peoples’ Minorities 2, Position of Croatian, Slovene and Serbian
Minority in Hungary) (1991), Ljubljana: Slovenska akademija znanosti in umetnosti. Nikolis, Dusan (1992), “SAD i jugoslovenska kriza” (USA and the Yugoslav Crisis), M edju n arodn iproblem i (International Problems), No. 1-2, Belgrade. 0berg, Jan (1994), “Conflict-Mitigation in Former Yugoslavia - It Could Still Be Possible”, in Radmila Nakarada (ed.), Europe and D isintegration o f Yugoslavia, Belgrade: Institute for European Studies.
Bibliography 301 Obradovic, Dragana (1991), “Jugoslavia u raspadanju: Pouka za Evropu koja se ujedinjuje” (Yugoslavia in Disintegration - A Lesson for Europe in Integration), in Radmila Nakarada, Lidija Basta-Posavec and Slobodan Samardzic (eds), R aspad Jugoslavije - P roduzetak ili kraj agonije (Disintegration of Yugoslavia - Continuation of or End to Agony), Belgrade: Institut za evropske studije. Omerzu, Mojca (1995), “Od ljudske armade do okupatorske armade” (From People’s Army to an Occupatory Army), B orec , No. 542-543, Ljubljana. Pagon, Milan, Anica Mikus Kos (eds) (1998), Begunci v Sloveniji: p re g le d dosedanjih aktivnosti (Refugees in Slovenia: A Review of Previous Activities), Ljubljana: VPVS. Pajic, Zeljko (1988), Socio-ekonom ski razvoj krajeva u SR H rvatskoj naseljenih srpskim stanovnistvom o d 1945 . godine (Socio-Economic Development of Areas in SR Croatia Populated by Serb Inhabitants since 1945), Zbomik radova o povijesti i kulturi srpskog naroda u SR Hrvatskoj 1 (Anthology of Works on History and Culture of Serbian People in SR Croatia), Zagreb: JAZU. Pavlovic, Milivoj (1932), “Dositej Obradovic”, in P. M. Petrovic (ed.), K la sici ju gosloven ski - D ositej O bradovic - D ela (Yugoslav Classics - Dositej Obradovic - Works), Belgrade: Narodno delo. Pecujlic, Miroslav and Radmila Nakarada (1994), “The Breakdown of Yugoslavia and the Constitution of the New World Order”, in Radmila Nakarada (ed.), E urope and D isintegration o f Yugoslavia , Belgrade: Institute for European Studies. Perry, Duncan (1992a), “A Balkan Problem and a European Dilemma”, RFE/RL R esearch R eport 1, June. Perry, Duncan (1992b), “The Republic of Macedonia and the Odds for Survival”, RFE/RL Research R eport 1, November. Pesakovic, Gordana (1994), “The Disintegration of Yugoslavia and of the USSR: Economic Consequences and Perspectives”, in Radmila Nakarada (ed.), Europe and D isintegration o f Yugoslavia, Belgrade: Institute for European Studies. Pesic, Vesna (1990), “O krivicnom delu silovanja: Uporedna analiza za SFRJ, uzu Srbiju, Kosovo i Vojvodinu”, (On Crime of Rape: A Comparative Analysis of SFRY, Narrow Serbia, Kosovo and Vojvodina), K osovski cvor: dresiti ili seci? (Kosovo Knot: To Untie or to Cut?), Belgrade: Chronos. Pesic, Vesna (1996), “Serbian Nationalism and the Origins of the Yugoslav Crisis”, P eacew orks , No. 8, 39, United States Institute of Peace. Petrov, Aleksandar (1991), “Kosovo - Sveta prica srpskog naroda” (Kosovo Holy Story of Serbian People), in Aleksa Djilas (ed.), Srpsko p ita n je , Belgrade: Politika. Petrovic, Ruza (1987), M igracije u Jugoslaviji i etnicki aspekti (Migrations in Yugoslavia and the Ethnic Aspects), Belgrade: IIC. Pettifer, James (1992), “The New Macedonian Question”, International Affairs , No. 68, Vol. 3.
302 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Pilar, Ivo (1918), D ie Südslawische F rage und d er W eltkrie , Vienna: Mazche K.U.K Hof.-, Verlags- U, Universitäts-Buchhandlung. Redzic, Enver (1970), “O posebnosti bosanskih muslimana” (On Particularity of Bosnian Muslims), P reg led , No. 60, April. Reitere, Albert (1996), “Reducing Ethnic Conflicts - Contemporary Approaches to Conflict Solution in Western Europe”, paper presented at the Scientific Symposium N ew D im ensions o f Sustainable Security in the P ost-C old-W ar W orld , Vienna, 2-3 November. Remington, Robin Alison (1993), “Bosnia is foreign problem No. 1 for U.S. Bosnia is a crucial test for Europe”, Kansas City Star , March 14. Remington, Robin Alison (1994a), “Partije, armije i bezbednost u istocnoevropskim balkanskim drzavama” (Parties, Armies and Security in the East European Balkans), in Zlatko Isakovic (ed.), Vojske i prom en e u evropskim socijalistickim zem ljam a (Militaries and the Changes in European Communist States), Belgrade: Institut za evropske studije - YUP ea ce Centar za istrazivanje mira i konflikata. Remington, Robin Alison (1994b), “Security Dilemmas in the Post-Communist Balkans - Party-Army Dynamics”, Eurobalkans , Winter 94/95, No. 17. Remington, Robin Alison (1995), “The Yugoslav Army: Trauma and Transition”, in Constantine P. Danopoulos and Daniel Zirker, C ivil-M ilitary R elations in Soviet and Yugoslav Successor States , Boulder: Westview Press. Remington, Robin Alison (1997), “Ethnonationalism and the Disintegration of Yugoslavia” in Winston A. Van Home (ed.), G lobal Convulsions . Race, Ethnicity, and Nationalism a t the End o f the Twentieth Century , Albany: State University of New York Press. Remington, Robin Alison (forthcoming), “Former Yugoslav Space: The ‘Eastern Question’ and European Security”, European Security. Reuter, Jens (1991), “Yugoslavia’s Role in Changing Europe”, in D. Muller et al. (eds), Vernderungen in Europa - Vereinigung D eutschlands - P erspektiven d er 90er Jahre, Belgrad: Institut für Internationale Politik und Wirtschaft. Richardson, Lewis Fry (1990), Statistics o f D eadly Quarrels , Chicago: Quadrangle Books. Roe, Paul (1977a), “The Intra-State Security Dilemma: Ethnic Conflict as a ‘Tragedy’?”, C O PRI Working Papers, No. 18, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Roe, Paul (1997b), “The Societal Security Dilemma”, C O PR I Working P apers, No. 3, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Roksandic, Drago (1990), Ljudska i gradjanska p ra v a i otvorena pitan ja person aln e i kulturne autonom ije Srba u H rvatskoj (Human and Civil Rights and Open Questions of Personal and Cultural Autonomy of the Serbs in Croatia), Zagreb: Scientia Yugoslavica. Roskin, Michael G. (1991), The Rebirth o f E ast Europe, Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice Hall.
Bibliography 303 Rossos, Andrew (1994), “The British Foreign Office and Macedonian National Identity, 1918-1941”, Slavic R eview 53, Summer. Rot, Nikola (1989), O snovi socijalne psih ologije (Fundamentals of Social Psychology), Belgrade: Zavod za udzbenike i nastavna sredstva. Salmon, Trevor C. (1993), “Testing Times for European Political Cooperation: the Gulf and Yugoslavia, 1990-1992”, International Affairs , Vol. 68, No. 2. Schierup, Carl-Urlik (1990), M igration , Socialism and the International D ivision o f Labor - The Yugoslavian Experience , Aldershot: Avebury. Schierup, Carl-Ulrik and Aleksandra Âlund (1986), Will They still Be D ancing? Integration and Ethnic Transformation am ong Yugoslav Im m igrants in Scandinavia, Umeâ: Department of Sociology of the Univesity of Umeâ. Sekelj, Laslo (1993), Yugoslavia: The P rocess o f D isintegration , New York:
Columbia University Press. Sharp, Jane M. O. and Michael Clarke (1996), “Making Dayton Work: The Future of the Bosnian Peace Process”, London: Centre for Defence Studies, 4 December. Simic, Andrei (1997), “Montenegro: Beyond the Myth” in Constantine P. Danopoulos and Kostas G. Messas (eds), Crises in the B alkans . View fro m the P articipants, Boulder: Westview Press. Simic, Predrag (1992), “The Challenges of Possible ‘Eastern Enlargement’ of the EC”, in Wolfgang Wessels (ed.), D eepening Versus Widening - D eb a te on the Shape o f EC-Europe in the N ineties, Bonn: Institut flir Europische Politik. Simic, Predrag (1993), “Civil War in Yugoslavia: From Local Conflict to European Crisis”, in Armand Clesse and Andrei Kortunov (eds), The P o litica l and Strategic Im plication o f the State C rises in C entral and Eastern Europe,
Luxembourg: Institute for European and International Studies. Simic, Predrag (1994), “Le conflit serbo-croate et l’éclateent de la Yougoslavie”, P olitiqu e étrangère, N o. 1. Simic, Predrag (1998), “Albansko pitanje - povodom knjige Mirande Vikers i Dzejmsa Petifera” (Albanian Question - On the Occasion of the Miranda Vickers and James Ptettifer’s Book A lbanija - o d anarhije do balkanskog identiteta (Albania - From Anarchy to a Balkan Identity), Belgrade: Nea. Sire, Ljubo (1989) Between H itler and Stalin, London: Andre Deutsch. Smith, Anthony D. (1991), N ational Identity, London: Penguin. Smith, Anthony D. (1996), “Culture, community and territory: the politics of ethnicity and nationalism”, International Affairs, Vol. 72, No. 3. Smith, Anthony D. (ed.) (1992), Ethnicity and N ationalism , Leiden: Brill. Stanovcic, Vojislav (1988), “History and Status of Ethnic Conflicts”, in Dennison Rusinow (ed.), Yugoslavia - A F ractured Federalism , Washington DS: The Wilson Center Press. Stanovcic, Vojislav (1989), “How political and Constitutional Institutions Deal with a People of Ethnic Diversity: The Yugoslav Experience”, in Robert A. Goldwin, Art Kaufman and William A. Schamibra, F orging Unity Out o f
304 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia D iversity - The A pproaches o f Eight N ations , Washington, D.C., American
Enterprise Institute for Public Policy Research. Stanovcic, Vojislav (1995), “Constitutional Institutions and the Rule of Law in Multi-Ethnic States”, paper presented at The Fourth World Congress of the International Association of Constitutional Law, Tokyo, 25 - 28 September. Stanovcic, Vojislav and Robin Remington (1991), “Bureaucracy and Socialism: The Experience of Yugoslavia”, in Jaroslav Piekalkiewic and Christopher Hamilton (eds), P ublic Bureaucracy Between Reform and R esistance , New York, Oxford: Berg Publishers and San Martins Press. Suceska, Avdo (1969), “Istorijske osnove nacionalne posebnosti bosanskohercegovackih Muslimana” (Historical Bases of the National Speciality of Bosnia-Herzegovina Muslims), Jugoslovenski istorijski casopis 4. Sugar, Peter F. and Ivo J. Lederer (1969), Nationalism in Eastern E urope , Seattle: University of Washington Press. Taylor, Peter (1994), “The State as Container: Territoriality in The Modem World System”, P rogress in Human G eography 40, Vol. 2. Teokarevic, Jovan (1998), “Forward to the Past: FR Yugoslavia’s Economy Admits further Sanctions and Simulated Reforms”, CSS Survey, No. 22. Thompson, Mark (1994), “Forging War. The Media in Serbia, Croatia and BosniaHercegovina”, A rticle 19, London. Tomasevski, Katarina (1997), Between Sanctions and Elections - A id D onors and Their Human Rights Perform ance , London and Washington: Pinter. Troebst, Stefan (1994), “Macedonia: Power Keg Defused”, RFE/RL Research R eport, No. 47, January. Troebst, Stefan (1998), “Conflict in Kosovo: Failure of Prevention? - An Analytical Documentation, 1992-1998”, E CM I Working P aper, No. 1, May. Troebst, Stefan (forthcoming), “IMRO + 100 = FYROM? - The Politics of Macedonian Historiography”, in James Pettifer (ed.) The N ew M acedonian Q uestion, Oxford: Oxford University Press. Tucovic, D. (1914), Srbija i Arbanija - P rilog kritici osvajacke p o litik e srpske burzoazije (Serbia and Albania - A Contribution to Critic of the Conquering Politics of Serbian Bourgeoisie), Belgrade: Nova stamparija Save Radenkovica i brata. Tudjman, Franjo (1989), Bespuca - povjesn e zbiljnosti (Wastelands - Historical Reality), Zagreb: Nakladni zavod Matice Hrvatske. Uzunova, Valentina and Vydrin, Valentin F. (1995), “Violence as a Side Effect of the Shift of Values in Post-Totalitarian Society”, in Hakan Wiberg (ed.), P ea ce and War - Social and Cultural A spects, Warsaw: UNESCO, Centre for Peace and Conflict Research & BEL CORP. Vallensteen, Peter (1968), “Characteristics of Economic Sanctions”, Journal o f P ea ce Research, No. 3. Vankovska-Cvetkovska, Biljana (1996), “The Trial of Democracy in ‘Macedonia’: The Ethnic Problems and the Military”, paper presented on the International Conference o f the International Political Science Association (IPSA), Research
Bibliography 305 Committee “Armed Forces and Society”, N ational Security an d G lobalization, Seoul, 23-26 July. Vankovska-Cvetkovska, Biljana (1997a), “Albania’s Turmoil Once Again: Political Decay and the Military”, CSS Survey, No. 21. Vankovska-Cvetkovska, Biljana (1997b), “Sovereignty Principle and Ethnic Pluralism - A Challenge to Macedonian State”, M edjunarodni p ro b lem i (International Problems), Vol. XLIX, No. 4. Vankovska-Cvetkovska, Biljana (1998a), “Post-komunistickata drzava i vojskata: makedonskiot predizvik” (Post-Communist State and the Military: Macedonian Challenge), in Trajan Gocevski (ed.), O dbranbeno-zastitniot sistem na R epublika M akedonija: sostojbi i perspektivi (Defence and Security System of the Republic of Macedonia: Current Situation and Prospects for the Future), Skopje: Ministerstvo za odbrana i Filozofski fakultet. Vankovska-Cvetkovska, Biljana (1998b), “UNPREDEP in Macedonia: New Approach to the Concept of Modem Diplomacy?”, paper presented at the International Studies Association 39th Annual Convention The Westphalian System in G lobal and H istorical P erspective , 17-21 March, Minneapolis, USA. Vayrynen, Raimo (1998), “Weak states and Humanitarian Emergencies: Failure, Predation, and Bent-Seeking”, paper prepared for the 39th Annual Convention of the International Studies Association, Minneapolis, March 17-21. Djuric, Vojislav (1964), “Buk Stefanovic Karadzic”, in Vojislav Djuric (ed.) Vukovi za p isi (Vuk’s Notes), Belgrade: Srpska knjizevna zadruga. Waever, Ole (1993), “Societal security: the concept”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration an d the N ew Security Agenda in E urope , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Waever, Ole (1994), “Insecurity and Identity Unlimited”, C O P R I Working P apers, No. 14, Copenhagen: Copenhagen Peace Research Institute. Waever, Ole (1995), “Securitization and Desecuritization”, in R. Lipschutz, (ed.), On Security, New York: Columbia University Press. Waever, Ole and Morten Kelstrup (1993), “Europe and Its Nations: Political and Cultural Identities”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup and Pierre Lemaitre (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security A genda in Europe, London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Walter, Wriston (1997), “Bits, Bytes and Diplomacy”, Foreign Affairs, Vol. 76, No. 5, September-October. Web Development Team (1995), “Serbo-Croatian Note”, Oregon: Yamada Language Center, University of Oregon, http://babel.uoregon.edu/yamada/guides/serbocroat2.html. Weber, Max (1972), Wirschaft und G esellschaft: G rundriss d e r verstenhenden Sociologie, Ttibringen: J. C. B. Mohr. Weber, Max (1976), P rivreda i drustvo (Economy and Society), Belgrade: Prosveta, Vol. I.
306 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Wiberg, Hakan (1983), “Measuring Military Expenditures: Purposes, Methods, Sources”, C ooperation and Conflict , Vol. XVIII. Wiberg, Hakan (1991), “Divided Nations and Divided States”, Working P apers , No. 11, Copenhagen: Centre for Peace and Conflict Research. Wiberg, Hakan (1992), “Divided States and Divided Nations as a Security Problem - The Case o f Yugoslavia”, Working P apers , No. 14, Copenhagen: Centre for Peace and Conflict Research. Wiberg, Hakan (1993), “Societal Security and the Explosion of Yugoslavia”, in Ole Waever, Barry Buzan, Morten Kelstrup & Pierre Lemaitre, (eds), Identity, M igration and the N ew Security Agenda in E urope , London: Pinter Publishers Ltd. Wiberg, Hakan (1994a), “Making Peace in Former Yugoslavia: Problems and Lessons”, in James Calleja, Hakan Wiberg & Salvino Busutttil, in collaboration with Sanaa Osseiran & Peri Pamir (eds), The Search f o r P ea ce in the M editerranean Region. P roblem s and P rospects , Valetta: Mireva Publishers. Wiberg, Hakan (1994b), “Yugoslavia and conflict resolution: problems and lessons”, in Dusan Janjic (ed.), Religion and War , Belgrade: European Movement in Serbia Wiberg, Hakan (1995a), “Ethnicity, Identity, Conflict”, From N onviolent Liberation to Tolerance - The D evelopm ent o f C ivil Society in Eastern C entral Europe, Reports and Abstracts, Conference From N onviolent L iberation to Tolerance - The D evelopm ent o f C ivil Society in Eastern C entral E urope , Vilnius: LOGOS. Wiberg, Hakan (1995b), “Former Yugoslavia: nations above all”, in Bogdan Goralczyk, Wojciech Kostecki, Katarzyna Zukrowska (eds), In Pursuit o f Europe - Transformations o f Post-Com m unist States, 1989-1994 , Warsaw: Institute o f Political Studies Polish Academy of Sciences. Wiberg, Hakan (1995c), Introduction, in Hakan Wiberg (ed.), P ea ce and War Social and Cultural A spects , Warsaw: UNESCO, Centre for Peace and Conflict Research & BEL CORP. Wiberg, Hakan (1996a), “Security Problems of Small Nations”, in Werner Bauwens, Armand Clesse, Olav F. Rnudsen & Nicholas Sherwen (ed.), Sm all States and the Security Challenge in the N ew E urope , London and Washington: Brassey’s. Wiberg, Hakan (1996b), “Third Party Intervention in Yugoslavia - Problems and Lessons”, in Jaap de Wilde and Hakan Wiberg (eds), O rganized Anarchy in E urope - The R ole o f States and Intergovernm ental O rganizations , London and New York: Tauris Academic Studies, I.B. Tauris Publishers. Wiberg, Hakan (1998), “Identifying Conflicts and Solutions”, Romanian Journal o f International A ffairs , Vol. 4, No. 1. Woodhouse, Tom (1996), “Ethnicity, Conflict Resolution and Post-Cold War Security”, in Lee-Anne Broadhead (ed.), Issues in P ea ce Research 1995-96 , Bradford: University of Bradford.
Bibliography 307 Zahariadis, Nikolaos (1994a), “Is the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia Security Threat to Greece?”, M editerranean Q uarterly , Vol. 5, No. 1, Winter. Zahariadis, Nikolaos (1994b), “Nationalism and Small-State Foreign Policy: The Greek Response to the Contemporary Macedonian Issue”, P o litica l Science Q uarterly , Fall. Zakosek, Nenad (1992), “National Liberation, But no Normalcy”, in Breakdown War and Reconstruction in Yugoslavia , London: Institute for War and Peace Reporting. Zametica, John (1992), The Yugloslav Conflict, Adelphi Paper II 270, London: International Institute for Strategic Studies. Zavalani, T. (1969), “Albanian Nationalism”, in Peter Sugar and Ivo Lederer (eds), N ationalism in Eastern E urope , Seattle: University of Washington Press. Zunec, Ozren (1996), “Democracy in the ‘Fog of War’: Civil-Military Relations in Croatia” in Constantine P. Danopoulos and Daniel Zirker (eds), Civil-M ilitary R elations in the Soviet and Yugoslav Successor States , Boulder: Westview Press. Zvonarevic, Mladen (1976), Socijalna psihologija (Social Psychology), Zagreb: Skolska knjiga.
Newspaper and Similar Articles “Belgrade Theater Poses Tough Social Questions from Stage” (1999), http://customnews.cnn.com/, 24 August. “UNHCR Warns of Critical Refugee Problem in Serbia” (1999), SHAPE NEWS, Sum m ary and A nalysis , 20 July. Andrejevich, Milan (1992), “More Guns, Less Butter in Bosnia and Herzegovina”, RFE/RL Research R eport , 13 March. 'Associated Press and Reuters (1999), “Montenegro Acts to Ease Serb Grip”, International H erald Tribune , 6 August. Ciric, Aleksandar (1997), “Na putu bez povratka” (On no return trip), Vreme , April. “Despite Violent Image, Serbs See Themselves As Being Persecuted” (1992), Wall Street Journal Europe, 18-19 September. Eyal, Jonatan (1994), “Britanska igra macke i misa” (British Cat and Mouse Game), Interview for the AIM, Vreme (Belgrade), 1 August. Hedges, Chris (1997), “Croatia’s Good Old Days”, International H erald Tribune , 12-13 April. Jaksic, M. (1996), “Slovenci bi trebalo da podignu spomenik JNA” (“Slovenes Should Erect a Monument to the YPA”), Politika, 17 August. Jovanovic, Vladislav, (1995), Interview given to Z bor , Skopje, in N ew s B ulletin , 21 April 1995, Ottawa: Embassy of FR Yugoslavia.
308 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia Keen, John (1995), “Zivi i pusti druge da zive” (Live and Let Live), interview, P olitika (Belgrade), May 30. Kotej, Nik (1996), “Cija Ce vojska biti najjaca na Balkanu” (Whose Army Will Be the Strongest in the Balkans), N edeljni T elegraf (Belgrade), 3 July. Kusovac, Zoran (1991), “Rat je u zraku” (War is in Air), Vreme , March 2. Mijatovic, Nada (1999), “Rastakanje licnosti” (Disintegration o f Personality), R epublika , No. 218-219, 1-31 August. Mikic, Ninko (1997), “Zivot na rezervi” (Life on Reserve), D ram a izbeglistva (Refugee Life Drama), Vreme , April. Moffett, Julie (1997), “Croatia’s human rights record remained poor in 1996”, RFE/RL R eport , Radio Free Europe, 2 March. Niksic, Stevan (1992), “Threats and Blackmail”, Politika: The International W eekly , May 16-22. Prokopijevic, Miroslav (1997), “Kasandra nije vise na RTS-u” (Casandra is not on RTS Anymore), interview, D uga, No. 1668, 24 May - 6 June. Reuters (1999), “Yugoslavia losses $60 bln in NATO conflict - EIU”, SHAPE NEW'S , Morning Update, 23 August. Rosenthal, A. M. (1997), “Why Wink at Croatian Fascism?”, The N ew York Times , reprinted in International H erald Tribune , 16 April. Schapiro, Mark (1999), “Serbia’s Lost Generation”, September/October, www.motherjones.com/motherJones/S099/serbia.h, 28 October, 2000. Tanjug (1994), “Zakasnelo Bejkerovo Priznanje” (Late Baker’s Confession), P olitika (Belgrade), 6 March. Tarle, Zvonko (1997), “Ruke za zutu traku” (Hands for Yellow Ribbon), D ram a izbeglistva (Refugee Life Drama), Vreme , April. Vasic, Milos et al. (1996), “Kako promeniti imidz Srbije” (How to Change Serbia’s Image), Vreme , 10 August. “Western diplomats reject call for Serb enclaves” (1999), http://customnews.cnn.com/, 25 August.
Lexicography, Documents and Similar Sources Annan, Kofi (1977), Report on UNTAES to the UN Security Council, 20 October. “Briefing to the Security Council by Under-Secretary-General Sergio Vieira de Mello on the UN Inter-Agency Needs Assessment Mission to the Federal Republic o f Yugoslavia” (1999), United Nations Facsimile System, 2 June. Bulletin o f the European Communities (1991), Vol. 24, No. 12. Carnegie Endowment for International Peace (1993), The O ther Balkan Wars , Washington, D.C.: A Carnegie Book. “Conflicts and Reconciliation in the Schools in Eastern Slavonia: The U.N. Is Needed There in theFuture” (1997), TFF P ress Info, No. 29, November 27. “Covering up NATO’s Balkan Bombing Blunder” (1999), TFF P resslnfo, No. 61, April 14.
Bibliography 309 D ayton P ea ce A ccords (1996), Washington: Office of Public Communication,
Bureau o f Public Affairs, US Department of State.
D em ografska kretanja i karakteristike stanovnistva Jugoslavije p rem a nacionalnoj p rip a d n o sti (Migrations and the Ethnic Characteristic of Yugoslavia’s
Population) (1998), Centar za demografska istrazivanja, Belgrade: IDN. Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1956), Zagreb: Leksikografski zavod FNRJ (Lexicographical Institute o f FNRJ), Vol. 2. Enciklopedija Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1958), Zagreb: Leksikografski zavod FNRJ (Lexicographical Institute of FNRJ), Vol. 3. E nciklopedija Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1960), Zagreb: Leksikografski zavod FNRJ (Lexicographical Institute of FNRJ), Vol. 4. E nciklopedija Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1962), Zagreb: Leksikografski zavod FNRJ (Lexicographical Institute of FNRJ), Vol. 5. E nciklopedija Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1965), Zagreb: Jugoslavenski leksikografski zavod (Lexicographical Institute of Yugoslavia), Vol. 6. E nciklopedija Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1968), Zagreb: Jugoslavenski leksikografski zavod (Lexicographical Institute of Yugoslavia), Vol. 7. E nciklopedija Jugoslavije (Encyclopaedia of Yugoslavia) (1971), Zagreb: Jugoslavenski leksikografski zavod (Lexicographical Institute of Yugoslavia), Vol. 8. E ncyclopaedia Britannica (1995), CD-ROM, 2.0. E ncyclopaedia Britannica (1998), CD. “Fact Sheet: Humanitarian Facts on the Civilian Implementation in Kosovo” (1999), www.usia.gov/regional/eur/balkans/kosovo/99072607.htm_, 26 July. “Funding and Donor Relations”, www.unhcr.ch/fdrs/ga99/alb.htm Operations in Albania, Basic Facts, Global Appeal/Former Yugoslavia & Albania, Operations in Albania, Basic Facts, http://www.unhcr.ch/fdrs/ga99/alb.htm. “Help Serbs and Albanians Settle Their Differences in Kosovo! - A Civilian U.N. Authority Supported By NGOs for a Negotiated Settlement in Kosovo” (1997), TFF P ress Info, No. 24, August “Kosovo - What Can Be Done Now?” (1997), TFF P resslnfo, No. 35, November. “Kosovo’s Long Hot Summer: Briefing on Military, Humanitarian and Political Developments in Kosovo” (1998), International Crisis Group, www.intl-crisisgroup.org, 2 September. “The Kosovo war: No Failure, All Had an Interest in It” (1998), TFF P ressln fo , No. 42, 17 August. Leksikon Jugoslavenskog leksikografskog zavoda (1974), (Lexicon of the Yugoslav Lexicographical Institute), Zagreb: Yugoslav Lexicographical Institute. “Memorandum SANU”, (1989), N ase tem e (Zagreb), No. 33. M icrosoft B ooksh elf 1996-97. Enciklopedija
310 Identity and Security in Former Yugoslavia “National report” (1996), “The Migration of Scientists and Professionals from FR Yugoslavia”, P roceedings o f the International Round Table on the M igration o f Scientists and P rofessionals , Belgrade: Federal Ministry for Development, Science and the Environment and Institute of International Politics and Economics. “NATO’s War - Boomerang Against the West (Part A)” (1999), TFF P resslnfo, No. 65, 30 April. “Opinion o f the Arbitration Committee” (1993), R eview o f the International Affairs (Belgrade), 1001-1002. “Opposition Wins Macedonian Parliamentary Elections” (1998), http://www.crisisweb.org/projects/sbalkans/reports, 4 November.
P ro ject on Ethnic R elations - R eporting in a P ost-C onflict Environment: Bosnian and C roat Journalist M eet, Dubrovnik, 26-28 September 1996. “Rambouillet - A Process Analysis” (1999), TFF P resslnfo, No. 56, February 20. “Rambouillet - Imperialism in Disguise” (1999), TFF P resslnfo, No. 55, 16
February.
Random H ouse W ebster's Electronic D ictionary and Thesaurus (1993), Windows
version 1.0.
SHAPE N E W S -S u m m a ry and A nalysis (1999), 30 August.
“Support Free Media and Education in Serbia Now” (1998), TFF P resslnfo, No. 51, 23 November. “The General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina” (1999), Initialled in Dayton on 21 November 1995 and signed in Paris on 14 December 1995, Annex 2, Agreement on Inter-Entity Boundary Line and Related Issues (With Appendix), http://www.OHR.INT/gfa/gfa-home.htm, http://www.OHR.INT/gfa/gfa-an2.htm, 2 May 2000. The W orld Alm anac and B ook o f Facts 1995, Suite, N.J.: Funk & Wagnalls Corporation. Transition o f Yugoslav Econom y (1992), Belgrade: Institute of Economics. “US Policy Toward Yugoslavia” (1991), Statement released by Department of State Spokesman Margaret Tutwiler, May 24, US Department of State Dispatch, Vol. 2, No. 22, 3 June.
Index Abdic, Fikret, 86, 93-94, 160 Adamic, Louis, 30 Aldis, Brian W , 102 Alexander the Great, 194, 206 Alexander, King, 120, 124, 180, 194, 206 Alia, Ramiz, 135, 176 Andrej evich, Milan, 84 Andric, Ivo, 104, 109, 184 Annan, Kofi, 72 Arsovski, Tome, 216 Àlund, Aleksandra, 155
Cankar, Ivan, 30 Carlton, David, 79, 275 Casule, Kole, 216 Ceric, Salim, 78, 101 Cesaree, August, 61 Chirot, Daniel, 35 Chopani, Adern, 119 Churchill, Winston, 122 Cingo, Zivko, 216 Ciric, Aleksandar, 239 Cirkovic, Sima, 35, 113-114 Clarke, Michael, 81, 95-96, 108 Clinton, Bill, 158, 167, 188 Cop, Matija, 29 Cosic, Dobrica, 65, 201 Craft, Graham, 9 1 ,1 9 3 , 198-201, 203, 206-207, 213, 217, 241, 272-275 Cmojevic, Arsenije III, 117, 182 Cmojevic, Ivan, 182 Cundric, Valentin, 30
Bahtijarevic, Fehim, 105 Baker, James, 140 Bakic-Hayden, Milica, 31 Baldwin, David A., 151, 153, Banac, Ivo, 31,51 Bartlett, C. N. O., 78 Bartók, Béla, 185 Basara, Svetislav, 184 Basic, Goran, 25-26, 45-46, 55, 97-98, 111, 129,217, 246-247 Baudrillard, Jean, ii Bebler, Anton, 123 Békésy, Georg von, 185 Berisha, Sali, 135, 204 Bjelica, Mihajlo, 29, 182 Blunden, Margaret, 2 Bogdan, Henry, 119, 196-199, 212 Bopp, Franz, 179 Bor, Matej alias Vladimir Pavsic, 30 Bulatovic, Miodrag, 158-159 Bulatovic, Momir, 184 Burg, Steven L., 78 Bush, George, 85, 158 Buzan, Barry, 1-4, 13-14, 26, 68, 95, 186, 225-226, 241-246, 249-250, 255, 258-259, 266
Dalmatin, Jurij, 29, 59 Danilovic, Jelena, 38 Danopoulos, Andrew C , 14, 119, 208 Danopoulos, Constantine P., 14, 119, 208 Davico, Oskar, 184 de Nevers, Renee, 268 de Rada, Jeronim, 180 de Wilde, Jaap, 14, 258, 266 Dedajic, Mihailo, 177 Demeter, Dimitrije, 60, 211 Devetak, Silvo, 14, 24 Dibra, Blendi, 14 Dietz, Thomas, 14 Dimitrije, Miladinov, 60, 129, 215 Dimitrijevic, Vojin, 45, 47, 63, 67, 144, 148-149, 151-153 Djilas, Aleksa, 40 Djilas, Milovan, 122 Djukanovic, Milo, 158-160 Djuric, Vojislav, 184
Calie, Marie-Janine, 39, 92-95, 97, 99-
100
Campbell, David, 241
311
312
I d e n tity a n d S e c u r ity in F o r m e r Y u g o sla v ia
Doder, Dusko, 19, 21, 40, 61, 64, 69, 81, 89, 105, 115-116, 120, 140, 202 ,2 1 5 Dole, Bob, 140 Doxey, Margaret P., 152 Draskovic, Jovan, 155 Drenova, Alexander, 180 Drzar-Murko, Mojca, 23 Drzic, Marin, 59 Dusan Powerful, Stefan, 115 Duverger, Maurice, 127 Ferdinand Habsburg, 38 Filipovic, Stjepan, 43 Filli, Boris, 23 Fine, John V. A., Jr., 102, 114,182 Fishta, Gjergj, 180 Fleiner-Gerster, Thomas, 49, 125 Floqi, Kristo, 180 Franzius, Enno, 102 Frashëri, Mehdi, 180 Frashëri, Mid’hat, 180 Friedman, Francine, 3 7 ,4 0 , 56, 60, 777 9 ,8 1 , 100-105, 107, 118, 120 Fromm, Erich, 64, 68-69, 233-237, 257 Fubini, Federico, 23-24 Gaj, Ljudevit, 59 Gallus, Jakob Petelin, 29 Galtung, Johan, 67, 152-153, 189, 230 Galus, Toma, 105 Garczynsky, S., 233 Gellniar, Ernest, 254 Generalic, Ivan, 62 Georgieva, Lidija, 14 Gjalski, Ksaver Sandor, 60 Glenny, Misha, 84,141 Glusac, Vaso, 103 Gow, James, 19 Grafenauer, Niko, 30 Grameno, Mihal, 180 Gregory VII, 115 Grey, Sir Edward, 119 Grizold, Anton, 26 Gundulic, Ivan (Djivo), 59 Hadzijahic, Muhamed, 78 Handl, Camiolus, 29 Handl, Jacob, 29
Hansen, Lene, 4, 14, 17, 22 -2 3 ,2 5 , 27, 31-32 Havel, Vaclav, 235 Hay, Denys, 190 Hayden, Robert M., 31 Hedges, Chris, 70 Heisler, Martin O., 275 Herring, Eric, 206 Hinic, Branko, 207-208, 280 Hislope, Robert, 50-52, 67 Holm, Ulla, 3 Holsti, Kalevi J., 245 Howgate, Kirstin, 14 Hoxha, Enver, 122,135 Huntington, Samuel P., 58, 227 Hussein, Saddam, 140 Ibsen, 180 Ignatieff, M., 69 Iljoski, Vasil, 216 Isakovic, Zlatko, 18, 23, 56, 83, 94, 119, 122,138, 141, 151-152, 199, 203204, 208-209, 219,2 2 2 , 233, 236, 246, 264, 268-269, 271 Ivic, Pavle, 113,178 Izetbegovic, Alija, 82-84, 86-88, 93-94, 145 Jaksic, Djura, 184 Jaksic, M., 58 Jancar, Drago, 30 Janevski, Slavko, 216 Jankovic, Branimir M., 118 Jankovic, Dragoslav, 113, 212 Jarc, Miran alias Janez Suhi, 30 Jelacic, Josip, 39,64-65 Jelavich, Barbara, 40, 175 Jelavich, Charles, 40, 175 Jesus, 102 Job, Cvijeto, 37, 45, 63-66, 70, 81-82, 114,121, 127, 129, 133, 186-188, 231 Joenniemi, Perth, 168 Jokl, Norbert, 179 Jovan, Teokarevic, 14,155, 184 Jovanovic Zmaj, Jovan, 184 Jovanovic, Vladislav, 202 Jurcic, Josip, 29
In d e x Kädär, Jänos, 122 Kadare, Ismail, 184 Kaldor, Mary, 107,138, 229, Kaleb, Vjekoslav, 62 Kaplan, Robert, 198 Karadzic, Vuk, 29, 87, 156, 183 Kardelj, Edvard, 20 Kazan, Isil, 14 Keen, John, 235 Keirby, Anne, 14 Kellas, James, 276 Kelstrup, Morten, 4, 26-27, 32, 254-255, 274 Kennan, George F., 44, 78, 199,213 King Ladislav, 37 King Louis II, 38 Kis, Danilo, 184 Klaic, Nada, 77 Klemencic, Mladen, 38 Kocbek, Edvard, 30 Koch, Koen, 141 Kodäly, Zoltán, 185 Kolar, Slavko, 61 Koliqi, Ernest, 180 Koneski, Blaze, 215-216 Konitsa, Faik, 180 Konstantin, Miladinov, 215, 218 Konstantinovic, Radomir, 66 Kopitar, Jemej, 29 Kosmac, Ciril, 30 Kosovel, Srecko, 30 Kostic, Laza, 184 Kotej, Nik, 98 Kovacevic, Filip, 118-119 Kovacic, Ivan Goran, 61 Kranjcevic, Silvije Strahimir, 60 Kranjec, Misko, 30 Krasniqi, Jakup, 162 Krjisnik, Momcilo, 93 Krleza, Miroslav, 61-62, 65 Krunic, Zoran, 23-24 Kucan, Milan, 21 Kulin, Ban, 77, 223 Kumicic, Evgenij, 60 Kusovac, Zoran, 51 Kusturica, Emir, 106 Lalic, Ivan, 184
313
Landt, Horace, 215 Laponce, J. A, 246 Laux, Jeanne Kirk, 135 Lavrin, Janko, 101, 283 Layton-Henry, Zig, 275 Lazarevic, Laza, 184 Lazic, Mladen, 123 Lederer, Ivo J., 227 Lemaitre, Pierre, 26 Lenin, 4 3 ,1 2 4 Licht, Sonja, 107, 138, 229 Liszt, Franz, 185 Loci, Agron, 14 Louis, 30, 38 Lucic, Hanibal, 59 Lutovac, Zoran, 157-158 Maksimovic, Desanka, 184 Malesic, Maijan, 14, 67 Marinkovic, Ranko, 62 Markotich, Stan, 26 Markovic, Brana, 135, 137, 143, 274 Martic, Milan, 50 Marulic, Marko, 59 Matavulj, Simo, 184 Matos, Antun Gustav, 61 Maull, Hanns W., 58 Mazuranic, Ivan, 60 Melino, Jacques, 67 Mellor, Roy E. H., 280 Mencinger, Joze, 14 Mestrovic, Ivan, 62 Meyer, Gustav, 179 Michael, 115,214 Mihailovic, Dragoljub Draza, 42 Mijatovic, Nada, 168 Mikic, Ninko, 155 Miladinov, Konstantin, 215, 218 Milinkovic, Branko, 64, 67 Miljkovic, Erna, 103 Milosevic, Milos, 21, 46, 50, 87, 94, 115, 134, 140-141, 148-149, 156, 158-161,166-170,210, 265 Milosevic, Slobodan, 21, 46, 50, 87, 94, 1 1 5 ,1 3 4 ,1 4 0 -1 4 1 ,1 4 8 -1 4 9 ,1 5 6 , 158- 161, 166-170,210, 265 Mimica, Vatroslav, 63 Mirkovic, Mirko, 173
314
I d e n tity a n d S e c u rity in F o r m e r Y u g o sla v ia
Misirkov, Krste P., 215 Mitrovic, Andrej, 120, Mjeda, Ndre, 180 Moffett, Julie, 71 Möller, Björn, 5, 163, 168, 209, 257 Murdzeva-Skarik, Olga, 14, 205, 215 Nakarada, Radmila, 137, 231, 272 Napoleon I, 18 Nazor, Vladimir, 61 Nedelkovski, Kole, 215 Nemanja Prvovencani, Stefan II, 115 Nemanja, Stefan I, 101, 115, 182 Nemanjic, Rastko, 115 Nemanjic, Sava, 115, 173 Neumann, John von, 185 Nikolis, Dusan, 134 Nobel, 62, 104, 184-185 Noli, F anS., 180 Obradovic, Dositej, 183 Obradovic, Dragana, 129, 132-133 Obrenovic, Milan, 118 Obrenovic, Milos, 118 Omerzu, Mojca, 19 Orwell, George, 233 Otokar II o f Bohemia, 18 Otto I. Geza, 114 Oberg, Jan, 157-158, 221 Paraga, Dobroslav, 51 Pasko, Dhimiter, 180 Paul, Prince, 121 Pavelic, Ante, 41,45-4 6 , 64, 70, 176 Pavic, Milorad, 184 Pavlovic, Milivoj, 183 Pavlovic, Miodrag, 184 Pecujlic, Miroslav, 137, 231, 272 Pedersen, Holger, 179 Pejic, Jelena, 148-149, 151-152 Pekic, Borislav, 184 Perko, Perko, 58 Perry, Duncan, 201, 203, 206, 216-217 Pesakovic, Gordana, 208 Pesic, Vesna, 134, 137, 142, 201-202 Petar I Njegos, 3 7 ,4 1 ,6 0 , 1 1 7 ,1 7 5 ,1 8 2 Petrov, Aleksandar, 115 Petrovic Njegos, Petar II, 182 Petrovic, Danilo I Nikola, 174
Pettifer, James, 198 Philip II, 194 Pilar, Ivo, 107 Plavsic, Biljana, 93-94, 160 Popa, Vasko, 184 Pope Agaton, 56 Pope John VIII, 59 Poplasen, Nikola, 91 Poradeci, Lasgush, 180 Porphyrogenitus, Constantine VII Flavius, 35-36 Postoli, Foqion, 180 Preradovic, Petar, 60 Presem, France, 29 Pridham, Geoffrey, 280 Prince Kocelj, 16 Prince Lazar, 115-116 Prishtina, Hasan Bey, 118 Prokopijevic, Miroslav, 27 Rabuzin, Ivan, 62 Racin, Kosta, 215 Radicevic, Branko, 184 Raickovic, Stevan, 184 Reitere, Albert, 246 Remec, Miha, 30 Remington, Robin Alison, 19, 38, 41, 85, 123, 126, 143, 145, 148, 168, 221, 224, 227, 2 3 1 ,2 6 9 -2 7 1 ,2 7 5 Reuter, Jens, 134 Roosevelt, Franklin, 122 Roskin, Michael G., 120, 137, 138, 199, 270 Rossos, Andrew, 200 Rot, Nikola, 6 Sakic, Dinko, 42 Salmon, Trevor C., 139 Sandru, Vasile, 14 Schapiro, Mark, 186 Schierup, Carl-Urlik, 9, 123-124,155 Sekelj, Laslo, 43, 123, 125-126, 155-156 Selimovic, Mesa, 106 Seliskar, Tone, 30 Senoa, August, 60 Seselj, Vojislav, 160 Sharp, Jane M. O., 81, 95-96, 108 Simic, Andrei, 117
In d e x Simic, Predrag, 18,21-2 2 ,4 7 -4 8 , 88-89, 139, 142, 144, 162, 278 Sire, Ljubo, 19 Skanderbeg, Gjergj Kastrioti, 77, 117, 180,224 Skarik, Svetomir, 192, 205, 211, 215 Skerlic, Jovan, 184 Slamnig, Ivan, 62 Smith, Anthony D., 4, 32, 276, 281 Snajder, Slobodan, 65 Sokolovic, Mehmed Pasha, 173 Soljan, Antun, 62 Sopov, Aco, 216 Sremac, Stevan, 184 Stalin, Joseph V., 122-123, 125,226 Stanovcic, Vojislav, 57, 113, 119, 121, 126, 200, 231 Starcevic, Ante, 40, 51 Stefanovic Karadzic, Vuk, 29, 87, 156, 183 Stefanovski, Goran, 216 Stepinac, Alojzije, 57 Strossmayer, Josip Juraj, 40, 60 Suceska, Avdo, 78 Sugar, Peter F., 227 Svacic, Petar, 37 Szilard, Leo, 185 Tarle, Zvonko, 155 Täufer, Veno, 30 Taylor, Peter, 241 Teller, Edward, 185 Teokarevic, Jovan, 14, 150, 160 Tesla, Nikola, 62 Thompson, Mark, 67 Tito, Josip Broz, 20, 30,41-43, 56, 6263, 68, 70, 81, 122-127, 130, 133, 137, 171, 176, 189, 200, 2 0 2,213, 224-226, 254, 260 Todorovski, Gane, 216 Tomasevic, Stjepan, 101 Tomasevski, Katarina, 152 Trägärdh, Lars, 14 Troebst, Stefan, 194, 195, 268 Tromer, Elzbieta, 26 Trubar, Primoz, 29 Tucovic, Dimitrije, 129
315
Tudjman, Franjo, 42, 49-51, 57, 66, 68, 70, 87, 129, 141 Udovic, Joze, 30 Ugresic, Dubravka, 62 Ujevic, Augustin Tin, 61 -62 Vallensteen, Peter, 152 Vankovska, Biljana, 14 Vankovska-Cvetkovska, Biljana, 135, 193, 196, 198- 199, 210, 219, 244246 Vasic, Milos, 67, 142 Vasile II, 14, 195 Vidric, Vladimir, 61 Vipotnik, Cene, 30 Vodnik, Anton, 30 Voranc, Prezihov alias Lovro Kuhar, 30 Vraz, Stanko, 60 Vukotic, Dusan, 63 Vukovic, Milan, 51 Waever, Ole, 1-5, 14, 26-27, 32, 57, 72, 95, 190, 206, 224, 226, 229, 254-255, 258, 266, 274, 276, 281 Waldheim, Kurt, 95, 160 Weber, Max, 56, 248, 304 Wiberg, Hakan, 6-12, 14, 20, 22, 27-28, 32, 3 7 ,4 0 , 44, 47-48, 61, 63, 65, 67, 70, 75, 80, 82-90, 103, 106, 121, 128, 130, 133, 139- 142, 145-146, 150, 154, 159, 162, 166, 177, 189, 206, 208, 210, 219-220, 228, 237-239, 246-248, 251, 253, 256, 267, 270, 276 Wigner, Eugene, 185 Wilson, Woodrow, 119, 144 Zahariadis, Nikolaos, 206 Zajc, Dane, 30 Zametica, John, 19, 120 Zavalani, T., 119 Zlobec, Ciril, 30 Zogu, Ahmed Bey, 121 Zunec, Ozren, 38 Zupancic, Oton, 30 Zvonarevic, Mladen, 29 Zvonimir, Dmitar, 37, 41