On March 31st, the Nationalism Studies Program hosted Professor Florian Bieber from the University of Kent (UK) for a public lecture: “Is Bosnia Failing? The future of a divided society and what it means for multinational states.” The lecture and subsequent discussion were chaired by Professor Anton Pelinka from the Department of Political Science and the Nationalism Studies Program.
Professor Bieber took stock of the recent development in Bosnian institutional politics, highlighting Catherine Ashton’s recent report as the High Representative for Foreign Affairs of the European Union—an unusually critical statement on Bosnia’s political elite; the newly passed Referendum Law in Republika Sprska; the questions about human rights breaches inherent in the Bosnian constitution raised by the European Court of Human Rights; and the perennial latent threat of inter-communal violent conflict, which has not abated substantially since the signing of the Dayton Accords in 1995.
Bieber noted the increased international interest in the Bosnian situation, from the visits of Catherine Ashton and US Vice-President Joe Biden, to the upcoming meeting of Bosnian politicians in Sarajevo, sponsored by the Spanish presidency of the European Union seeking a joint declaration on Bosnia-Herzegovina’s unity. This renewed concern reflects international qualms about the possible outcomes of a crisis that has resulted from a number of internal and external factors—including the failures of constitutional and police reform, the downgrade of the previous interventionist approach from the international community, and the arrival of what Professor Bieber called “Second-generation nationalists” to power in Bosnia. For Bieber, the sources of institutional friction are to be found in the asymmetrical nature of the Dayton Accords, balanced with the creation of a highly decentralized state with excessive veto points and the lack of representatives elected from a genuinely multiethnic electoral pool.
Professor Bieber concluded his lecture with a call to draw lessons from the Bosnian experience, particularly the dangers of overestimating the power of institutional design for post-conflict societies, and the need to create spaces for a “consensual state” allowing for the articulation of points of common concern amongst communities.
Florian Bieber is a Lecturer in East European Politics at the University of Kent, UK, and a Visiting Professor at the Nationalism Studies Program at CEU. He received his M.A. in Political Science and History and his Ph.D. in Political Science from the University of Vienna, as well as an M.A. in Southeast European Studies from CEU. He has taught at Cornell University, University of Graz, University of Bologna and University of Sarajevo. He is the author of Nationalism in Serbia from the Death of Tito to the Fall of Milosevic (2005) and Post-War Bosnia (2006).