This paper addresses the influence of the economic crisis on national identity in Slovenia. It first analyzes the creation of the contemporary national identity following independence in 1991 that ...was established in relation to a negatively perceived Balkan identity, which represented “the Other,” and in relation to a “superior” European identity that Slovenia aspired to. With the economic crisis, the dark corners of Slovenia's “successful” post-socialist transition to democracy came to light. Massive layoffs of workers and the bankruptcies of once-solid companies engendered disdain for the political elites and sympathy for marginalized groups. The public blamed the elites for the country's social and economic backsliding, and massive public protests arose in 2012. The aftermath of the protests was a growing need among the people for a new social paradigm toward solidarity. We show that in Slovenia the times of crisis were not times of growing nationalism and exclusion as social theory presupposes but, quite the contrary, they were times of growing solidarity among citizens and with the “Balkan Other.”
Cilj pričujočega prispevka je kritično analizirati dosedanje raziskovanje diskriminacije v Sloveniji s poudarkom na raziskovanju intersekcijske diskriminacije, ki omogoča razumevanje novih vsebin in ...novih realnosti diskriminacije v sodobnih družbah. Prispevek predstavi pregled opravljenih raziskav s področja diskriminacije v slovenskem prostoru med letoma 1991 in 2018, ki pokaže, da je raziskovanje diskriminacije najpogosteje osredinjeno na enodimenzionalno izkušnjo diskriminacije. Doslej sta bili v Sloveniji opravljeni samo dve empirični študiji, ki neposredno obravnavata intersekcijski pristop k diskriminaciji. To pa ne pomeni, da se z intersekcionalnostjo ne ukvarjajo oziroma je ne obravnavajo druge študije. Nasprotno, že v 90. letih zasledimo raziskave, ki so opozarjale na součinkovanje več osebnih okoliščin na položaj posameznika oziroma posameznice ter na nove družbene realnosti, ki nastajajo na teh presečiščih in s katerimi se srečujejo diskriminirani posamezniki in posameznice.
With the powerful attraction of membership and conditionality, the EU has been
encouraging democratic processes in the Western Balkans, however not always as
successfully as in Central-Eastern ...Europe. This article looks at how the condition of
full cooperation with the ICTY influenced political discourses and public opinion in
Croatia by challenging national identity which was partially built on the patriotic
war and national heroes from the 1990s. The question is why domestic political
elites still complied with the ICTY condition although it clashed with national
identity. The main argument is that even if the so-called ‘ICTY condition’ is
unpopular with the public because it challenges national identity, domestic political
elites still complied with it because the benefits of the European integration process
are greater than its costs.
