Ethnic sovereignty has unintentionally been promoted by the peace processes of the Balkans. This has arisen through a fundamental weakness of the move towards what Stephen
Krasner
has described as ...'shared sovereignty' whereby vertical local-international relationships have furnished local entities, particularly Kosovo but also in the overlooked case of Republika Srbska, with the material and political assets required to further their claims for sovereignty. Far from aiding peacebuilding, this process has masked a continuing ethnic nationalism with the result that peacebuilding in these contexts has resulted in mono-ethnic entities. This article investigates these problematic dynamics and processes, and argues for basic forms of horizontal governance with and between entities, rather than shared sovereignty and vertical governance, if the peace settlement for the Balkans is to take a more sustainable form.
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