In Part I of this article author details the claims to independent statehood of Croatia and Krajina based upon the right of peoples to self-determination in the context of the emergence of ...nationalism as a powerful political force in Yugoslavia in the early 1990s. He also details the response of the international community to the crisis which these irreconcilable claims gave rise to. In Part II author explores the reasons why the secession of Croatia succeeded and the secession of Krajina failed. Finally, the ramifications of Croatia’s and Krajina’s competing claims to statehood for the right of peoples to self-determination are discussed in the Conclusion.
The article deals with the causes, participants, course, and consequences of the military operation Southern Move (Južni potez), the last battle between the Army of Republika Srpska and Croatian ...forces in the war in Bosnia. The article attempts to throw some light on the role of the Western diplomacy and regional actors in the operation Southern Move. Through an analysis of strategic and operative aspects of the operation, the account of the battle intends to elucidate primary characteristics of the belligerent armies. The article is based on the original sources published by the Hague Tribunal, as well as on secondary sources.
Starting from the political science definition of penal policy as the administering of punishment on subjects related to political power and the organization of the state order, this work seeks to ...provide a contribution to the reconstruction of organized violence and punishment linked to the apparatus of coercion and crimes on the territory of the Republic of Serbian Krajina, a political order established by rebel Serbs in Croatia in the period between 1991 and 1995. The work has two primary functions, historiographical and that of political science. In addition to the analysis of the regulatory and institutional frameworks that were supposed to govern the criminal justice system, this paper empirically reconstructs the work of formal and informal institutions of the Krajina’s penal policy and its “rhythm of crime” on the basis of published sources. The obtained discursive data is interpreted in terms of political theory in order to reconstruct a picture of the relationship between political order and punishment in the observed space and time. Instead of controlling violence and implementing rational punishment, the political order, by its instability and production of political violence, further undermined the loyalty of the population subjected to it.
The intention of this paper is to show the possible prospects of relations between Serbia and Republika Srpska and by giving, in short, the outlines the three possible scenarios for the development ...of future relations between the two states, indicating some possible 'sub-scenarios' within these paradigms. These three paradigms-scenarios are inter-Serbian unification, schism and alienation.
This article examines how rebel Serbs in Croatia reinterpreted narratives of World War Two to justify their uprising against the democratically elected Croatian government in 1990 and gain domestic ...and international legitimacy for the Republika Srpska Krajina (RSK) parastate. While scholars have written about the strategies nationalist elites used regarding controversial symbols and the rehabilitation of World War Two collaborators in Croatia and other Yugoslav successor states, the RSK's “culture of memory” has received little attention. Based on documents captured after the RSK's defeat in 1995, this article shows that it was not only the government of Franjo Tudjman that rejected the Partisan narratives of “Brotherhood and Unity,” but a parallel process took place among the leadership in the Krajina. Ultimately the decision to base the historical foundations of the Croatian Serbs’ political goals on a chauvinist and extremist interpretation of the past resulted in a criminalized entity that ended tragically for both Serbs and Croats living on the territory of the RSK.
The crisis of identity is the underlying hallmark of the contemporary era. It is not confined to the question of the individual but also applies to a more politically serious problem. After the ...breakup of Yugoslavia and the interethnic and civil war, the newly established political entities were faced with ongoing and parallel processes of reverting to the form of collective identity as well as the formulating new facets of national and political identities. These aspects denote an intentionally conceived self-determination in the face of impending challenges. In this paper, emphasis is placed on the role of mass media in terms of identification and self-identification of people, social groups, political communities, and the promotion of political values and goals as well as the encouragement of behavioral patterns concerning mediated political initiateves. .
Writing about the rhetoric of Milorad Dodik, one certainly has to bear in mind his beginnings, especially as a 1998 RS prime minister whom Albright (1998) called a “breath of fresh air” and someone ...“determined to peacebuilding, reconciliation and connection of democratic alternative” in Bosnia and Herzegovina (henceforth BiH). Dodik's early rhetoric that brought him to power abounded in phrases such as “economic progress,” “debt return,” and “opening to the world,” while some media reports referred to him as the “America-supported man who occasionally attended Ambassador Miller's secret dinners” (Dani, 22 September 2000) (Majstorovic et al. 2010). In 1998, Dodik attended donors’ conferences and was given significant support to pursue the reforms he started, including normalization of relations with the BiH Federation and Croatia. In 1998, his results secured him between $400 million and $600 million in aid money (Beta, 13 May 1998).
The paper aims to analyze the main barriers and opportunities for the modernization of the agricultural sector of Republika Srpska with a specific focus on the role of small farms.A particular ...attention has been given to specific elements related to the human, social, and institutional capital. Methodologically the work has been based on an extensive desk research, on the use of a field survey and on a number of personal interviews with national experts and professionals. Overall the investigation has also greatly benefited from the theoretical framework elaborated by R.Yin within the “case study methodology”.
This paper explores the limits and possibilities for postethnic mobilization in Bosnia-Herzegovina. It employs and critically assesses Tarrow's classic concept of political opportunity structure for ...the explaining the variations in the occurrence of postethnic mobilization in Bosnia-Herzegovina, a deeply divided society. While the main cleavages in the country run along ethnic lines, a number of groups and NGOs attempt to mobilize alternative identities across ethnic boundaries. These groups are mostly based in the Federation entity of Bosnia-Herzegovina and not in the Republika Srpska. My analysis shows that the concept of political opportunity structure only partly explains this difference. I thus suggest an alternative perspective, which takes into account the cultural environment in which the mobilization happens. The first part of the paper expands on the definition of postethnic activism, explaining what it is and how I proceeded in researching postethnic groups in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The second part uses the framework of political opportunity structure for assessing the influence of environmental factors on the emergence and development of postethnic activism. The third part of the paper evaluates the relevance of the political opportunity structure framework, considers the merits of an approach which takes into account the cultural context, and suggests some further avenues for research.
The article examines the relations within Serbian wartime leaderships in the first half of 1993, during negotiations about peace plan for Bosnia and Herzegovina known as Vance-Owen plan. On the basis ...of available archival material and published sources, the analyzed positions of political and military leaders of Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, Serbia, Montenegro, Republika Srpska and Republika Srpska Krajina reveal growing cleavage which culminated with renouncing of the peace plan, suggesting hence the need to research polycentric aspect of Serbian wartime policy and the complex character of relations between its leaders.
PDF
