This article focuses on the effects of the Covid-19 pandemic and lockdowns in spring 2020, on the sphere of minority language media. Taking a comparative case study approach across 11 minority ...language settings in Europe, the research builds upon expert interviews conducted with practitioners and scholars by the present authors. This is thematically broken down into the areas of audience figures and funding implications, effects on non-news content, relations between majority and minority, logistical aspects, and social media. The findings included a mix of positive and negative aspects, which the analysis places in the context of previous theoretical concepts and legal standards related to minority languages and media. Increased audience figures and social media engagement suggest positive signs for the vitality of minority language media and the options for online breathing spaces of minority language usage. The effects on non-news content are more mixed, with issues due to cancellations as well as new innovative content having differing effects per sphere in terms of genre completeness. However, the status of minority languages and importance of minority language media outlets were insufficiently acknowledged in examples of tense minority-majority interactions as well as cases of funding issues due to reducing advertising revenues.
Whereas Western European governments have devolved political authority to minority regions, governments in Eastern Europe have shied away from using decentralisation to accommodate national ...minorities. This article assesses how these differences affect the secessionism of minority parties. The theoretical section argues that both programmatic accommodation (i.e. when governments adopt positions in favour of decentralisation) and institutional accommodation (i.e. when governments create regions that correspond to the settlement areas of minority groups and transfer authority to the regional level) increase the likelihood that minority parties will adopt secessionist positions. Regression analyses of 83 European minority parties show that a higher level of programmatic and institutional accommodation is indeed associated with a higher likelihood of secessionism. However, increases in programmatic accommodation between 2011 and 2017 in fact decrease the likelihood that minority parties turn secessionist when using the method of first differences. Future research should therefore collect panel data on minority parties' positions.
In the Norwegian truth and reconciliation commission («Kommisjonen for å granske fornorskingspolitikk og urett overfor samer, kvener og norskfinner, og skogfinner»), appointed 2018, much emphasis is ...on giving those affected by the so-called ‘politics of Norwegianization’ an opportunity to tell their narratives about the consequences of this policy (usually said to have taken place during the duration of 1850–1950). In the mandate, formulated by the Norwegian Parliament, the commission is urged to provide opportunities for those affected to share their personal experiences and narratives of the Norwegianization policy. The narratives are collected and documented through interviews and open meetings. Partly based on the work of other similar truth commissions, this article will examine how such collected narratives have been interpreted. From a folkloristic point of view, what kind of narratives can they be categorized as, and what happens when the context for dissemination changes from the private space to a public investigation? Can folkloristic research in any way support the understanding and appreciation of these narratives?
This article explores the relationship that exists between ideology and political interest and applies it to the study of the international system that arose in Europe after the First World War. ...Following Alexander Wendt’s approach to identity as a socializing process, we have underscored the extent to which the principles of the Versailles system affected its member’s identities and goals. Because these assumptions derived from the national narratives that had become widespread in Europe during the previous decades, the new international framework became decisively modelled in accord to nationalist ideas. In turn, this meant that member states were socialised within an environment in which nationalist claims and interests could be perceived as legitimate. By depicting nations as the product of narrative practices, this research tries to shed light on the ways in which the institutionalised logic of national discourse influenced international developments after 1920. To do so, a general examination of some political instability issues in interwar Europe will be provided so as to analyse the degree to which nationalist assumptions shaped them. Finally, we argue that this framework had enormous consequences not just for minority and border populations which became increasingly regarded as factors of instability, but also for the broader objective of the Versailles system of maintaining a specific balance of power in Europe.
Peculiarities of the international legal status determination of the national minorities within the Versailles system have been studied using the example of a number of Central and Eastern European ...countries. The governments of Czechoslovakia, Poland, and Hungary were asked, based on the norms of international law, to develop appropriate provisions for the protection of the rights of national minorities in order to prevent new conflicts and threats to peace.
The system of treaties, declarations and agreements, which were supposed to ensure the observance of the rights of national minorities and whose guarantor was the League of Nations, has been analyzed. In practice, this was embodied in giving minorities the right to submit petitions to the Council or Assembly of the League of Nations, as well as in the activities of the Permanent Chamber of International Justice. The right to submit petitions was used at different times by representatives of the Ruthenian minority in Czechoslovakia, the Russian minority in Eastern Galicia, the Jewish minority in Hungary, the German minority in Poland, etc.
The weaknesses of this system have been identified, which prevented the creation of effective international mechanisms for the protection of the rights of national minorities in the specified regions of Europe. In particular, it has been emphasized that the majority of treaties, conventions, treatises, etc. were openly sabotaged by the countries that were supposed to fulfill them. The governments of the countries of Central and Eastern Europe considered the proposed system unequal, because its conditions did not apply to a number of other multinational states that had similar problems. Conflict situations surrounding the problem of national minorities continued to arise. They were caused by various factors: from divided loyalties and irredentist movements to manifestations of governmental and social discrimination.
Measuring institutional mechanisms that facilitate ethno‐national representation is a difficult enterprise. Most studies examine the electoral system, while a set of other indices focus on designs ...and policies related to minority recognition. This article addresses a number of gaps in the existing literature by taking a wide view that considers a breadth of institutional designs that facilitate representation in a political system. The goal is to recalibrate our theoretical and empirical approach to measuring ethno‐national representation – to move beyond narrower assessments based solely on the electoral system, while also providing additional depth and breadth to existing indices and studies of related aspects of institutional design. To achieve this goal, the article (1) constructs an analytical framework that accounts for the institutional mechanisms that facilitate the direct and indirect representation of ethno‐national minorities across both macro‐level and micro‐level institutional designs in a state and (2) applies this framework to map institutional designs in twelve states to provide an indication of the usefulness of a new measurement tool (a representation index). The argument is that this framework and tool provide a corrective to the limitations of current approaches, advancing our ability to measure the institutional mechanisms of minority representation.
The words “national minorities” have not always been part of Russian and Ukrainian Constitutions. Starting from this assumption, this essay aims to verify - from a diachronic and synchronic ...comparative perspective - whether the introduction of those words in different historical phases led to a significant dissimilarity in the way the two countries developed their respective legal regulation on national minorities, or if, in spite of that, they still elaborated a similar one.
Abstract
This study looks into Ukraine's minority politics after the Revolution of Dignity of 2014. It analyses the inclusivity of minority politics against three key parameters - institutional ...framework, dialogue mechanisms, and non-discriminatory policies. The research is conducted through an in-depth comparison analysis of minority politics of two post-revolutionary presidents - Petro Poroshenko (full term) and Volodymyr Zelenskyi (first two years). The conclusion is made that the political elites failed to drive an inclusive course towards ethno-linguistic minorities. The inclusivity along the three criteria has been provided impetus either on ad-hoc basis or not at all. On the level of policies, a regression can be observed. The underlying cause for the state not succeeding in achieving an inclusive minority course is that the two administrations had predominantly divergent motives for addressing this topic. As a result, the implementation of some inclusivity-oriented measures suffered and the minority-related discourse became highly politicized.
Zaštita prava manjina, što podrazumijeva i osiguranje učinkovitog sudjelovanja, kako u političkom, tako i u kulturnom, društvenom i gospodarskom životu pripadnika nacionalnih manjina, nedjeljiva je ...od načela zabrane diskriminacije. Republika Hrvatska primjer je dobro uređenog normativnog okvira učinkovitog sudjelovanja pripadnika nacionalnih manjina, što podrazumijeva i njihovo sudjelovanje u tijelima javne uprave. Zato je s ciljem utvrđivanja trendova u zapošljavanju pripadnika nacionalnih manjina u tim tijelima – tijelima državne uprave, pravosudnim tijelima i upravnim tijelima jedinica lokalne i područne (regionalne) samouprave – napravljena analiza javno dostupnih podataka iz izvješća o provođenju Ustavnog zakona o pravima nacionalnih manjina od 2009. do 2021. godine. Također, napravljena je analiza podataka o pojavnosti diskriminacije na temelju etničke pripadnosti u području rada i zapošljavanja iz izvješća o pojavama diskriminacije Ureda pučke pravobraniteljice. Analiza rezultata pokazuje trendove smanjenja udjela zaposlenih pripadnika nacionalnih manjina u spomenutim tijelima.
The protection of the rights of national minorities, which also implies ensuring effective participation, in the political, as well as in the cultural, social and economic life of members of national minorities, is inseparable from the principle of prohibition of discrimination. The Republic of Croatia is an example of a well-regulated normative framework for the effective participation of members of national minorities, which also implies their participation in public administration bodies. With the aim of determining trends in the employment of national minorities in these bodies - state administration bodies, judicial bodies and administrative bodies of local and regional self-government units, an analysis was made of publicly available data from the report on the implementation of the Constitutional Law on the Rights of National Minorities for the period from 2009. until 2021. From the report on the occurrences of discrimination of the Office of the Ombudsman, an analysis was made of the occurrence of discrimination based on ethnicity, as well as in the field of work and employment. Analysis of the results shows decreasing trends in the share of employed members of national minorities in public administration bodies.
Ustavnopravna zaštita nacionalnih manjina Kuzelj, Valentino; Kvartuč, Domeniko; Petričušić, Antonija
Političke perspektive,
03/2022, Letnik:
11, Številka:
2
Journal Article, Paper
Recenzirano
Odprti dostop
Formalni pozitivno-pravni okvir zaštite prava nacionalnih manjina u Republici Hrvatskoj na visokoj je razini uzimajući u obzir odredbe Ustava Republike Hrvatske i Ustavnog zakona o pravima ...nacionalnih manjina (sa snagom organskog zakona), prihvaćenih i potvrđenih međunarodnih ugovora, te drugih zakona i podzakonskih akata. Dodatno, iz ustavnosudske prakse proizlazi spremnost na zaštitu prava nacionalnih manjina, što je apostrofirano potvrdom st. 2. Izvorišnih osnova, čl. 1. i čl. 3. (iz kojih proizlazi prihvaćanje tzv. političkog ili građanskog koncepta naroda), te čl. 15, st. 4. (individualno pravo pripadnika nacionalnih manjina na služenje svojim jezikom i pismom) dijelom hrvatskog ustavnog identiteta. Stoga je razloge problema u ostvarivanju prava nacionalnih manjina potrebno tražiti u nedostatnom stupnju razvoja društvene i političke kulture.
The formal legal frame for the protection of national minorities in Croatia is highly developed considering the regulations of the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia and the Constitutional law on the rights of national minorities (as an organic law), concluded and ratified international treaties, and other laws and by laws. Additionally, the readiness to protect the rights of national minorities is evident from the jurisprudence of the Constitutional Court, which is accentuated by the conformation of the paragraph 2 of the constitutional Preamble, articles 1 and 3 (from which the acceptance of the so-called political conception of the people arises), and article 15, paragraph 4 (individual right of members of national minorities to use their language and script) as a part of the Croatian constitutional identity. Therefore, the reasons for the problems in exercising the rights of national minorities need to be sought in the insufficient level of political culture.
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