Naslov
From war to tolerance? Bottom-up and top-down approaches to (re)building interethnic ties in the areas of the former Yugoslavia

Autori
Banovac, Boris ; Katunarić Vjeran

Vrsta, podvrsta i kategorija rada
Sažeci sa skupova, neobjavljeni rad, znanstveni

Skup
18th Annual World Convention of the Association for the Study of Nationalities (ASN)

Mjesto i datum
Sjedinjene Američke Države, 18.04.2013. - 20.04.2013

Vrsta sudjelovanja
Predavanje

Vrsta recenzije
Međunarodna recenzija

Ključne riječi
former Yugoslavia; ethnic conflicts; multiethnic areas; peaceful coexistence

Sažetak
In recent history Balkans passed through periods of conflict and violence typical of many post- imperial nation-states unable to establish lateral links with their neighbors without or outside the central (imperial) connection. In a way, these states imitated historical records of imperial conquests. In this regard, ethnic conflicts that escalated into wars of the former Yugoslavia can be taken as examples of an erratic transformation of post-imperial into modern nation-states eager to build up democracy at home and peaceful coexistence with others in international environment. Nevertheless, it is not that all multiethnic areas were taken by violence (e.g. instances of “peace enclaves” in multiethnic areas in Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and in Kosovo). On such examples, which will be illustrated with results of empirical research, authors recognize potentials for building tolerance from bellow. On the other hand, in most other places peace was a follow up of post-conflict processes. In these cases, local potentials of ethnic tolerance were rather weak. Nowadays, there is a variety of inter-ethnic relations more or less characterized by tolerance: from Hobbessian equilibrium to civic-democratic consensus. The paper will provide some examples illustrating regional differences in this regard within Croatia. Actually, the whole process of normalization of ethnic relations in peaceful terms is far from going smoothly. Some parts of national elites foster distance and antagonism against the others. On the other hand, in Croatia, which is to be a new member of the EU in 2013, nationalistic rhetoric significantly recedes on the level of the official politics. The question is whether the impact of policies in institutional sphere, both national and international, i.e. top-down approach, is decisive in shaping inter-ethnic relations – as it actually was before and during the wars in the former Yugoslavia. We conclude that the institutional, top-down arrangements of peace and tolerance cannot be sustainable without concomitant micro-or bottom-up processes, which theoretically corresponds to a “conformant policy” vis-a-vis “linear policy” or determinism of the center and contingencies in the peripheries.

Izvorni jezik
Engleski

Znanstvena područja
Sociologija

POVEZANOST RADA