Multinational Federalism in Bosnia and Herzegovina

Soeren Keil

• Publisher: Routledge
• Year: 2016
• ISBN:
  9781317093428
• Edition: 1
• Topic: Politik & Internationale Beziehungen
• Subtopic: Nationalismus & Patriotismus

In 1995 none of the political parties representing the peoples of Bosnia preferred a federal option. Yet, Bosnia became a federal state, highly decentralised and with a complex institutional architecture. This solution was imposed on them by international actors as a result of peace negotiations following the Yugoslav wars. Political parties in post-war Bosnia were not willing to identify with or accept the federation. The international community intervened taking over key decisions and so Bosnia and Herzegovina became the first state to experience a new model of federalism, namely 'imposed federalism' and a new model of a federal state, that of the 'internationally administered federation'. By combining comparative politics, conflict analysis and international relations theory Soeren Keil offers a unique analysis of federalism in post-Dayton Bosnia and Herzegovina. By exploring this model of 'imposed federalism' not only does this study greatly contribute to the literature on developments in Bosnia and Herzegovina it also re-evaluates comparative federalism in theory and practice. This study also offers important conclusions for similar cases, both in the Western Balkans region and the wider world, where international involvement and federalism as a method of conflict resolution in diverse societies becomes ever more prevalent and important.

Chapter 1
Introduction

The introductory chapter will help to understand the reasons why it is important to study federalism in Bosnia and Herzegovina.¹ It will explain the background of this book and some of its evolutionary features. Furthermore, it will highlight the methodology used and define the major terms used in this study. The overall aim is to understand that Bosnia and Herzegovina as a federal country is studied as one case of a number of countries that demonstrate the evolution of new models of federalism, understood here as a political ideology and the normative basis of federation, which shall refer in this piece to a federal state.² This conceptual distinction between federalism and federation informs the book throughout. Therefore, in particular the concluding remarks will refer to some comparative aspects of Bosnian federalism and federation. Finally, the introduction will discuss the structure of this study and the rationale behind it. In short, the book is structured so that the first chapter introduces the reader to the current debates on multinational federalism and multinational federations, whilst the following three chapters will analyse Bosnia and Herzegovina as an example of a new model of multinational federalism and federation. The aim of the concluding chapter is to widen the research findings and provide some insights into the wider comparative merit of this study.

Introduction to the Topic

I first became interested in federalism in Bosnia in 2005. Since 2005, however, we can witness important changes in Bosnia and Herzegovina, including the introduction of a countrywide Value-Added Tax in 2006. Democracy and peace have been stable in the whole Western Balkans over the last years and all countries of the former Yugoslavia are now on the way to membership in the European Union (EU), even if this might be a long way. Bosnia managed to sign a Stabilisation and Association Agreement with the EU in 2008. However, since then no major progress has been made on the country’s path towards membership in the EU. Bosnia has seen important changes in its party system in the 2006 election and again in the 2010 election, and has gone through positive and negative phases. The ambiguous role of the international community and, in particular, of all High Representatives after Lord Paddy Ashdown contributed to a sense of insecurity in Bosnia and Herzegovina, both amongst the leaders of the country and amongst its ordinary people. With Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran and the wider Arab world being at the centre of attention of Western leaders, Bosnia and Herzegovina, because it was peaceful, risked losing out. The political crisis that followed the 2006 election, and the debate about a police reform that finally resulted in the resignation of the Chairperson of the Council of Ministers reminded internal actors that whilst Bosnia is at peace, it is far from being a stable self-sustaining country.³ The long negotiations to form a government after the 2010 election, the failed process of political reform and the lack of progress in the Europeanisation process have also contributed to a sense of Bosnia as a state in permanent crisis.⁴ Additionally, federalism in Bosnia and Herzegovina has become an often-debated topic in the framework of further talks on constitutional reform. There is a lively debate about federalism in Bosnia between the Bosnian elites as well as between representatives of the international community. What is often lacking is a clear understanding of federalism and its advantages and disadvantages in plural societies in general, and in BiH in particular.

This study of federalism and federation in Bosnia and Herzegovina aims at examining the international state-building and democratisation project in Bosnia and Herzegovina from the perspective of its federal nature. It is important, because more than 15 years after the end of the Bosnian conflict we are now able to come to an assessment of international policy in Bosnia that focuses, in particular, on the building of a federal state. This book will focus on assessing its federal features but by doing so will inevitably also contribute to a deeper understanding of international state-building and democratisation. Bosnia is considered a successful example of international intervention by scholars of conflict studies, since we see no large-scale recurrence of violence after 1995. However, such optimism is not appropriate when it comes to the assessment of federalisation, state-building, and democratisation. Whilst there have been major successes, as mentioned above, the latest problems in Bosnia demonstrate that the country is far from self-sustaining and that its only future is the eventual integration into European structures. In contrast to other post-conflict countries, such as Afghanistan or Iraq, the international community has the carrot of European integration in its own hands. To this extent, the success of Bosnia and Herzegovina will also be a success of the EU.

Methodological Concerns

The aim of this book is twofold. On the one hand it aims to examine the federal political system of Bosnia and Herzegovina as it has been implemented (and developed) as a result of the Dayton Peace Agreement of November 1995. This means that the federal system in Bosnia, as well as its normative basis (“federalism as the ideology behind federation”), is the object of the research. In this respect, Bosnia and Herzegovina is a case study where the explanation of a certain social reality within the case is the research focus, namely the application of federalism and federation in Bosnia and Herzegovina after 1995. On the other hand, the federal system of Bosnia and Herzegovina after 1995 is also studied as one case in a wide range of new federal models in the post-Cold War era. In this way, the application of federalism and federation in Bosnia becomes a unit within the research ‘for the purpose of understanding a larger class of (similar) units.’⁵ Consequently, it can be argued that the discussion and analysis of federalism and federation in Bosnia and Herzegovina will help us to understand similar phenomena in other countries.⁶ This is why we will refer to other countries when appropriate and we will apply methods of comparative politics in this study whenever applicable.⁷ As the comparative discussion of new models of federalism and federation will demonstrate in the concluding chapter, we can witness the evolution of a number of new models of federation in nearly all parts of the world, including Ethiopia in Africa, Nepal in Asia, Iraq in the Middle East, and Bosnia and Russia in Europe. The main reason why Bosnia and Herzegovina is an appropriate example for the study of the broader phenomena of new models of federalism and federation is the fact that Bosnia and Herzegovina has been a federal state for nearly two decades. Furthermore, the role of international actors in the set-up and implementation of a federal system in Bosnia also calls for further analysis. To underline this issue, it is important to highlight that Bosnia did not become a federal state because Bosnian political elites thought this would be the best political organisation to accommodate the multinational character of the country whilst still preserving its territorial integrity. In fact, the Bosnian leaders could not agree on territorial decentralisation after the first free elections in 1990, although this organisational principle was preferred by Bosnian Croats and Bosnian Serbs. Instead, they installed a unitary system and elite power-sharing in the central state institutions.⁸ However, this was also before Bosnia declared its independence from Yugoslavia and a three and a half year long war massively changed the population distribution. Nevertheless, even during the Dayton negotiations there was no Bosnian party that particularly favoured a federal state organisation. As will be demonstrated in Chapter 4, it was the international community and, in particular, American politicians and civil servants that “imposed” a federal system on Bosnia and Herzegovina. Ever since then, parts of the Bosnian elite have attempted to get rid of this imposed system, either by pursuing secession and inclusion in Bosnia’s neighbouring states or by demanding centralisation and the abolition of the entity system.

The categories used to describe Bosnian federalism as “imposed” and the Bosnian federation as “internationally administered” are, therefore, very specific to Bosnia and Herzegovina. Only in recent years, with the intervention of a US-American force in Iraq and the establishment of a federal state in this Middle Eastern country, has a second case evolved that might match Bosnia’s characteristics. However, with the international community becoming more active in state-building projects, it can be considered most likely that further attempts will be made to “impose” federalism as a solution in countries with deep national cleavages. Current discussions in Afghanistan to implement a federal system highlight this point.⁹ Similar discussions have also started in Libya, although international actors play a lesser role in the actual constitutional and political negotiations in the country following the end of Gaddafi’s dictatorship.¹⁰

However, the choice of Bosnia and Herzegovina can also be explained by a lack of literature on the topic of federalism in the country. Whilst there is a substantial body of literature about state-building and international involvement in Bosnia, as well as on its power-sharing institutions, there has been little detailed study of the federal features, not as part of power-sharing or peace-building but as independent and distinct elements of the state organisation and its constitutional character.

Finally, some words about the research methodology of this piece are important. The main research method applied throughout this book is contextual interpretation. This will be applied to the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as to the constitutional features of the country. The interpretation will help to understand Bosnia and Herzegovina as a federal political system. Therefore, literature about the history of the Ottoman Empire will be discussed in the light of the continued importance of historical elements within the Bosnian federal system, more concretely the application of the Ottoman millet system to Bosnia and Herzegovina. In this way, existing literature will not just be reviewed but will be discussed in the light of its importance for the federal discourse in Bosnia and Herzegovina. To understand the current debates on federalism in Bosnia, I held a number of elite interviews with government and party representatives in Sarajevo, Banja Luka and Mostar between July and September 2008.¹¹

Whilst the Bosnian constitution does not define Bosnia and Herzegovina as a federal state per se, the application of the principle of self-rule and shared-rule, the territorial organisation of the country, and the interpretation of the constitution by the Bosnian Constitutional Court and other international actors allow for the definition of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a federal country.¹² In light of these interpretations it is the main research aim of this study to understand the origins and nature of Bosnian federalism and analyse its implementation within the Bosnian federation and to discuss the wider implications of federalism and federation in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Definition of Key Terms

The key to the analysis of the Bosnian federal system is the development of an appropriate t...