Imaginary Trials

Abstract

civil society in post-confl ict societies, they evaluate the power-sharing in Bosnia-Herzegovina and Macedonia that has resulted from the Dayton (1995) and Ohrid (2001) agreements. The authors reach the grim if predictable conclusion that both political systems and civil societies are weak and that support is needed from international actors, but they recognize that at the same time that would undermine ‘the very principles of local ownership’ (210). The contributions of Stefano Bianchini, Wladimir Fischer and Ian D. Armour are off -topic, but well writt en and interesting in their own right. Bianchini discusses the resurgence of nationalism in times of crisis and can deploy particular expertise on the economic crisis of the 1980s in Yugoslavia. He claims that for EU too there looms a similar retreat to nationalism as occurred in Yugoslavia during the 1980s, at least if further austerity policies are imposed. From his work based on the analysis of a selection of Croat and Serb magazines from the 1980s, Fischer argues that ‘from the 1950s onwards, nationalist traditions were catered to in the framework of Yugoslavism, which was itself nationalist in a new, multi-nationalist way’ (71). Hence, when nationalist discourse became dominant in Yugoslavia during the 1980s, it was within a framework that already provided for national categories. Armour meanwhile presents a historical account of Austro-Hungary-Serbia relations in the second half of the 19th century, with its focus on the work of the Serbian Historian Vasilije Krestić. Armour argues that Krestić’s ‘portrayal of anyone but the Serbs as manipulators and hegemonists’ implies that Serbs are ‘blameless victims’ (107) and shows how Krestić’s work serves the diplomatic interests of Serbia in the region and that it was matched by the policies of the Croats and other forces within the Dual Monarchy, thereby Armour places Serbian victimhood in perspective. It could be argued that all thee authors have addressed the underlying problems of the wars of the 1990s and are therefore dealing with issues that are subject to post-confl ict reconciliation, but that would be a stretch. The fi nal contribution comes from Lenard J. Cohen and draws on his book written with John R. Lampe Embracing Democracy in the Western Balkans (2011). Here, the argument is that democratisation is a key ingredient in the process of reconciliation, and Cohen describes political developments in the region and their relation to the spread of the liberal democratic values adopted by the urban middle classes. He remains optimistic from his birds-eye view of politics in the Western Balkans; rather a contrast to certain of the contributors who are perhaps more sensitised to the political problems in the region. A bright ensemble of chapters of high quality, this volume does however read somewhat like a scholarly journal and so runs the risk of seeming att ractive only to scholars of post-confl ict reconciliation, whereas some of the less specifi c individual articles are just as worthwhile. Overall, then, although individual chapters are all interesting in their own right, the book does rather lack cohesion.