Police Reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina: State, Democracy and International Assistance

Abstract

As a starting point, this article takes the assertion by Clifford Shearing that there is a lack of synchronisation between patterns of policing in established democracies and the international policing assistance programmes they pursue. This provides a background against which to examine concrete examples of multilateral (UN and EU) and bilateral (UK) assistance to post-war Bosnia and Herzegovina. The discussion of these programmes is set in the context of ongoing debates on democratic policing, and explores the problems and needs experienced in policing post-war and post-socialist Bosnia and Herzegovina. International responses to these problems and needs are examined, and a mixed picture emerges in which multilateral assistance schemes appear to suggest that Shearing's concerns remain pertinent ten years on, while bilateral assistance from the UK suggests that there are circumstances in which international policing assistance escapes the framework of the state and recognises the importance of non-state actors in security provision.

Keywords:

• State
• Democratisation
• Police
• Reform
• Bosnia and Herzegovina

Notes

1. UNHCR estimates cited by the Constitutional Court of Bosnia and Herzegovina suggest the composition of Republika Srpska went from being 54.3 per cent Serb in 1991 to 96.7 per cent in 1997: “Due to the massive ethnic cleansing during the war … Republika Srpska is now an almost ethnically homogenous entity” (U 5/98 III, 2000: paragraphs 86–87).

2. Davidovic (1993) describes self-protection as an aspect of the Yugoslav self-management system. This consisted of local preventative measures against flood, fire, vandalism and violence, and a security service for productive enterprises akin to private security provision in a market economy. These forms do not seem to have survived the war intact.

3. These forty-seven defendants represent those who had been found guilty in a first instance tribunal for offences committed in BiH, and whose convictions had not, by 26 October 2005, been reversed in appeals proceedings. Cases relating to crimes outside BiH, resulting in acquittal, withdrawn before the conclusion of proceedings, or still pending, have been excluded.

4. A number of individuals in this group played an ambiguous role. It was unclear whether they answered to military, police, or other civilian authorities, for example Goran Jelisić (Prosecutor v Jelisić, 1999) and Dragan Kolundžija (Prosecutor v Sikirica, 2001).

5. All decisions to remove public employees and politicians are listed by date on the OHR website (www.ohr.int.decisions/archive.asp). The removals referred to here took place on 10 February (Dragan Bašević, Veljko Borovčanin and Ivan Sarač) and 30 June 2004 (Mile Pejčić and Zoran Petrić).

6. Those barred from office in this second round of removals were Svetislav Jokić and Pero Sakota (1 July 2004), and Predrag Jovičić, Milorad Marić, Milomir Malis, Zoran Ostojić, Petko Pavlović and Mrsko Skočajić (17 December 2004).