https://orcid.org/0000-0001-6727-4207
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ABSTRACT
Ethnopopulist denial has become an essential part of the political repertoire of the political leadership of Republika Srpska (RS) in Bosnia and Herzegovina. It has turned into an effective strategy to preserve power, appeal to voters and disparage internal opposition and international institutions. This article traces the origins of denial and relativisation of the past, outlining the main mechanisms, discourses and processes of leveraging denial as part of the ethnopopulist repertoire. It also depicts how and why denial resonates with the public and why. The article argues that the RS leadership escalates denial when its power is challenged.
Acknowledgements
I would like to thank Milada Anna Vachudova for her advice and useful detailed comments on this article. I would also like to thank Adam Fagan, Danijela Dolenec, Milada Anna Vachudova and Natasha Wunsch for the organisation of the symposium Has Eastern Europe really turned away from liberal democracy? in March 2020 at King’s College London that prompted me to write this article.
Disclosure statement
No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).
Notes
1 For a review of these debates, see Ethnopolitics (Vol 17:5, 2018) and this journal (Vol 36:3, 2020).
2 For example, many military organisations refuse to accept crimes committed by their co-combatants as it delegitimises the existence of their own sacrifices and potentially incriminates them.
3 It is no coincidence that some recent terrorist attacks (e.g., New Zealand in 2019) were inspired by the Bosnian Serb nationalists.
4 Also (imprecisely) called Bosniaks as a new, reinvented political identity (Bougarel Citation2009).
5 A smaller District of Brčko was also designed under international administration.
6 War crimes were recorded not only by Bosnian Serbs and Croats but also by Bosniaks.
7 Although the RDC and ICTY numbers somewhat differ, these differences may be caused by different methodologies (who died when) and how “missing people” are categorised – whether indeed missing or assumed dead.
8 The interviews were conducted with the approval of Oxford University’s Social Science Ethics Committee and are stored with the author.
9 Interview with a survivor, Srebrenica, 2019.
10 In the so-called “Srebrenica Cases”, Selimović and 48 Others (CH/01/8365), Decision on Admissibility and Merits, Human Rights Chamber for Bosnia and Herzegovina.
11 Karganović led the project from 2008 to 2014. It received 1,923,900 KM (close to 1 million Euro) from RS. See: http://srebrenica-project.com/. He was later prosecuted in RS for embezzling nearly 50,000 Euro.
12 Interview with a political analyst, Sarajevo, 2015.
13 Serbia has equivalent institutions such as the Centre for Crimes against Serbs (Centar za zločine nad Srbima).
14 Interview with Goran Krčmar, Banja Luka, 2015.
15 Interviews with victim representatives and ICMP researchers, 2015 and 2019.
16 Interview with Nevenko Vranjaš, Banja Luka, 2015.
17 Interview with a former VRS soldier, Banja Luka, 2015.
18 Bosniaks celebrate 1 March as the “Day of Bosnian Independence”, and with Croats also the “Day of Bosnian Statehood” on 25 November as the historical creation of BiH in 1943. In August 2020, Serbia and RS also declared to celebrate 15 September as a “Day of Serbian Unity”.
19 Whom he continues to acrimoniously attack even after his passing, well aware of how disliked Ashdown remains in RS.
20 A group of academics led by Eric Gordy published a protest letter about their establishment.
21 Most surveys shows that unemployment and corruption are main concerns of citizens in Bosnia and RS (IPSOS Public Affairs Citation2019; National Democratic Institute Citation2010; Prism Research Citation2013).
22 Interview with a SRNA journalist, Banja Luka, 2015.
23 Interview with a journalist, Banja Luka, 2015.
24 Interview with a victim representative in Višegrad, 2014.
25 In Bosnia, World War II claimed the lives of nearly 17% Bosnian Serbs, 13% Croats and 9% Muslims (Hoare Citation2010, 1203).
26 Similarly, pupils in the Federation rarely travel to RS.
27 Interview with a political analyst, Banja Luka, 2015.
28 Interview with a journalist, Banja Luka, 2015.
29 Interview with an NGO worker, Banja Luka, 2016.
30 According to a 2019 poll, while 54% of Bosnian Serbs support membership in the EU (as opposed to 88% Bosniaks and 75% Croats in favour), the majority (53.1%) would vote against NATO membership (IPSOS Public Affairs Citation2019).
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Jessie Barton Hronešová
Jessie Barton Hronešová is an ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow at the Oxford Department of International Development. She is the author of “The Struggle for Redress: Victim Capital in Bosnia and Herzegovina” (Palgrave 2020) and Post-War Ethno-National Identities of Young People in Bosnia and Herzegovina (Peter Lang, 2012). She holds a DPhil from the University of Oxford (2018) in politics.