Protest movement in Bosnia and Herzegovina raises some important questions for the political elite and international community
On 5 February 2014, the center of the Bosnian city of Tuzla turned into a chaotic scene as about 3000 people took to the streets in protest to the unemployment and poverty that they blamed on the inefficiency of the political leadership. The protestors barricaded streets and surrounded governmental buildings, throwing rocks and eggs at them, while the police used tear gas to disperse the crowd. The protests calmed as the new day dawned, but left behind damaged buildings, about 18 people injured, and allegations of excessive use of police violence.
This already was the worst unrest in the country since the end of the Bosnian war in 1992-95. But more was to follow in the coming days. By 7 February, the protests had spread to a number of towns country-wide, buildings including the presidential palace were set to fire, and the numbers of injured rose to hundreds. Thousands of people joined the protests as information spread on social media sites. Politicians initially tried to play down the significance of the demonstrations, but eventually the Federal Government was forced to call an emergency meeting. The Prime Minister of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, Nermin Niksic, issued a statement recognizing the right of the people to voice their dissatisfaction but strictly condemning the use of violence, echoing the general response of the political elite. After the first heated weekend, the demonstrations began to calm, and eventually turned into scattered and peaceful protests at irregular intervals. It seemed that the ‘Bosnian spring’ declared by more presumptive commentators was cancelled. Politicians went back to normal, using the unrest to further their own, usually ethnically inspired agendas. The fiercest debate seems to have moved to the pages of newspapers and comments of policy analysts who are eagerly trying explain the causes and effects of the events. Yet what has been easy to miss is the fact that the protest movement itself has not disappeared, but instead has organized into more systematic bodies working to further the goals of the protesters. At least in Tuzla and Sarajevo these so-called citizens’ plenums have succeeded at eliciting at least some sort of responses from the administration. This raises interesting questions as to whether the struggle for change really is over.
While the force of the protest may have come as a shock to many in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the fact that they took place shouldn’t be a surprise to anyone who has been following the political life in the country over the past years. It has an unemployment rate of over 40%, and the recent privatizations of state companies have mostly just succeeded at further weakening the status of many ordinary citizens. It is a common complaint that instead of attempting to restructure and modernize the economy, the politicians are only setting their sights on gaining as much personal benefit as possible. Therefore, it is also no wonder that it was in Tuzla that the discontent finally brimmed over. The city is the heart of an industrial region in North-Eastern Bosnia and Herzegovina that has been dealt a particularly heavy blow by the economic crisis and privatizations. The protest that initiated the riots started as a peaceful gathering of workers who have been left unemployed from local companies and were demanding that the local government investigate questionable privatizations of their previous employers.
But the reasons for the unrest are not limited to the economic situation. The frustration is to a large extent caused by the years of inefficiency and corruption that are characteristic of Bosnian political life. What makes matters worse is the peculiar multi-level system of administration that was created primarily as a peace-keeping mechanism in the Dayton Agreement. Bosnia and Herzegovina consists of two entities, the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and Republika Srpska (RS), with a presidency equally divided between the three ethnic groups – Bosniaks, Croats and Serbs. The Federation is further divided into cantons, each with its own government. The complexity of the system effectively disperses political responsibility across the administrative structures, making the decision-making processes opaque and slow. The Federation has been in a political crisis since 2006, which has further contributed to the stagnation. Yet despite the lack of development, the public officials in Bosnia and Herzegovina enjoy some of the highest salaries in all of the Balkan region. Combined with the economic difficulties, the atmosphere has led especially young people to resign to a sense of disillusionment.
The demonstrations thus seem to have been a relatively spontaneous reaction to a number of complaints culminating at the same time. Neither are the protesters a particularly unified lot, but rather include the full range of workers, students, academics as well as some inevitable hooligans. Their main means of communication is through Facebook and other social networks, which provided live coverage of the events and are used to invite more participants to join in the protests. At first, their demands mostly focused on calling for leading politicians at both cantonal and federal level to step down. While this goal has stayed on the agenda, it has since been complemented with more elaborate appeals to improve workers’ rights, suspend and audit improper privatizations, and limit the benefits and compensation enjoyed by public officials.
One of the most interesting things about the protests is that, to a great extent, they bridged the ethnic boundaries that have traditionally held such sway over the political life in the country. For once, the ethnicity question has been put aside and different groups are coming together to jointly oppose the inefficiency of their politicians and entire governance structure. The appeals of the citizens’ plenums have specifically called for a rejection of the nationalism that has so often been used by politicians to maintain rifts in the society and play different groups against each other for their own private benefit. In a country as divided as Bosnia and Herzegovina, this alone constitutes a breakthrough.
This does not mean, of course, that the protests would not have effectively been nationalized – in fact it has been one of the main strategies of most of the political elite.. Politicians from Republika Srpska have been quick to point out that the protests are mostly limited to the area of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, suggesting this to be another sign that the bi-entity structure cannot function and RS should be independent. The entity president, Milorad Dodik, went on to suggest that the protests were a ploy by politicians in the Federation to destabilize RS. Within the Federation, too, party leaders have started to blame the unrest on Bosniak, Croat or Serb interests – depending on which is the most convenient culprit – that are supposedly trying to tip the balance of power for their own benefit. These arguments have not shied away from using war rhetoric, scare tactics and outright fabrications. In other words, the politicians have turned one of the main messages of the demonstrations on its head and kept up the narrative of ethnic division simply to avoid having to address the more urgent concerns expressed by their own citizens. While this may come as no surprise to anyone, it does still reveal the deep-rootedness of the pursuit of self-interest in the political culture of the country.
It doesn’t help that the local mainstream media has largely sided with the political leadership. During the rioting in February, it immediately started producing a steady flow of stories detailing violence, hooliganism and shocking eyewitness accounts while almost totally neglecting to report the point of view of the protesters. The politicians have largely been spared inconvenient questions, instead giving them an outlet to dismiss the appeals of the protesters and continue to deny the need for any reform. The difference from the picture presented in social media and independent internet portals is striking. Clearly, neither side presents an objective portrayal, but it is true that the mainstream Bosnian media is intrinsically tied with political powers and have an interest in maintaining the status quo. This disparity further adds to the sense of a battle of the people against the establishment.
Meanwhile, international reactions to the events have been moderate, with both the EU and US condemning acts of violence while emphasizing the people’s right to voice their concerns. The EU also gave credit to local law enforcement agencies for controlling the situation, which was met with disappointment by the protesters who have been complaining about police violence. It is hard to avoid detecting a sense of relief from the international community at the calming of the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Some analysts suggest that the evasive response has to do with the failure of the international community, particularly the EU, to itself efficiently oversee the governance and financial assistance in the country.
Indeed, the debate has now moved on to inconvenient questions about reforming the governance structure and Dayton Agreement. For many inside the country, it is clear that the current system is not working but only feeds the mechanisms for corruption and stagnation. Even fast EU membership, if it were possible, is not seen as the kind of silver bullet solution it has often been portrayed as, but rather as another way of transferring the most pressing problems into a new political context. Opinion polls suggest that the majority of the population – unlike many politicians – is not focused on blaming the failures of the country solely on the Dayton agreement or the international community, but there is an understanding that the system does need to be fixed in order to move ahead with the necessary reforms. However, for many within the EU and other interested parties, it is equally clear that both the Dayton agreement and the overall structure of the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina are the kind of Gordian knots no one is keen to go opening.
Yet at the local level the protesters have managed to gain small victories. Some cantonal officials have resigned and local administrations have to some extent been forced to involve the citizens’ plenums in their decision-making processes. Perhaps most importantly, the protest movement seems to have created a new interest in political participation and a sense of change. This, of course, mostly applies to the relatively small share of the citizens that are actively taking part in the movement, but their work so far has demonstrated a high level of efficiency. The continuing plenum meetings, the buzz in the social media and the networks that are emerging across the country suggest that the activists are capable of getting organized and engaging in the kind of systematic cooperation necessary to get things done.
One of the main challenges to follow will be the general election in October. The protests have inevitably changed the setting for that what was expected to be a routine election with low turnout. The sharp eruption of discontent may force politicians to address unemployment, poverty and other issues that are the most pressing in the minds of the voters. On the other hand, elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina have traditionally only intensified the radical tones in the political rhetoric. The unrest may therefore also be further pinned down on ethnic rivalry and used as a weapon in the nationalist battles. Either way, it is unlikely that the protest movement could completely turn around Bosnian politics in the election, or that this indeed even is its goal. Opposition parties sympathetic to the protesters’ demands may gain ground at the national level, but a lot would have to happen for the mainstream ethno-nationally based parties to lose their majority positions. The dominant parties, on the other hand, have stayed strikingly far removed from the demands of the protesters, in essence not acknowledging their presence on the political scene, thus making it very unlikely that any of their goals could be channeled through the majority parties. The activists themselves have demanded for the installation of expert-based technocratic governments in cantons, but so far this also looks unrealistic.
The protesters may thus be in for disappointments. On the other hand, they are likely to be well aware of this as they by and large know what to expect from their politicians. It remains to be seen whether the political elite will be able to continue to thoroughly ignore the voice of their own population, but based on what has happened so far this seems fully possible. The other question is whether anything can persuade the international community to break its silence over Bosnia and Herzegovina. So far, though, any little debate that there has been has moved at the level of High Representatives and international organizations – in other words, far removed from the realities of the ordinary population. Yet it looks disturbingly obvious that the majority of the country’s problems are ones that need to be solved at the local level. For its part, the protest movement has sent a clear signal that there now is a force at the grassroots that is willing and able to work for a change. Unfortunately, it looks as if all the potential partners are all doing their best to not to hear.