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POPULATION, SPACE AND PLACE Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) Published online 7 January 2010 in Wiley Online Library (wileyonlinelibrary.com) DOI: 10.1002/psp.607 Refuchess: Locating Bosniac Repatriates after the War in Bosnia–Herzegovina Stef Jansen* Department of Social Anthropology, University of Manchester, Manchester, UK

ABSTRACT Received 20 December 2008; revised 11 September 2009; accepted 11 November 2009 One of the central contradictions Keywords: home; ethnic cleansing; refugees; characterising the state of Bosnia–Herzegovina return; Bosnia–Herzegovina that emerged from the ashes of the 1992–1995 war concerns the territorial distribution of its population according to nationality. On the INTRODUCTION one hand, the foreign intervention, and the Dayton Peace Agreement it brokered, 1994 poster entitled REFUCHESS by the sanctioned its division into largely nationally Art Publishing Service in the then homogenised polities, consolidating military A besieged city of Sarajevo depicted a conquests. On the other hand, large foreign chessboard with two rows of 10 person icons. funds were invested in programmes of refugee Representing those displaced in the conﬂ ict in repatriation and return to redress ethnic Bosnia–Herzegovina (BiH) as pawns, a classic cleansing, with considerable success in terms metaphor of subjection and manipulation, the of property restitution. Rather than poster implied that displacement itself had understanding these dynamics as a become a strategic parameter in the 1992–1995 resurrection of a prior situation, this article war. Wartime refuchess took many forms, of considers them as part of a set of interrelated which the military expulsion of persons of unde- transformations. Working from ethnographic sired nationality – an activity that henceforth material gathered among Bosniac repatriates came to be designated as ‘ethnic cleansing’ – was in the early phases of large-scale return, it ﬁ rst the most documented. It also involved nationalist introduces the notion of refuchess, the strategic elites organising, with varying degrees of force, deployment and movement of nationalised the resettlement of the very people they claimed persons across nationalised places. It then to represent, such as the resettlement of Bosnian zooms out to investigate such return Croats into western BiH. Post-war examples movements more generally in terms of include the 1996 exodus to territories under different projects of home making and in Serbian control by Bosnian Serbs from Sarajevo terms of their paradoxical implications on suburbs that the Dayton Peace Agreement had the national demographic structure of assigned to the Bosniac-dominated canton of 1 Bosnia–Herzegovina. Copyright © 2010 John Sarajevo. Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Chess, of course, often serves as a metaphor for war. If the poster represented displaced persons (DPs) as pawns, who were the Karpovs, the Fischers, and the Kasparovs in this lethal game in BiH? In wartime Sarajevo, the primary actors referred to are undoubtedly the Bosnian Serb nationalist elites and their tutors in Serbia. In fact, * Correspondence to: Stef Jansen, Social Anthropology, School of Social Sciences, University of Manchester, Manchester M13 both the wartime political leader of the Bosnian 9PL, UK. E-mail: [email protected] Serb nationalists, Radovan Karadzˇic´, and their

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Locating Bosniac Repatriates 141 military commander, Ratko Mladic´, were known game of chess) further fanned resentment. As a to be keen chess players – during the war, they result, even among those who did not straight- even countered rumours of disagreement between forwardly reject the FIAs as the institutional and them with a televised game near the front line. military arm of Western conspiracies, suspicion Chess is also popular in the detention centre of was prevalent. It is against the background of the International Criminal Tribunal for the former this multi-stranded chess game of war-time BiH Yugoslavia in Den Haag, where many inmates that we must understand the bitter paradoxical have apparently no aversion towards those with combination of the sense of subordination and of different national backgrounds when it comes abandonment felt by many Bosnians. to post-war entertainment. In this context, it is The stakes of this game were high. Every important to note that the refuchess poster shows second Bosnian fl ed her or his pre-war place of a chessboard set up for a game, which requires residence, and around 100,000 people have been more than one player: Hence, at least two of the confi rmed killed or are still missing, of which military-political elites in the confl ict (and possi- some 41% civilians. Over 80% of all civilians con- bly all three of them) are being accused of treat- fi rmed killed or missing are Bosniacs.3 In late ing the displaced as pawns in their geostrategic 1995, with the territorial balance tipped after a schemes. Events on the ground have tended to period of intense offensives as well as NATO support this view: Many patterns of displace- (North Atlantic Treaty Organisation) air strikes ment in the BiH war can only be understood as against VRS positions, the foreign-brokered integral parts of wider processes of military con- Dayton Agreement secured a sovereign BiH, quest, consolidation of territories, foreign and which had been the stated preference of 62.68% local political support, control over humanitarian of its adult population in a 1992 referendum (99% aid, and so on (see e.g. Bougarel, 1996). of those who did vote in a 64% turnout; a major- Furthermore, already during the military ity of Bosnian Serbs did not vote). Dayton BiH, violence, most Bosnians clearly detected another however, was divided into two entities: Federacija party at the chessboard: the Foreign Interven- BiH (‘the Federation’) and Republika Srpska (‘RS’). tion Agencies (FIAs).2 Dominant Serbian and Because the Federation was itself decentralised Croatian nationalist discourses represented them into cantons, this effectively consolidated the largely as an occupying imperialist force, but largely nationally homogenised Bosnian Serb, among others, particularly among inhabitants of Bosnian Croat, and Bosniac polities produced by Bosniac-dominated territories, the situation was wartime population movements. Indeed, in 1996, more ambiguous (partly refl ecting the overlaps only 10% of all Bosnian Serbs who had, in 1991, between Bosnian unitarism and Bosniac nation- lived in the geographical area that is now the alism): On the one hand, FIAs were seen as Federation remained there, while only 5% of all possible allies, or at least guarantors of survival, Bosnian Croats and Bosniacs remained in their but on the other hand, people resented what pre-war places of residence in what is now RS. they experienced as their ineffi cacy, their reluc- The military dimension of refuchess thus ended tance to intervene when desired, and their with a near-total unmixing of the population in pragmatic (many say cynical) deal making with terms of nationality. various sides. A much-quoted example involves FIA complicity in the invasion of Srebrenica by the Army of Republika Srpska (VRS), the ‘evacu- THE DAYTON PARADOX AND ation’ of its Bosniac population (itself already 1 MILLION RETURNS consisting largely of DPs), and the ensuing massacre of thousands of men and boys. Another In 2000–2001, basing myself in Tuzla, I carried reason for indignation was the fact that the FIAs out a year-long period of participant observation allowed VRS considerable control over humani- and interviews among displaced and returned tarian aid deliveries to the city of Sarajevo that it persons with different national backgrounds in besieged. In both cases, pictures of foreign func- north-east BiH, both in the Federation and in RS.4 tionaries engaging in a seemingly friendly I worked with people on reconstruction sites, manner with Bosnian Serb nationalist top brass attended meetings by would-be returnees as well (over food, drinks, and, indeed, the occasional as those who did not wish to return, and listened

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/psp 142 S. Jansen to their stories over copious amounts of coffee. DPs]. Probably the single most quoted section of In this article, I present some fi ndings from that the Dayton Agreement was its Annex 7: ethnographic research and then cast them against ‘All refugees and displaced persons shall have documentary and narrative evidence collected to right freely to return to their homes of origin. during subsequent yearly research visits to BiH They shall have the right to have restored to (roughly a few months every year) as well as them their property of which they were during a new long-term research project in a deprived in the course of the hostilities since Sarajevo suburb (8 months in 2008). This later 1991 and to be compensated for any property research did not focus on return per se, but the that cannot be restored to them. The early issue is so central to Bosnian political life that return of refugees and displaced persons is an its presence is always felt. Hence, while still important objective of the settlement of the drawing on the immediacy of ethnography, for confl ict in BiH. The Parties confi rm that they the purpose of this special issue, I step back to will accept the return of such persons who try to make sense of return movements on a have left their territory, including those who longer time scale, both in terms of different have been accorded temporary protection people’s (re)makings of home and of their para- by third countries.’ doxical implications on the national demographic structure of BiH. The last line indicates that, of the three ‘durable Six years after the production of the refuchess solutions’ for refugees as defi ned by the UNHCR, poster, when I started my fi eld research, many voluntary repatriation of refugees from BiH was people still harboured its representation of the prioritised over integration and resettlement displaced as pawns. If anything, the strength of (Heimerl, 2005). Clearly, the desire to repatriate this image seemed to have increased, as had the refugees from Western Europe included a large relative responsibility attributed to the FIAs. The dose of realpolitik: With hostility towards asylum Dayton Agreement established a strongly decen- rising and welfare state provisions decreasing, tralised state, in which many executive, legisla- governments were unwilling to secure long-term tive, and judicial powers lay with a myriad of shelter for hundreds of thousands of Bosnians institutions on the level of entities and cantons, (Harvey, 2006). In FIA documents and speeches, now largely homogenous in terms of the nation- however, a more ‘moral’ argument was made for ality of their populations. Ever since, many return policies: They were meant to restore Bosnian politicians – particularly but not exclu- human rights and to show nationalist elites that sively Bosnian Serb and Bosnian Croat national- their war exploits would not be rewarded with ists – have actively worked to maintain the mononational mini-states but rather reversed in weakness of the BiH state level and to maintain a ‘remixed’ BiH (Phuong, 2000: 166; Black, 2002; or strengthen their fi efdoms. The Dayton Agree- Heimerl, 2005). The unusual reference to return ment established strong mandates for the Offi ce to ‘homes of origin’ [the UNHCR normally of the High Representative, the United Nations emphasises return to country of origin (Phuong, High Commissioner for Refugees (UNHCR), the 2000: 170)] also indicates that, from the outset, Organisation for Security and Cooperation in FIA rhetoric opposed return to ethnic cleansing. Europe, and a host of associated institutions, all The return process, both internal and external, as guarantors of the Dayton Agreement. Yet it is is ongoing, but tiny fi gures after 2005 indicate a precisely this agreement – which still functions saturation point. Results have been hailed as a as BiH’s constitution today – that has consoli- success by many foreign observers, and, when dated the existence of the nationally homogenised compared with other recent post-war situations, lower level polities (Cúrak, 2004; Mujkic´, 2007). they are impressive indeed. According to 2008 However, by no means should we conclude UNHCR statistics – the source of all fi gures in that the FIAs have only worked to set in concrete this article – a total of just over 1 million Bosnians the ‘unmixed’ BiH that emerged from the war. have become returnees in BiH (of whom 440,000 Among many domains, I focus here on one that repatriates). That is almost half of the total was considered to be central to their role: the number of people who fl ed their pre-war places return of DPs and refugees [following local use, of residence. Over 9 out of 10 claims for property I refer to internally displaced persons (IDPs) as restitution have been settled, re-assigning some

200,000 units of accommodation to their pre-war for Iraq – a ‘controlled realignment of population owners or holders of the right to residence. groups in order to minimize communal violence Taking the link between return and ‘remixing’ at and set the stage for a stable political settlement, face value, it would seem then that the ethnic what might be termed a “soft partition” of the cleansing of BiH has been reversed considerably country’ (O’Hanlon and Joseph, 2007) – such a by massive homecomings. focus may prove timely. To a large extent, the remainder of this article qualifi es this judgement. Given my critical MAJORITY RETURN tone, let me point out fi rst that I salute both foreign and local efforts that have made return Roughly three-fi fths of the over 1 million possible for a proportion of the displaced and, Bosnians who sought protection abroad did not particularly, the courage of many of those who repatriate. The other two-fi fths repatriated mainly pioneered as actual returnees. Perhaps more as part of a government-assisted repatriation controversially, I also sympathise with those programme, run by the International Organisa- Bosnians who draw a degree of moral satisfac- tion for Migration, from Germany, the state that tion from seeing ethnic cleansing campaigns had accepted by far the largest number of them. being partially reversed in the face of those who Some other states, such as Switzerland, followed, carried them out. Yet in what follows, I focus on and the vast majority of repatriations (over 70%) two major limitations of such reversals. First, took place in the fi rst three post-war years. By branching out from ethnographic research, I con- 2008, out of a total of 440,000 repatriates, about sider the national demographic impact of return on 280,000 were Bosniacs. Regardless of whether BiH’s population–territory matrix: To what extent they actually experienced this as a return to their have the 1 million returns actually reversed patria, we can distinguish three main categories and to what extent have they left untouched, in terms of their national demographic settle- consolidated, or even exacerbated nationally ment. In the language of the FIAs: ‘majority homogenised patterns of residence? Second, to returnees’, ‘relocators’, and ‘minority returnees’. understand some less immediately visible pat- The fi rst category, ‘majority returnees’, are terns beyond aggregate statistics, I trace some persons who repatriated to BiH and moved back experiential aspects of return as a process, not into their pre-war town or village, which was by an event (see Introduction to this issue): What then primarily inhabited by fellow-nationals and kind of’ ‘home’ does it involve? What are the controlled by political parties claiming to repre- implications for the social study of return (cf. sent their nation. While precise fi gures are diffi - Black and Koser, 1999; Long and Oxfeld, 2004; cult to obtain, we can deduce that they constituted Markowitz and Stefansson, 2004)? perhaps about half of all Bosniac repatriates. In Even though my research has always involved terms of its national demographic effects, such people with different national backgrounds, for majority return, of course, did not reverse ethnic reasons of brevity, I shall focus here exclusively cleansing at all. Instead, every single Bosniac on the experiences of Bosniac repatriates. majority returnee to Federation territories now Bosniacs are the most numerous among the actual under Bosniac political control tilted the balance return population (over 60% of all returned DPs further in favour of local Bosniac numerical and of all repatriates by 2008), and the political domination. parties dominated by Bosniacs – whether with But did these persons return to their ‘homes of explicitly nationalist programmes or not – have origin’? If by ‘home’ we mean ‘a certain house or shown somewhat more commitment to such fl at’, then many did. If we widen our defi nition return movements than others. Rather than beyond safety and property (Jansen and Löfving, claiming statistical representativity, I fi rst turn 2008), this becomes debatable. Majority returnees the spotlight on the trajectories of some persons were not subject to nationally specifi c problems who make up the repatriation statistics within a of physical safety, but many reluctantly sought wider context of refuchess, then aiming to fl esh their way in their pre-war place of residence, out some more general contradictions within dis- which they often experienced as having changed placement and return processes themselves. With beyond recognition. In this, their situation shared US policy makers considering a ‘Bosnia option’ much with other, not war-related returnees

(cf. Long and Oxfeld, 2004; Markowitz and trajectory took her to several refugee centres and Stefansson, 2004). After a prolonged stay in hospitals in Croatia. Nijaz escaped, via Croatia, Western Europe, they were likely to experience to the Netherlands. After a year of fearing the less severe material problems than many of those worst, they found each other through a UNHCR who had stayed behind during the war, which in advertisement, and Nusreta joined her husband turn often exposed them to a degree of resent- in the Netherlands. When their asylum proce- ment by the latter (Jansen, 2007). Of course, repa- dure was complete, they moved into a fl at and triates were also affected by socio-economic drew Dutch pensions. While expressing grati- dimensions of war destruction, the collapse of tude to Holandija, Nusreta and Nijaz Lupic´ never Yugoslav networks, and post-socialist de-indus- really felt at home there. They were far away trialisation. Even so, for a section of majority from their relatives, struggled with the language, returnees, voluntary repatriation did constitute felt overly dependent upon others, and were an attractive option, particularly on an affective simply bored. basis: It allowed them to be where they felt they Two years after the war, the Lupic´s signed up belonged (Stefanssson, 2004). Others expressed for a return scheme under which they retained anger at their treatment as pawns in the refuchess their Dutch pension and health insurance. As scenarios of repatriation policies and attempted they remarked, the fact that they had no children re-emigration. The voluntariness of repatriations made this decision easier. The couple moved back is also put into perspective by the fact that fi gures to BiH, but not to Modricˇa, now in RS. Instead, from states that did not have early mass repatria- they moved in with Nusreta’s sister’s household tion programmes remained minimal.5 in Gradacˇac, a few kilometres to the south-east, in the Federation. This is where I got to know RELOCATION them in 2001. Previously ‘mixed’, now overwhelmingly Bosniac inhabited, Gradacˇac con- A second category of Bosniac repatriates returned tained a large DP population directly from nearby to BiH but not to their pre-war place of residence, Modricˇa as well as a number of repatriates like now under Bosnian Serb or Bosnian Croat control. the Lupic´s. By 2001, Nusreta and Nijaz Lupic´ had The refuchess they were caught up in unfolded on visited nearby Modricˇa only once, just after they the crossroads between the repatriation schemes arrived back in BiH. Their house was destroyed. of Western European governments and national They had been warmly welcomed by some neigh- demographic concerns of nationalist forces in bours, but Nusreta in particular – having grown BiH. up there – was hurt by the contrast between her Let us look at an example. Nusreta and Nijaz memories of a common, working Modricˇa and its Lupic´, both retired skilled labourers in their late current overwhelmingly Serbian homogeneity in 60s, ‘returned’ to the town of Gradacˇac in 1998. terms of population, architecture, and iconogra- Prior to the war, they had lived in a privately phy, and its depressive atmosphere. The Lupic´s owned house in the centre of Modricˇa, Nusreta’s put in a claim for property restitution but never birthplace. Pre-war Modricˇa had no absolute intended to return to their old hometown, ‘because majority of any one nationality, but its centre was it didn’t exist anymore’. All in all, however, they inhabited by a majority of Bosniacs (then: Bosnian were pleased to have returned to BiH and happy Muslims). In 1992, shortly after the referendum to be with loved ones. outcome in favour of BiH independence, Nijaz Bosniacs made up more than half of all refu- Lupic´ was among the numerous non-Serbs in gees from BiH seeking protection in third states Modricˇa who were arrested in a Serbian national- (over 600,000). Because Bosnian Croats and ist takeover. Some men were executed or forced Bosnian Serbs were most likely to have fl ed to to work as labourers, but Nijaz Lupic´ escaped Croatia and Serbia, where there was little or no this fate, probably, he assumed, because of encouragement to return, Bosniacs also consti- an intervention by their neighbour-policeman, tuted more than half (63%) of all refugee repatria- a Bosnian Serb (or, as he typically put it: tions. The vast majority of those, over four-fi fths, Orthodox). Nevertheless, the couple was sepa- settled in Bosniac-dominated parts of the Federa- rated, and they entered a refuchess scenario not of tion. By 2008, less than 10% returned to RS. Many, their own choosing. Nusreta Lupic´ fell ill and her of course, have never lived in that territory in the

fi rst place (majority returnees), but others had, resistance from nationalist elites and has been and yet they did not return there. Instead, like the countered with refuchess strategies that some- Lupic´s, they ‘relocated’ into places where a major- times amount to ‘ethnic engineering’ (see Ito, ity of inhabitants, including those controlling the 2001; O´ Tuathail and Dahlman, 2006). Thus, on local authorities, shared their national back- the one hand, through intimidation, violence, ground. Estimates on relocation hover around and non-intervention (no evictions of illegal 50–60% (Phuong, 2000: 174; Black, 2002: 131; occupants, passive police presence, etc.), local Belloni, 2005: 439). The UNHCR’s own estimate authorities in RS prevented Bosniacs such as the for 1997, the top year for repatriation, was 70%. Lupic´s from returning. On the other hand, using These relocators thus make up a considerable promises, fear-inducing propaganda, and threats, part of return statistics, but, unless we consider they also discouraged Bosnian Serb DP popula- the outer borders of a weakly integrated protec- tions in their municipalities from returning to torate consisting of nationally homogenised ter- their pre-war places of residence now in the ritories to be the boundaries of ‘home’, we must Federation. While offi cially responsible for the conclude that a large proportion have not returned implementation of return, local authorities in RS to the ‘homes of origin’ of Annex 7. They have were much more adept at allocating accommoda- effectively moved into internal displacement in tion to their own displaced nationals than they the ‘other’ entity, and some relocators, like the were to create conditions for return by Bosniacs. Lupic´s, have succeeded to make a new home in Of course, there was a genuine need to house the Federation upon their return to BiH. large numbers of displaced Bosnian Serbs (partly Relocation as a refuchess scenario, common because local authorities in the Federation were among non-Bosniac repatriates too, was justifi ed often similarly reluctant to create conditions for by the repatriating governments with reference their return), but local authorities also cherished to the ‘internal fl ight alternative’: If a person can such people as loyal voting banks (Jansen, 2003). safely return to her/his state of origin, a localised These strategies to demographically ‘secure’ risk of persecution in one part of that state is not certain territories through relocation and recognised as a basis for asylum claims. So, rather integration of their ‘own’ DPs further diminished than being personifi cations of the Dayton pledge prospects for Bosniac returnees to RS, but it did to reverse ethnic cleansing through return to not completely prevent such return. ‘homes of origin’, a large majority of repatria- We can gain some insights about early minor- tions actually entrenched national homogenisa- ity return from the experiences of one household tion both in RS and in the Federation. While who had been repatriated from Germany. In the some, like the Lupic´s, moved in with relatives, summer of 2000, Sebiha and Muharem Ðapo many others occupied accommodation of which (both in their late 40s) were among perhaps a the owners or holders of the right to residence thousand returnees in the large village of Janja, had themselves fl ed. Given the dynamics of the nestled along the Drina, now the state border BiH war, those previous residents were often with Serbia. Their 18-year-old daughter Sanela national others, and their potential return was was with them while another daughter had also made diffi cult by such relocation. In fact, remained in Germany. With most of the early rather than ‘remixing’ BiH, relocation move- (mainly older) returnees, the Ðapo’s lived on a ments have thus produced further ‘unmixing’ by peripheral unpaved dust road. Two houses had increasing already existing local majorities of a self-made kiosks in the front, selling a tiny selec- particular nationality. tion of goods. Many had solid metal fences around their gardens. In those summer days of ‘MINORITY RETURNEES’: EARLY DAYS 2000, most shutters were closed, some damaged, and plastic screens of foreign humanitarian Rather than relocation or majority return, the organisations were ubiquitous. Yet, as we shall reversal of ethnic cleansing requires ‘minority see, much of the destruction that these screens return’, defi ned by the UNHCR as ‘return by covered up had not occurred during the 1992– people to their pre-war homes in areas controlled 1995 war. by another ethnic group’. Yet, from the outset, Janja had formed a municipality on its own the spectre of minority return has met with strong until 1963, after which it became a part of the

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/psp 146 S. Jansen larger municipality of Bijeljina. While Bijeljina war, Bijeljina’s nationalist authorities allocated town had a ‘mixed’ population, most villages most of them to Bosnian Serb DPs. around it were almost exclusively inhabited by Much of the destruction that was so visible in people of one national group. In Janja, known as Janja in the summer of 2000 had taken place a relatively prosperous place with a strong agri- recently, when groups of Bosnian Serb DPs ‘pro- cultural sector, some 95% of the over 10,000 pre- tested’ against the possibility of eviction from the war inhabitants had declared their nationality as Bosniac-owned accommodation they occupied Bosnian Muslims. Because of its proximity to (the inverted commas indicate that they knew Serbia, some had worked there, while there were full well that the local authorities, who were sup- also contingents of Gastarbajteri in Germany and posed to carry out those evictions, would not do in non-aligned states. Sebiha Ðapo used to work this on their own accord). Sebiha and Sanela in a shop, whereas her husband had been a Ðapo told me that they had fi rst noticed that their long-haul lorry driver. In the spring of 1992, the phone had been cut off, and quickly after that, area very quickly fell under control of Serbian the electricity went. Then, a large number of (para)military forces from both sides of the Drina. Bosnian Serb DPs entered their street: men, Unlike in many other parts of RS, many Bosniacs women, and children. Some marched and sang initially stayed on in Janja, being promised safety ‘This is Serbia’, whereas others appeared in cars after handing in any arms they had to the militar- with the number plates removed. They blocked ily vastly superior surrounding Serbian forces. the roads, harassed and stoned Bosniac return- Nevertheless, the exodus of the Bosniac popula- ees, threw molotov cocktails, and seriously tion started straight away and lasted for over 2 damaged some houses. Sebiha and Sanela Ðapo, years: Several dozen Janjarci were killed, and by terrifi ed, hid in a cupboard. Meanwhile, Muharem 1995, all but some 200 had left – some expelled Ðapo returned from one of his on-and-off jobs in with physical violence, and some worn out by Tuzla and tried to make his way into the street, discrimination and threats, which increased as but the ‘protestors’ stopped him. They dropped the war continued and ever more Serbian an explosive device, and while he reacted quickly DPs arrived. Expulsion often took the form of enough to kick it away, he was badly burned and so-called voluntary departure, organised at had to be transported to hospital. The RS police great cost (see Human Rights Watch, 2000). and Russian Stabilisation Force (SFOR) soldiers, The Ðapo’s did initially stay, a decision helped the Ðapos told me, looked on from the corner of by the fact that they had no sons who could be the street. It was only after US SFOR helicopters mobilised. They maintained relatively good fl ew over that things calmed down. terms with the Bosnian Serbian DP reserve offi cer With many other Bosniacs, the Ðapos fl ed who they, as instructed, accommodated in their temporarily back to Tuzla. But they quickly house. Still, in 1994, Muharem Ðapo, who had returned. When I fi rst met them, Muharem been subjected to a regime of forced labour, came Ðapo was recovering from his wounds, Sebiha under pressure to work at the frontline, and was on a heavy diet of tranquilisers, and the Sehiba Ðapo lost her job. Like many Janjarci whole household shared the multiple precarious- before them, the Ðapo’s eventually fl ed to Tuzla, ness so typical of minority returnee lives in BiH the nearest sizeable town in the Federation, and in those days. It is in this context that we must from there, they soon joined Sebiha’s sister in understand the fact that by the end of the millen- Germany. In 1998, they were repatriated to BiH. nium, only about a quarter of all returns in BiH Their eldest daughter remained in Germany, and fell into the category of minority returns and that, the rest of the family relocated to Tuzla. A Janja in 1999, it was reported that only 3% of Bosnians DP association there was actively organising for who succeeded in obtaining a certifi cate of pro- return to Janja, and the Ðapo’s were among the perty restitution from the foreign-run Com- fi rst to return, in 2000. However, they found their mission for Real Property Claims actually arrival obstructed; by then, Bijeljina housed about succeeded in moving back into their house or fl at 30,000 Bosnian Serb DPs, one of the highest rates (International Crisis Group, 1999). Moreover, in BiH. Because no real battles had taken place in even reconstructed houses, less subject to com- Janja, its housing stock had remained largely petition, often stood empty: some 40% in 1999 unscathed by the violence, and by the end of the (Cox, 1999).

MINORITY RETURN: 2000–2008 external displacement). Some 150,000 Bosniacs are said to have returned to RS, which is about FIA functionaries were well aware of these prob- one-third of all Bosniacs who used to live on that lems: By the end of the 1990s, when they consid- territory before the war. This fi gure is unlikely to ered the major part of the repatriation effort from rise further without major changes in the political Western states over, it became clear that the set-up of BiH. number of relocating repatriates was much larger than the number of minority returnees. Return REFUCHESS AND THE SOCIAL STUDY OF movements were thus doing more to consolidate HOME MAKING nationally homogenised populations on certain territories than they were doing to counteract I now step back and, refracting my ethnographic them. Minority returns were considered danger- material against broader patterns on a longer ous; the small number that had taken place by time scale, propose a critical look at some more 1999 was mainly those of Bosniacs and Bosnian general patterns in the return movements in BiH. Croats within the Federation. In response, FIAs Anyone familiar with the return process in BiH mounted a campaign for minority return. Despite (anthropologists, FIA functionaries, and, above the Dayton consolidation of wartime territorial all, returnees) knows that offi cial statistics of conquests, this reaffi rmed the foreign interven- minority returnees have always been infl ated. tion’s self-representation as an effort to reverse Registration of returnees is often based on unsys- ethnic cleansing (O´ Tuathail and Dahlman, 2004). tematically collected fi gures from local authori- If, before 1998, FIAs had in fact discouraged ties and FIAs, both of whom, for different but minority return to places where they feared related reasons, wish to provide evidence of good safety problems (Belloni, 2005: 439), this policy performance. A second problem is of more inter- was later changed, particularly in response to est to me here: The dynamics of population pressure for return from Bosniac DP associations, movement in BiH render the line between a such as the Janjarci in Tuzla. Very large funds returnee and a non-returnee much more ambigu- were invested, and increasingly effective guaran- ous than it may seem at fi rst sight. I have written tees for the safety of returnees were provided by about this in ethnographic detail elsewhere foreign soldiers and pressure on local police. (Jansen, 2008); so in the remainder of this article, Money and materials were set apart for benefi - I schematically sketch some of its interrelated ciaries who had made a clear commitment to patterns in order to put into perspective the offi - engage in minority return in all directions (e.g. cial tally of 150,000 Bosniac minority returnees in by cleaning up the site and taking part in FIA- RS. This will require me to relate the notion of supported overnight stays). In the process, statis- minority return constituting a reversal of ethnic tics regarding minority returnees became central cleansing to wider processes in post-war, post- in the self-evaluation and self-justifi cation of the socialist BiH and, thus, to the social study of foreign intervention (Jansen, 2005). home making. Results became visible in 2000 already, with over 60,000 minority returnees. The Ðapos Degrees of Return formed part of an offi cial total of some 25,000 Bosniac minority returnees to RS that year. While Minority return has involved a reorganisation of they and many other early returnees to RS ex- horizons of security and possibility, refl ecting the perienced violent obstruction, they persisted in new political geography of BiH and its division their desire to return to their pre-war place of into nationally homogenised territories. Resonat- residence and paved the way for several more ing with the view of return as a process, not an thousands of returnees to Janja in the following event (see Introduction to this special issue), this years. For BiH in its entirety, the minority return has also shaped return practices, rendering them process peaked in the period 2001–2003, after a not either/or experiences but a matter of degree. shift from actual return to property restitution Many early Bosniac minority returnee concentra- (see below), and 2008 statistics speak of a cumu- tions were located in villages just across the Inter- lative 460,000 minority returnees (a little under Entity Boundary Line (IEBL), thus allowing life half of all those returning from internal or in RS which was predominantly oriented towards

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/psp 148 S. Jansen the Federation. But also further into RS, and until member of the RS assembly, returnees thus today, many retain their Federation identity (ID) ‘become ping-pong balls in the hands of politics cards and effectively straddle the IEBL for and of the unsolved relations between entities employment, education, health care, shopping, and cantons’ (Oslobod-enje, 2008b). With the and so on.6 In fact, many people initially signed state itself in suspension, and reluctant to be up for return programmes in order to qualify for either pawns or ping-pong balls, returnees reconstruction assistance without intending to themselves retain certain forms of suspension move back permanently. This was made easier (ambiguity with regard to actual return) to reduce once the FIAs switched their emphasis from other forms of it (precariousness of lives and actual return to property rights (Philpott, 2005) livelihoods). and lifted provisions of actual return. Even after physical safety became less of a burning issue, in Concentration in Peripheral Enclaves villages in RS like the one I have written about elsewhere (Jansen, 2008), many returnees main- Minority return in BiH is concentrated in par- tained this ambiguity. Still today, only a propor- ticular places, whereas others are characterised tion of those making up the fi gures of minority by none or very little of it (for the sake of argu- returnees live permanently on RS territory, ment, we will assume that actual statistics, even while some occasionally stay overnight, some though infl ated, do correspond proportionally to use their houses for weekend purposes, and actual return). In Janja, for example, where the others commute from the Federation. Some rent Ðapos were part of a return vanguard, it is esti- out their restituted accommodation, and some mated today that more than half of the pre-war of those who have not done so already still hope population has returned. Again, this has involved to sell or exchange it while living in a ‘majority’ refuchess strategies by competing political actors. area or abroad. The initial violent obstruction by local authorities Many DPs consider the feeling of being sus- and by Bosnian Serb DPs diminished with the pended in time and space (‘being nor in the sky, provision of alternative accommodation and land nor on earth’ [ni na nebu ni na zemlji], as the local plots for those DPs, softening the blow of even- saying goes) one of the worst problems associated tual evictions. Another factor was the lifting of with displacement. Why then would they prolong restrictions on the resale of restituted properties such a situation of suspension? In the specifi c in the Federation, which allowed those Bosnian circumstances of Dayton BiH, where the very set- Serbs to sell or exchange their repossessed up of the state itself is experienced as being in houses and fl ats there. suspension, I suggest that many choose to engage Janja is one example of a place where Bosniac only in a degree of return because this allows minority returnees, through return in a concen- them to spread both risks and opportunities. With trated fashion, actually came to reconstitute local few people confi dent that refuchess is completely majorities in certain villages or small towns that over, a degree of return allows them to re-estab- form (usually a peripheral) part of RS munici- lish forms of affective attachment as well as mate- palities. Yet return in Bijeljina town, previously rial investment in their pre-war place of residence ‘mixed’, remains much less common. From the while stopping short of a headlong dive into the perspective of the returnees, such enclave cre- diffi culties associated with ‘being a minority’. ation reduces the physical, existential, and socio- Local employment, for example, remains economic insecurity following from hostility extremely diffi cult to obtain for minority return- and discrimination of the kind that the Ðapos ees, and straddling remains common for work, experienced, as well as from more generalised but also for educational, health, and administra- precariousness in BiH. In the face of such chal- tive purposes. An additional problem in the dys- lenges, enclaves allow safety in numbers as well functional labyrinth of state, entity, canton, and as intra-national mutual help, employment, municipality institutions in BiH is that returnees trade, and health care. For the political parties who register in RS often fail in their bids to replace involved, it also has its advantages. Bosniacs con- the welfare payments they no longer receive in stitute a relative majority and are by far the the Federation with equivalent ones in RS (e.g. most likely to identify with BiH as a state, and civilian war victims). In the word of one Bosniac the most successful parties among Bosniacs

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/psp Locating Bosniac Repatriates 149 present themselves as BiH patriots wishing a ment, health care, and education. On the other reversal of ethnic cleansing. Wishing to capitalise hand, a willingness to return opened routes to on people’s right to vote in their pre-war place of foreign reconstruction assistance, and many dis- residence, political parties were heavily involved placed Bosniacs decided to make provisions in in organising DPs into associations known as case they would be evicted from the accommoda- ‘communes in exile’. Bosniac minority return tion they occupied in the Federation, which some movements often took place within those frame- subsequently were. Frustrating as they may have works and combined the considerations of been for pro-return policies, such hedging of returnees themselves with a more or less organ- household bets is an unsurprising strategy to ised attempt to impact on the national demo- cope with national minority status. Yet, as we graphic structure of local authorities in RS. Still, shall see, it is also a strategy to minimise expo- the pro-return stance of those politicians has sure to the precariousness of life in post-war BiH always been uneven: Rarely is a warm welcome more generally – beyond considerations of extended to potential Bosnian Serb returnees to nationality. the Federation. Moreover, such commitment The longer term results of these intergenera- sometimes fails to go beyond rhetoric and tional household strategies, trying to reduce the electoral strategy, because those parties too risks of the refuchess game, are becoming clear are focused on the territory where they can today. Despite the strong reduction of physical exercise maximal power.7 danger and despite very high rates of property In any case, as well as building some represen- restitution, for the vast majority of displaced tative muscle in local administration, return Bosniacs, nostalgia and FIA return policies have enclaves allow impact on the policing of settle- provided an insuffi cient enticement to (re)make ments, through direct involvement and through home in their pre-war place of residence now in decent relationships with Bosnian Serb RS police RS. Moreover, sustainability prospects of some offi cers. Moreover, returnee concentrations in returnee enclaves remain doubtful, especially in enclaves allow for separate schooling. In 2001, smaller, remote settlements. Actual returnee a survey among Bosniac returnees in RS found populations contain many elderly persons who that 85% of their children went to school in are not dependent on employment and do not the Federation (United States Committee on have school-aged children. After up to 15 years Refugees, 2001: 6). Later, these fi gures shifted in Federation towns, their children and grand- somewhat, as Bosniac pupils became increas- children are ever more reluctant to return (note ingly likely to follow – offi cially or unoffi cially – that the younger ones never lived there). curricula used in Bosniac-dominated areas of the Understanding the parameters by which Federation (Mulic´-Bušatlija, 2001). Bosniacs, and Bosnians in general, attempt to (re)make home after the war thus requires us to look beyond conceptions of security as safety Generations and Transformations only and of home as house only (e.g. Jansen, The straddling and degree-like nature of 2006, 2008). They must be seen, for example, in much concentrated Bosniac minority return in the context of a long-term urbanisation process, (peripheral) enclaves relies heavily on intergen- intensifi ed by the 1992–1995 war. Today, infra- erational household strategies. Initially, having structural neglect and FIA attempts to enforce committed themselves to returning to their pre- neoliberal economic reforms further exacerbate war village and rebuilding their houses in what the urban/rural gap. A reluctance to return can was now RS, many households also retained thus partly be understood as a reluctance to an occupied place in the Federation. The most engage in the ruralisation that return has mostly common pattern was that retired family members come to mean. Most displaced Bosniacs, whether returned to settle in their pre-war village, whereas they previously lived in towns or in villages, the younger ones engaged at most in part-time have settled into Federation towns. With periph- return.8 On the one hand, with the household eral enclaves the most feasible targets for minor- straddling the IEBL, they limited exposure to the ity return, their expectations with regard to risks and problems associated with minority livelihoods and ways of life do not entice return, including concerns of safety, employ- them to ‘go rural’ (even if it is ‘rural again’). In

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/psp 150 S. Jansen the current socio-economic climate, for many, the Federation. In both cases, their repatriation, the issue is not only that they do not wish to whether or not we wish to call it a return to their leave the Federation for life in RS, but they also ‘homes of origin’, further contributes to over- do not wish to leave a town for life in a village whelming, war-produced majorities of persons (cf. Holt, 1996). of certain nationalities in certain places. In con- Our assessment of minority return in BiH must trast, minority return represents a reversal of thus take into account a double dynamic: on the ethnic cleansing. Yet in practice, it is a matter of one hand, issues of safety and physical violence degree, shaped among other things by intergen- inherent in ethnic cleansing, and, on the other erational household strategies and ‘straddling’. hand, broader transformations on the societal, Therefore, and especially because of its concen- household, and individual levels. While the fi rst tration in peripheral enclaves, it actually ‘remixes’ set of issues are straightforwardly nationality the population of BiH only on some levels. It specifi c (a Bosniac in RS has legitimate – but increases the number of Bosniacs to RS (said to thankfully decreasing – grounds to experience a be some 150,000 in 2008), but it also re-establishes degree of fear for her/his safety), the second set previous patterns in the BiH population struc- involves wider socio-political transformations in ture in a different manner, and whether or not BiH and differential engagements with them this produces ‘remixing’ depends on the scale of according to age, gender, wealth, and educational measurement. In the case of return just across the profi le. The remembered ‘mixed’ pre-war BiH IEBL, this can be seen to simply ‘extend’ the reach existed as a unit of the socialist Yugoslav federa- of the Federation. But deeper into RS, too, con- tion, whereas return occurred (or not) a decade tradictory dynamics are at work with regard to later in a BiH going through a FIA-led process of the consequences of ethnic cleansing. This is post-socialist ‘reforms’ (Jansen, 2006). To be sure, because the populations of many Bosnian towns unemployment and/or reduced health-care pro- had been ‘mixed’, whereas villages had often visions are not unrelated to nationality – for been inhabited by people with a shared national example, because of discrimination, a Bosniac in background, or sometimes subdivided in rela- RS will be relatively more exposed to them than tively homogenously populated hamlets. There- a Bosnian Serb in RS – yet majority nationals are fore, with minority return mainly taking place in also struggling to reduce precariousness and to rural areas and in outlying areas around towns, generate the ‘sense of possibility’ that is an impor- ‘remixing’ does take place on the level of RS and tant part of making home (Jansen and Löfving, of those municipalities, but, zooming in on the 2008). The decisions that underlie population constituent villages and hamlets that were always movements, even war-related ones, are taken already largely nationally homogenous, we can with one eye on the past and one eye on the see that segregation is in fact consolidated. What future. Practices of return or non-return, and of we witness here is the recreation of Bosniac- the variety of patterns that exists as degrees inhabited enclaves in what is now RS, whereas between them, take shape at the point where previously ‘mixed’ town centres, in contrast, memories of localised belonging meet or, more see little ‘remixing’.9 often, fail to meet expectations of lives and liveli- The return of Bosniacs in RS is thus reduced to hoods in a changing socio-economic and political a minor, segregated presence. And while author- context. ities in RS today (grudgingly) allow Bosniacs to re-inhabit their houses in places out of sight, the different ‘mixed’ Bosnian home that had been CONCLUDING REMARKS experienced in towns before the war is not about to be recreated. This reluctance to facilitate sig- Upon return to BiH after the 1992–1995 war, nifi cant return and reintegration also reigns Bosniac repatriates have tried to make home in among Bosnian Croat and Bosniac nationalist different ways. Some, known as majority return- elites (even though the latter deploy a pro-BiH ees, have moved back to their pre-war places rhetoric), who, like their Bosnian Serb counter- of residence in Bosniac-dominated parts in the parts, continue to attract majority electoral Federation, whereas others, who used to live support among those of their co-nationals who in territory that is now in RS, have relocated to vote. With most Bosnians unable to imagine a

Copyright © 2010 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Popul. Space Place 17, 140–152 (2011) DOI: 10.1002/psp Locating Bosniac Repatriates 151 solid basis to make home in territory dominated and the Netherlands. All names used in this article by national others, and with entire new genera- are pseudonyms. tions now growing up in nationally homogenised (5) For example, of over 50,000 Bosnian refugees in social spaces, the reversal of ethnic cleansing Sweden, 1329 had returned by 2001, mostly to through minority return is likely to remain areas of BiH where they belonged to a national majority (Eastmond, 2006: 147). limited. Of course, the rights of the displaced (6) For example, by May 2008, only some 40% of circa have always included the right to return or not 20,000 minority returnees in Zvornik municipality return. What they do not include is the right to had taken out RS IDs (Oslobod-enje, 2008a). leave; yet in every poll over the last decade, a (7) On the lack of actual support for return, see e.g. majority among younger persons has stated that Hadzˇic´, 2002. In 2008, many Bosniac municipality they do not see a future anywhere in BiH, and councillors in RS still commuted from the Federa- would emigrate if that was possible. Whether or tion (e.g. in Srebrenica, where some Serbian coun- not they would actually leave, we may consider cillors also commuted . . . from Serbia). Enclave such utterances as articulations of socio-economic concentration and degrees of return are thus not concerns with a wider lack of perspective – the mutually exclusive. experience of living in lasting suspension that (8) See Fischel de Andrade and Delaney, 2001; D’Onofrio, 2004; Stefansson, 2006. In 2002, an esti- in many respects seems a cynical but logical mated 75% of those whose pre-war accommoda- outcome of wartime refuchess. tion was reconstructed did return, but a third of those sent only a part of the household (Heimerl, 2005: 386). NOTES (9) Many Bosniacs from towns now in RS sought property restitution with an eye on sale or exchange. In 2003, an estimated three-quarters of (1) I employ ‘Bosnian’ as short for the non-national properties restituted to returnees in urban term ‘Bosnian–Herzegovinian’. This article relies areas were for sale in all of BiH (Helsinki Commit- largely on collective national labels: Bosnian tee for Human Rights in Bosnia–Herzegovina, Croats, Bosnian Serbs, and Bosniacs (before 1993: 2003). Bosnian Muslims). In no way does this exhaust life experiences before, during, or after the war. Yet politics in BiH today – and much writing about it – actively reproduce the reduction of persons to REFERENCES embodiments of nationality statistics. For my analysis here, unfortunately, returnees’ experiences of Belloni R. 2005. Peacebuilding at the local level: refugee national labels attached to them are less important return to Prijedor. International Peacekeeping 12(3): than how others experience them and where they 434–447. fi t in the broader national demographic picture. Black R. 2002. Conceptions of ‘home’ and the political Thus, the imperative use of national labels in geography of refugee repatriation: between assump- the descriptive parts of my article on return is tion and contested reality in Bosnia-Herzegovina. one more expression of the scope and power of Applied Geography 22(2): 123–138. refuchess. Black R, Koser K. (eds). 1999. The End of the Refugee (2) Functionaries of those mainly Western-led military Cycle? Refugee Repatriation and Reconstruction. and inter-governmental structures, and major Berghahn Books: Oxford. so-called non-governmental organisations, as Bougarel X. 1996. Bosnie: anatomie d’un confl it. La well as most commentators in BiH and abroad Découverte: Paris. talk of ‘the International Community’, whereas, Cox M. 1999. The Dayton agreement in Bosnia- among themselves, Bosnians usually speak of Herzegovina: a study of implementation strategies. stranci [‘the foreigners’]. I prefer my own sweeping British Yearbook of International Law 70: 201–243. term. C´ urak N. 2004. Dejtonski nacionalizam. Buybook: (3) Figures from Istrazˇivacˇko-dokumentacioni centar, Sarajevo. Sarajevo (2009). D’Onofrio L. 2004. Welcome Home? Minority Return in (4) Developed with Andy Dawson and fi nancially South-East Republika Srpska. Sussex Migration supported by the Toyota Foundation, the Working Paper 19, University of Sussex. Leverhulme Trust, and the University of Hull, Eastmond M. 2006. Transnational returns and this project also involved shorter periods of 3 reconstruction in post-war Bosnia-Herzegovina. months each with refugees in Serbia, Australia, International Migration 44(3): 141–166.

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