Dissertation
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DISSERTATION Titel der Dissertation MOVING DEMOCRACY STUDENT CONTENTION IN FORMER YUGOSLAVIA Verfasserin Mag.phil. Astrid Reinprecht, MSc angestrebter akademischer Grad Doktorin der Philosophie (Dr. phil.) Wien, 2014 Studientkennzahl lt. Studienblatt A 796 310 300 Dissertationsgebiet lt. Studienblatt Politikwissenschaft Betreuerin / Betreuer Univ.-Prof. Dr. Dieter Segert 1 INDEX OF CONTENTS INTRODUCTION 5 Research Questions, Definitions and Cases 11 The Argument 16 Methodology and Sources 18 The Background 20 A Tour of the Thesis 22 I – THEORY 30 I.1 On Democratisation anD Democracy 30 I.1.i A Conceptual Basis for Transformation Research 30 I.1.ii Democratisation: Linking Transition with a Normative Goal 31 I.1.ii.a Of Breakthroughs and Consolidations 31 I.1.ii.b The Cultural Side of Democratisation 35 I.1.iii Creating Which Democracy? 38 I.1.iii.a The Polyarchy: Merging Contestation, Participation and Competition 40 I.1.iii.b Placing People in the Public: Deliberation as Participation 42 I.1.iii.c Conflictual Democracies: Radical Theories of Democracy 45 I.1.iv On Nationalism and the Yugosphere 51 I.1.iv.a Excursus: The Yugosphere 56 I.2 On Social Movements 58 I.2.i Introducing Social Movements 58 I.2.ii Social Movements and Culture 61 I.2.ii.a Identification: The Strive Towards The Self 62 I.2.ii.b Contentious Language: Framing the Challenge 65 I.2.iii Contention Beyond the Nation State 66 I.2.iii.a Informal Transnational Networking 67 I.2.iii.b Formalising Transnational Activism: Coalition Building 68 I.2.iv Student Contention: The Power of Disruption 69 I.2.v Social Movements and Democracy: Keep Rolling Through Dissent 71 II - EMPIRICS 75 II.1 From Research Question to Results: Designing Research 75 II.1.i Ontological and Epistemological Basis 75 II.1.ii The Possibilities and Limits of Qualitative Methodology 77 2 II.1.iii Choosing Methods, Cases and Sources 79 II.1.iii.a Methods of Investigation: Documents Analysis and Interviews 83 II.1.iii.b Method of Interpretation: Qualitative Content Analysis 87 II.1.iv Moving from the Field to Interpretation to Reflection and Back 88 II.1.iv.a Cycles of Research: How My Study Evolved 89 II.1.iv.b Decisions Taken: On Units, Questions, Partners and the Grid 91 II.2 History: Protests anD Democratic Change 101 II.2.i Grass-roots Activism and Contentious Politics in Former Yugoslavia 101 II.2.i.a 1968 and the Croat Spring 105 II.2.i.b Unrest under the Impression of Nationalism in the 1980s 107 II.2.ii Fighting War and the Regime During the 1990s 111 II.2.iii Peculiarities of Change in Former Yugoslavia after 2000 122 II.3 StuDent Contention after 2000 127 II.3.i Overview: Submerged Networking and Transformative Events 127 II.3.ii Regional Commonalities of Contention 144 II.3.ii.a Education Is Not For Sale: Diffusing the Commercialisation Frame 144 II.3.ii.b Acting Together As Others Did: Diffusing Direct Democracy 148 II.3.iii We Are Different: Varieties of Contention 152 II.3.iv Comparing Student Contention in Croatia and Serbia 157 II.3.iv.a Crafting Contention Through Framing and Identification 157 II.3.iv.b Organising the Movement: Choosing Principles and Strategies 168 II.3.iv.c Macro- and Meso-Level Contexts: From Politicians to the Faculties 177 II.3.iv.d Fellow Travellers: Expanding Collaboration to Sympathetic Actors 189 II.3.v Interacting at Regional Level: Transnational Collaboration 192 II.3.v.a Networking: Exchanging Information and Signs of Solidarity 192 II.3.v.b Institutionalising Transnational Activism: Coalition-Building 198 CONCLUSION 205 Post-script on Bosnia and Herzegovina 219 BIBLIOGRAPHY 220 Figures, Tables and Pictures 241 ANNEX 244 Annex 1: Questionnaire – Template for Questions and Form 244 Annex 2: Questionnaire – Forms Filled out by Interviewees 247 Interviewees from Croatia 247 Interviewees from Serbia 261 3 Annex 3: Abstract - English 277 Annex 4: Zusammenfassung - Deutsch 278 Annex 5: Curriculum Vitae 280 4 INTRODUCTION For some time now, the successor states of Yugoslavia1 seem to have fallen short of all ‘Western miracles’: peace, prosperity and democracy have bypassed it. While moving (more or less smoothly) towards Europe, none of this region’s countries – with the possible exception of Slovenia – appear to enjoy the brightness of untarnished democracy. As this narrative tells us, popular apathy and disaffection from politics are just benign signs of the malaise. The enthusiastic times of the 1990s, when the Otpor! movement (for a fine introduction see: Lazic 1999) pushed the “power of the street corners”2 (Nadjivan 2008: 90) onto the radar of worldwide attention, are now over. Practitioners and academic observers judge the participatory potential to be fairly bleak in the Yugoslav successor states today. More than twenty years after the collapse of communism, “[t]he transition (…) to post- communism [has resulted in] a transition from a hopeless society to a hope without society” (Buden 2010)3. Within postcommunist studies, some blame collectivist mentalities and “Balkan particularisms” (Mungiu-Pippidi 2005) for the “belated” (Golubovic 2004: 83ff) development of so-called civil society. Others do acknowledge that something is filling the residual space between the state and the economy but would not characterise it as civil (Sampson 2002). They rather see this space as captured by foreign donors’ agendas and/or domestic nationalisms (cf. on football hooligans: Colovic 2000; on the mobilisation of the 1990s: Bieber 2011). Bosnia and Herzegovina – rampant with local corruption, ethno- nationalist divisions and socio-economic problems – seems to epitomise it all. But then came June 2013, and local administration’s inability to issue a passport for an infant in Sarajevo triggered what observers labelled the Bosnian “civic awakening” (Stiks 2013). Then followed February 2014, and newspapers picked up on the early seeds of a Bosnian Spring.4 One Bosnian scholar and activist wrote: “Bosnia today is a school of democracy. What is happening in plenums and on the streets is democracy live” Ahmetasovic 2014). Whence this local enthusiasm, and, particularly amongst Western European media, 1 The question of how to label the countries that once formed the Communist Yugoslav Federation (Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Serbia, Slovenia, Macedonia and Montenegro) is difficult. The term Western Balkans, currently preferred by some international institutions (such as the EU), comprises former Yugoslav states plus Albania, minus Slovenia. But the concept of Balkans has a contested history (cf. Todorova, 1999). I will therefore not use it. Southeast Europe appears more neutral, but it is very vague. Since I exclude Albania and include Slovenia in my study, I will use the term “successor states of Yugoslavia”, aka “former Yugoslavia”. 2 My translation from German: “Straßeneckenmacht” 3 My translation: “Der Übergang vom Postkommunismus [ist] zu einem Übergang von einer hoffnungslosen Gesellschaft zu einer Gesellschaft ohne Hoffnung [geworden].” 4 Compare e.g.: Al Jazeera: http://www.aljazeera.com/indepth/opinion/2014/02/it-spring-at-last-bosnia- herzegov-2014296537898443.html [01/03/14], and the Economist: http://www.economist.com/news/europe/ 21596572-latest-troubles-bosnia-may-wake-up-countrys-inept-leaders-fire [01/03/14] 5 astonishment about the participatory potential in this ostensibly forsaken region of the world? Are the successor states of Yugoslavia a sinister place for democratic participation, or are they not? As usual, answers are not as easily given as questions are found. A cursory glance into broadly distributed indices and surveys5 seems to support the dire assessment of democracy in the Yugoslav successor states. The democracy scorecard provided by Freedom House below6 serves as an exemplar. It demonstrates that countries seem to be stuck in the stage of semi-consolidated democracies and hybrid regimes. Figure 1: Democracy Scorecard 2013, © Freedom House Such indices routinely include at least some variables to capture the participatory dimension of democracy. In order to present diverse examples, I herewith illustrate the narrative of popular disaffection with indicators by the Gallup Balkan Monitor survey.7 Thus, the two variables of “confidence in civil society” and “volunteering” in the table below may be held to serve as proxy indicators for participation. 5 Indices such as the Nations Transition Index by Freedom House (http://www.freedomhouse.org/report- types/nations-transit), the Bertelsmann Transformations Index by the Bertelsmann Stiftung (http://www.bertelsmann-stiftung.de/cps/rde/xchg/SID-559FB94A-C9D09EFD/bst/hs.xsl/307.htm) or the NGO Sustainability Index by USAID (http://transition.usaid.gov/locations/europe_eurasia/dem_gov/ngoindex/) immediately spring to mind, [01/03/14]. 6 Available from: http://www.freedomhouse.org/blog/democratic-scorecard-western-balkans [29/12/13] 7 All data in percent, accessed on: http://www.balkan-monitor.eu/index.php/dashboard [13/02/12] Questions were: a) High confidence in NGOs: “In [Country], do you have a lot of confidence in each of the following, or not? How about … - Civil Society, NGOs”, b) Volunteering: “Have you done any of the following in the past month? How about … - Volunteered your time to an organisation?” 6 Confidence in Civil Society Volunteering Bosnia 2009 10.9 3.2 2012 10.1 4.6 Croatia 2009 12 2.3 2012 17 6.2 Kosovo 2009 34.2 14 2012 14.8 8.2 Macedonia 2009 10.2 7.3 2012 14 7 Montenegro 2009 16.3 7.1 2012 7.5 7.6 Serbia 2009 5.3 4.3 2012 6.1 6.6 Figure 2: Balkan Gallup Monitor, Sources from: Gallup Institute for the Balkans The table shows consistently low figures for confidence in civil society. The only exception is Kosovo, where in 2009 (i.e. one year after its independence) confidence in civil society rose to 34%.