The Ethnopolitics and Crisis of Sovereignity in Bosnia and Herzegovina

European Perspectives – Journal on European Perspectives of the Western Balkans Vol. 2, No. 2, pp 123-132, October 2010 The Ethnopolitics and Crisis of Sovereignity in Bosnia and Herzegovina Asim Mujkić1 SUmmaRY Analyzing the status of the sovereignty of Bosnia and Herzegovina (herein- after ‘BiH’) the author inquires the ethnopolitical strategies including the International community’s various practices of political de-personalization of BiH since 1992 that supported further fragmentation of “Bosnian con- stituency” into ethnopolitical entities in the attempt to answer an important question on whether Bosnia and Herzegovina could be considered a sovereign state. The present ethnopolitical regime heavily depends on the perpetual “apolitical crisis” as the primary source of political articulation and action. Indeed, author claims, that through the process of, what he coined, ‘humanitarization’ that had occurred during the 1992-95 war the internationally recognized UN member state has progressively been trans- formed into the ‘conflict zone’ and thus politically depersonalized. Parallel to this process was the process of depersonalization of citizens – from political persons, individual bearers of fundamental rights and freedoms they were depersonalized through the humanitarization into biological units, or beings awaiting to be fed. That is why, the political personality of both the state and its citizens has been just empty concept to this day in Bosnia and Herzegovina. In Heideggerian words, Bosnian state is, but does not exist. In that regard, author inquires the possibilities of ‘postnational’ self- understanding of Bosnian political community. KEY WORDS Ethnopolitics, sovereignty, ‘humanitarization’, ‘state of emergency’, political personality; 1 CORRESPONDENCE ADDRESS: Asim Mujkić, Ph. D., University of Sarajevo, Faculty of Political Science, Association of Political Science in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Skenderija 72, Sarajevo, Bosnia and Herzegovina, e-mail: [email protected] ISSN 1855-7694 © 2010 European Perspectives, UDK: 327 (4) 123 Asim Mujkić In an interview with the distinguished Emeritus Professor of Sarajevan University Ćazim Sadiković in daily Oslobođenje (March 20, 2010) the following has been accentuated: „There have been five to six events at- tracting our attention recently – each of them being elements of a ‘state of emergency’. In short, the preconditions for the application of Article 15 of the European Convention have been met, since the existence of Bosnian nation has been endangered. Not literally, though, however, it is rather endangered in a long term. With the introduction of extraordinary measures, or the state of emergency, all conditions would be met to dismiss the causes threatening the existence of the nation itself, and these do not relate exclu- sively to war”. Furthermore, Professor Sadiković concludes: “all this refers to the condition that begs the necessity of a state of emergency. This state is even requested by the Parliamentary Assembly of the Council of Europe, as well as by the Resolution of the American Congress”. The reason why I mention this view of the distinguished Sarajevan Professor is not the very complexity of problems BiH has been faced with, nor is it the analysis of certain measures he proposes. Simply, I was struck by a Schmittian question in its crude simplicity – really, who is the one in BiH entitled to declare the state of emergency? At first sight, this question could be viewed as just another additional spark to initiate a devastating political fire. But this is not the case. In fact, the precise answer to the question above could refer us to the question of all questions in this country: “Who or what is truly a sovereign in BiH?”; or “Is BiH really a sovereign state at all?”; “Does BiH indeed have anything resembling of a ‘political personality’?”. I intend to argue that at best, BiH is only formally a sovereign state. Although in the Preamble of its fundamental political document, that is the Annex 4 of the Dayton Peace Agreement, titled as “Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina” it is clearly provided: „Committed to the sovereignty, territorial integrity, and political independence of Bosnia and Herzegovina in accordance with international law“ ; furthermore in 5th paragraph of Article III of the same document the attributes of statehood are enumerated as fol- lows: „the sovereignty, territorial integrity, political independence, and international personality of Bosnia and Herzegovina“; in addition, there are numerous formal acts of the recognition of BiH as a sovereign nation, its full membership to the UN, now its membership in the UN Security Council. However, a unanimous answer to the question whether BiH is fully a sovereign state could not be found. In fact, it could be even 124 The Ethnopolitics and Crisis of Sovereignity in Bosnia and Herzegovina inferred that “BiH today is suffering from an acute case of virtual statehood” (FPI, 2010: 9). In order to offer a plausible answer to the issue of sovereignty of BiH I intend to reflect upon few important terms such is the very conception of territorial sovereignty, as well as upon the issue of political personality within which the issue of sovereignty is, in my view, significantly re- flected. In that regard, by ‘sovereignty’ in general I mean the Westphalian conception according to which the “sovereign state is an independent, territorially defined, equal and free agent of state and international acts” (Nohlen, 2001: 448). This term derives its meaning from the word ‘sovereign’ (Latin: superanus) meaning “1. Above or superior to all others; chief; greatest; supreme 2. Supreme in power, rank, or authority 3. Of holding the position of ruler; royal; reigning 4. independent of all others /a sovereign state/” (Webster’s New World Dictionary, 1988: 1283). As it appears sovereignty is two-fold phenomenon: it refers equally both to authority within the state borders, but also to authority, agency, or personality in the sphere of international relations. In fact, as Kayaoglu notes “various IR scholars have suggested territorial jurisdiction is con- structed through the interactions of various state, nonstate, and international actors” (Kayaoglu, 2007: 650). As internationally recognized entity, the sovereign state enjoys international legal and political personality, meaning that this entity is an agent of the international law. Therefore it is possible to talk about the domestic and international aspects of sovereignty, which BiH as an internationally recognized state apparently has. However, within a Westphalian framework authors such as Nick Vaughan-Williams suggest that “it is possible to identify three regulative ideals that have shaped the international legal and political system: states must be responsible for their own internal domestic legal system; states must respect the legal existence and equality of other states before international law; and states must not violate the principle of the territorial integrity of any other state” (Vaughan-Williams, 2008: 324). In this light I intend to problematize the first regulative ideal, namely, that a state must be responsible for its own internal domestic legal system. Since the internal legal system of BiH is subject to the international agreement the first important question with which I will not deal in detail in this text is whether this ‘domestic’ fact influence its ‘international’ counterpart of the definition, namely the international legal and political personality which qualifies certain country as responsible agent in the international relations. This question seems rather plausible after BiH had been elected 125 Asim Mujkić as non-permanent UN Security Council member but also when it comes to international treaties and other obligations. The second important question is how does this ‘domestic’ fact that the internal legal system is subject to the international agreement affect the political personality and identity of BiH. This question is about the internal sovereignty which leads us to the issue of the identity or political personality if the personality is understood as the quality or fact of being a particular person/entity, in terms of identity and individuality. Based on this insight one can argue that BiH is a state with international sovereignty with clearly recognized borders and political personality in terms of membership in the international organizations and signature to the international treaties, but without clear domestic sovereignty, domestic political personality, without the established political order that would make political rulers responsible and accountable for political activities both domestically but also internationally2. So, let me try to answer the question once posed by Carl Schmitt – who in BiH can declare the state of emergency? First of all, because BiH has been in a particular state of emergency since 1992 – war, constitution imposed in the form of the international peace agreement, presence of international military and police forces, numerous organizations who take part in shaping the articulation of political personality of this country, or better put in acting political personality of this country. In fact, Schmittian question should be rephrased: who in BiH can declare the state of normalcy? Precisely in the context of such rephrased question the first trace of answer could be identified. Article I of Annex 10 of the DPA provided that the institution of the Office of High Representative

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