Südosteuropa 62 (2014), no. 4, pp. 500-522
MIECZYSłAW P. BODUSZYńSKI
Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way: Explaining Croatian Attitudes towards the EU
Abstract. What explains widespread Euroscepticism among the Croatian public? A scarce two years after accession, despite immense incentives to join the EU and more than a decade of EU promotion by politicians and officials in Zagreb and Brussels, large parts of Croatian society remain ambivalent, indifferent, or even hostile to the ostensible benefits of EU member - ship. This article analyses the sources of Croatian attitudes towards the EU and argues that while certain causes and manifestations of Croatian Euroscepticism reflect wider European trends, Croats’ views of the EU are also uniquely shaped by Croatia’s short experience with independent statehood and the ongoing complications related to the building of a new state and national identity after the dissolution of Yugoslavia .
Mieczysław P. Boduszyński is Assistant Professor of Politics and International Relations at Pomona College, Claremont, California, USA .
Introduction
This article analyses the nature and sources of Croatian Euroscepticism, both before and after Croatia’s accession into the European Union (EU) 1. on 1 July 2013, Croatia formally entered the EU, following a long decade of negotia- tions with, and close supervision by, Brussels. Throughout this process, the EU promoted Croatia as a Western Balkan model for democratic reform and stressed the rewards that such reform would bring. For proponents of European enlargement, Croatia’s experience demonstrates the power of democratization through EU conditionality .
1 The research for this article was generously funded by a grant from Pomona College, with research assistance provided by Scott Panek and Kevin Wang. The author also wishes to thank the anonymous referees for their valuable feedback . Some of the arguments in this article were previously presented in a book chapter: Mieczysław P. Boduszyński, The Trials and Triumphs of Europeanization in Croatia . The Unbearable Weight of Structure and State- building?, in: Arolda Elbasani (ed .), European Integration and Transformation in the Western Balkans . Europeanization or Business as Usual? London et al . 2013, 39-53 . Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 501
Yet, in the years leading up to membership, an unmistakable schism ap- peared in Croatia: on one side of the divide were elites from all the mainstream political parties in Zagreb, who unambiguously supported EU accession,2 and, on the other side, large parts of the Croatian public, who grew increasingly disillusioned with Brussels and the project of joining the EU. Indeed, elites in Brussels and Zagreb were forced to confront the undeniable irony that, at the beginning of the second decade of the new millennium, even as Croatia stood at the doorstep to the European Union, Croats expressed the greatest scepticism towards the EU among all the Western Balkan aspirant countries. In 2005, when Croatia achieved candidate status, Eurobarometer polls showed that only 28% of Croats viewed the EU positively, the lowest level recorded on the continent that year .3 In 2010, only 25% of Croats believed that entry into the EU would be a good thing for the country, while 54% believed that membership would bring no benefits at all. 4 It was especially striking that in that same year the youngest generation of Croats polled, ostensibly the group best poised to benefit from membership, also harboured the greatest ambivalence towards Europe. 5 In- deed, in the 2000s public support for EU integration had steadily fallen among Croats even as backing for the process of integration became consistent across the leadership of all relevant political parties .6 While ultimately over 60% of Croatian voters supported EU membership in the January 2012 referendum,7 the very low turnout for such a critical decision
2 There were no representatives from anti-EU parties in the Croatian parliament in the decade leading to membership . 3 See Eurobarometer 63 .4, National Report on Croatia, Spring 2005, available at http://< ec.europa.eu/public_opinion/archives/eb/eb63/eb63_exec_hr.pdf>. In 2005, 61% of Turkey’s population, by contrast, had positive perceptions of the EU. All internet sources were accessed on 3 February 2015 . 4 See the Gallup Balkan Monitor 2010, available at
(43.5%)8 and a multitude of public opinion polls showed that ordinary Croats were at the very least indifferent to but in many cases deeply sceptical about joining the European Union, while some parts of the population were openly hostile to the idea . In spring 2013, on the eve of membership, Eurobarometer surveys recorded that only 38% of Croats believed that membership would be a “good thing” for the country: this was a substantially lower figure than had been recorded for the same question in Poland (50%), Slovenia (52%), and Hungary (49%) in spring 2004, just before those countries entered the EU, or Romania (71%) and Bulgaria (52%) in 2007, on the eve of their admission.9 When Croatia formally entered the EU on 1 July 2013, authorities organized an impressive show in Zagreb’s main square to celebrate, but the public mood was anything but euphoric . A year later, the mood of Croats had hardly improved . On 1 July 2014, prominent Croatian newspapers highlighted unemployment and poverty in the country rather than celebrating the first anniversary of EU membership .10 All this prompts the question: despite the immense incentives to join the EU, and despite more than a decade’s worth of pronouncements by politicians and officials in Zagreb and Brussels about the benefits of doing so and the accompanying rhetoric emphasizing Croatia’s “European”, i . e . non- Balkan, orientation, why is it that so many Croats continue to feel sceptical about the EU?11 The present analysis argues that Croatian Euroscepticism has roots in economic and identity considerations, and that each of these is related to the challenges of building a new, post-Yugoslav Croatian state. As I will show, economics and identity in the Croatian case are in fact strongly intertwined, in that many Croats see free-market reforms as a threat not only to their mate- rial well-being, but indeed also to their hard-won sovereignty and identity as
8 This was even lower than the turnout for the Hungarian referendum in April 2003, which was just above 45%. In July 2011, reading the lack of enthusiasm among the Croatian public for the EU and anticipating a low turnout, the Croatian parliament changed the rule requiring a 50% turnout for this referendum in particular. 9 Figures are from various Eurobarometer polls . 10 The front page of the national daily Jutarnji list on 1 July 2014 carried the headline “Glad i bijeda” [Hunger and poverty] while the regional Novi list, published in Rijeka, on the same day highlighted a European Commission report indicating that every other Croat would leave to work abroad if given the opportunity. Another article in Jutarnji list, however, listed how Croatia stands to benefit from membership in the coming years. 11 Even in the last days of Yugoslavia, EU integration was promoted as a way to bring the country out of crisis and improve living standards. After 2000, EU membership was accepted as an inevitability among the Croatian political elite, and came to be popularly seen, according to Dejan Jović, Croatia and the European Union . A Long Delayed Journey,Journal of Southern Europe and the Balkans 8 (2006), no. 1, 85-103, 87, as the second “recognition” of Croatia, the first being the recognition of Croatian independence in 1992. Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 503 a people. This goes far in explaining why Croatian Euroscepticism is pervasive and enduring compared to other post-communist cases . The article proceeds as follows. The second section, immediately below, reviews existing theories of Euroscepticism across the continent and, drawing on the results of Croatian public opinion polls, discusses how the Croatian case fits into these theories. The third section focuses on the economics of Croatian Euroscepticism and its roots in the country’s structural profile, inherited from Yugoslavia and before . In the fourth section, I elaborate my central argument: while frustration with the economic situation and its associated woes, such as unemployment, matter to some degree in explaining Croatian Euroscepticism, the phenomenon has more profound roots . These relate to Croatia’s short ex- perience with independent statehood, as well as the complications of building a new state and national identity after the violent dissolution of Yugoslavia. As a result, while the Croatian elite has more readily signed on to the tradeoffs associated with the pursuit of EU membership, the public at large is far more sensitive to consequences such as diminished sovereignty and the perceived threats associated with foreign investment. The final section summarizes the findings and discusses prospects for the country’s future as an EU member.
Euroscepticism as a European and Croatian Phenomenon
As noted above, in their Euroscepticism Croats are hardly alone in Europe . The results of the May 2014 elections to the European Parliament (EP), in which right-wing anti-EU parties won many seats, show that the rest of Europe, espe- cially the part which former US Secretary of Defense Donald Rumsfeld famously referred to as “Old Europe”, seems to be no less Eurosceptic. Furthermore, low turnouts in critical EU-related elections are also not unique to Croatia . As Dejan Jović points out, elections to the European Parliament across the continent rou - tinely fail to produce turnouts above 40%. 12 In many of the older EU member states, voters have projected their frustration with the economic recession that has spread across the continent in recent years on Brussels and the perceived dysfunction and arrogance of its institutions 13. Seen in this light, Croats seem to be in good company in their ambivalence towards the EU and its institu-
12 Dejan Jović, Croatian EU Membership and the Future of the Balkans, in: Vedran Džihić / Daniel Hamilton (eds.), Unfinished Business. The Western Balkans and the International Community, Washington/DC 2012, 63, available at
14 European Parliament, Results of the 2014 European Elections, available at
16 Ibid . 17 Aleks Szczerbiak / Paul Taggart, opposing Europe? The Comparative Party Politics of Euroscepticism . oxford 2008 . 18 Liesbet Hooghe, Does Identity or Economic Rationality Drive Public opinion on European Integration?, Political Science and Politics 37 (2004), no. 3, 415-420. 506 Mieczysław P. Boduszyński of Euroscepticism given the negative public “mood” that results from economic decline . Interestingly, these authors find that the recession’s effect on attitudes towards the EU was different in Western than in Eastern Europe: in the West, people see EU membership as a cause of the economic downturn, while those in the East see EU membership as potentially relieving the economic malaise . Thus, expectations about what Brussels can and should do are also powerful shapers of attitudes towards the EU.19 Education and the awareness of the EU’s role towards a given member state can also influence attitudes. For instance, Poles have been greater Euroenthusi- asts than many of their neighbours in part because of the high profile afforded to the EU in Poland, especially in funding infrastructure projects. It is also well known among the Polish population that its farmers have been great benefi- ciaries of EU funds 20. Constructivist theories show us how varying kinds of identity influence public opinion regarding EU membership . Strong national identities can prevent the adoption of a plural sense of identity, incorporating a “European” as well as a national identity, that can lead to positive views of the EU. Van Kersbergen sees EU identity as being derivative of an existing identity, while Risse describes it as a layer cake, in which EU and national identities are closely related but distinct. Those countries with populaces that see themselves as holding an ex- clusive, independent national identity (Austria and Switzerland, for instance) often reject the notion of an overarching EU identity, and therefore tend towards Euroscepticism, regardless whether their countries are actually part of the EU. On the other hand, those countries or territories where citizens tend to have “inclusive” or multiple national identities, such as Catalans who identify with both Catalonia and Spain, may be more open to the adoption of an even more inclusive, pan-European identity 21.
Sketching Croatian Euroscepticism
On the surface, Croatian attitudes towards Europe fit very well into exist- ing theories focusing on economics and identity . over the past decade, Croats
19 Joe Ritzen / Klaus Zimmermann / Caroline Wehner, Euroscepticism in the Crisis . More Mood than Economy. Bonn, February 2014, available at
22 Simona Guerra, The Rise of Euroscepticism in Croatia, Ballots & Bullets, 12 July 2013, available at
As such, Croatian views of the EU have become increasingly characterized by what Jović argues are currently dominant attitudes of indifference towards the EU (euroravnodušnost) .26 However, the deeper and more idiosyncratic roots of Croatian ambivalence towards the EU become evident when one reviews surveys that focus on the substantive fears many Croats harbour concerning membership . These surveys indicate that beneath the outward economic anxieties lie profound fears about the EU’s perceived effect on cherished narratives concerning the formation of the independent Croatian state after the breakup of the former Yugoslavia . For example, Blanuša finds that over 56% of survey respondents believe that the EU was “partly responsible for offending the dignity of the Homeland War”; 57% answered that the EU is attempting to “equalize the role of Croatia and Serbia” in that same war. 27 A high percentage of Croats (nearly 70%) expressed fears about the survival of the Croatian language and identity within the framework of the EU. Focus-group studies by Skoko and Bagić largely support these survey results .28 While such attitudes varied by level of education and urbanization, they nonetheless strongly suggest that Croatian Euroscepticism is distinct from what is to be found in other parts of Europe because it is underpinned by feel - ings of national pride which spring directly from recent statehood and the war experiences that are very much in living memory . While the theories focusing on national identity vis-à-vis the EU are a starting point to interpret Croatian attitudes towards the EU, they focus more on the possibilities for multiple iden- tities rather than the insecurities in identity that are inherent in state-building . Moreover, the existing theories do not help to explain why Croats, who are poised to benefit from EU assistance, do not see EU membership as a potential source of relief from their painful recession. In the following, I elaborate the sources of Croatian attitudes in greater detail.
The Economic Sources of Croatian Euroscepticism
Popular frustration with the EU is partly rooted in a seemingly perpetual economic crisis, with persistently high unemployment, especially among the young. In December 2014, the overall unemployment rate in Croatia was 19.6%,
Bonn 2006, 141-160 . 26 Jović, Croatian EU Membership . 27 Nebojša Blanuša, Euroscepticizam u Hrvatskoj, in: Šiber (ed .), Hrvatska i Europa, 11-46, 20 . 28 Božo Skoko / Dragan Bagić, Pet uvjerenja i 29 razloga protiv, in: Šiber (ed .), Hrvatska i Europa, 47-85 . Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 509 while youth unemployment was recorded at 44.8%, and has averaged 34% over the past decade 29. Approximately 35,000 jobs were lost during the first year of EU membership . In addition, Croatia “failed to gain traction in the EU market and foreign investments, one of Zagreb’s highest priorities, decreased by 60 per cent in 2013. Incomes were stagnant and the public debt increased to an estimated 64 per cent of GDP .”30 According to a spring 2014 Eurobarometer poll, a staggering 95% of Croatian respondents saw the economic situation as “totally bad”, putting Croatia in the company of Greece, Spain, Portugal, Bulgaria, and Italy as the most economically pessimistic Europeans 31. As the crisis set in at the end of the new century’s first decade, initially many Croats saw the prospect of better outcomes through joining the EU.32 The research findings presented earlier in this paper, based on the experi- ence of other net recipients of EU aid in the eastern and southern parts of the continent, suggest that Croats might see the EU as a potential source of relief from economic recession . Yet the opposite has been the case: sustained economic hardship has only hardened anti-EU feeling among Croats . This is because the roots of the economic malaise in Croatia are related to complicated and ambivalent feelings about free-market policies . Croatia’s current malaise is also linked to the country’s economic structure: despite some well-developed sectors and industries, there is also a substantial part of the Croatian economy, developed and industrialized under communism, that had been negatively af- fected by the years of Yugoslav economic crisis and the loss of unified markets after independence. The enduring legacy of weaknesses in Croatia’s economic structure has made recovery more difficult, is the basis of extensive clientelism and corruption, and, importantly for the present analysis, has shaped wide - spread antipathy towards EU-mandated free-market policies, such as laws promoting international competition and trade. In the Croatian case, such laws were also seen through the lens of the recent past, amid fears that Europeaniza - tion – through trade, competition, and foreign investment – would challenge Croatia’s sense of national pride .
29 Croatia – Economic Indicators, Trading Economics, available at
The Initial Conditions of Transition
Quantitative research by Pop-Eleches suggests that the initial conditions of transition constitute a powerful determinant of the subsequent path of post- communist change . Croatia, granted a substantial degree of autonomy as one of the six republics of the socialist Yugoslav federation, had sectors and regions that were quite developed and connected to Western markets, but also a poor interior and sectors that had been developed in the communist mould, which meant that they struggled to compete in global markets 33. What amounted to an urban-rural divide has shaped voting patterns in successive Croatian elec- tions after independence, with the poor periphery often opting for populist and nationalist political groups and politicians who harbour Eurosceptic views.34 During state socialism, Croatia’s economy depended heavily on tourism and the sending of guest workers to Western Europe as a source of hard currency income and as a safety valve for a chronic unemployment problem, which was especially high among young people (and remains so today) . The Croatian economic structure was based, furthermore, on many semi-viable sectors and some volatile ones . Thus, despite being much more developed than the southern Yugoslav republics, Croatia’s economy was adversely affected by the 1980s eco - nomic crisis in Yugoslavia . Independence and the loss of traditional markets in the south exacerbated the crisis .35 Due to high living standards throughout the 1970s, and given that many Croats had travelled to Western Europe and were familiar with lifestyle and consumption standards there, the feeling of frustration was profound, especially among the waves of educated young people unable to find stable employment in the 1980s. A deeply corrupt privatization process in the 1990s put failing industries in the hands of insiders within the nationalist and authoritarian regime of former president Franjo Tuđman and his nationalist party, the Croatian Democratic Union (Hrvatska demokratska zajednica, HDZ), who then used their positions to strip firms of any valuable assets. The HDZ party insiders did little to restruc- ture the firms and make them viable. Many other industries, especially those developed under communist industrialization, were not privatized but were allowed to survive on the basis of heavy state subsidies, buoyed by the influence of politically powerful unions with strong memories of the benefits and security
33 Grigore Pop-Eleches, Historical Legacies and Post-Communist Regime Change, The Journal of Politics 69 (2007), no. 4, 908-926. 34 Mieczysław P. Boduszyński, Regime Change in the Yugoslav Successor States . Divergent Paths toward a New Europe . Baltimore 2010 . 35 William Bartlett, Croatia. Between Europe and the Balkans. London 2003, 89 . Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 511 of the Yugoslav model of self-management . The kind of pro-competition reforms necessary for EU accession were hard to swallow for these industries and sec - tors, and thus were politically difficult to implement. 36 The Adriatic shipyards in particular became a bastion of political resistance to capitalist restructuring and were a thorn in the side of pro-EU Croatian elites as they scrambled in 2011 and 2012 to negotiate the provisions dealing with competition policy. The shipyards, dependent on the Soviet market, had enjoyed considerable prestige, but now they are no longer viable given the competition from Asia.
Free-Market Reforms and Euroscepticism
The deep antipathy among many Croats young and old to the market-centred (or “neoliberal”) economic agenda espoused by the EU is a direct result of the Yugoslav legacy of extensive social protection and state paternalism . Robert Bajruši, writing in the popular weeklyNacional , commented: “Generally speaking, many Croatian citizens are unwilling to give up the relatively comfortable lives and social rights that are a legacy from the past, and that is exactly what some of the conditions from the EU require.” 37 Fear of policies that would open up the Croatian economy to international competition and allow the free movement of capital plays an important part in conditioning Euroscepticism among the public, including, somewhat surpris - ingly, young people . In a poll of 999 high school students carried out by the nongovernmental organization GoNG (Građani organizirano nadgledaju glasanje , “Organized citizens oversee voting”) in 2010, 50% thought that an inflow of foreign products would destroy Croatian producers, while 60% believed prices would rise (even though import duties with EU countries had been abolished for several years) .38 Many Croats, especially those on the political left, became convinced that EU membership would effectively mean auctioning off the most
36 In 2010, trade unions gathered 230,000 signatures for a petition opposing restructuring in the state sector . Another example of resistance to neoliberal reform is the agricultural sector . In 2010, farmers actively protested the government’s pro-EU policies . Also, large parts of Croatia’s agricultural sector have been deemed unable to compete in European markets . The EU cited policies not amenable to market competition among the reasons it did not include Croatia in the second round of enlargement to post-communist countries in 2007, though this view is very controversial. Cf. Klaus Frohberg et al ., Croatia’s Dairy Sector . Can it Compete in the European Market?, International Advances in Economic Research 16 (2010), 223-236; John Ashbrook, Croatia, Euroskepticism, and the Identity Politics of EU Enlargement, Problems of Post-Communism 57 (2010), no. 3, 23-39, 31. 37 Robert Bajruši, Novi Promoter EU-a [The New Promoter of the EU], Nacional, 12 october 2010, available at
39 Skoko / Bagić, Pet uvjerenja i 29 razloga protiv, 58f . 40 Interview with Christian Axboe Nielsen, Zagreb, June 2014. 41 Interviews with several Croatian scholars, Zagreb, June–July 2014. 42 Interview with Vjeran Pavlaković, Zagreb, June 2014. 43 Ibid . 44 Skoko / Bagić, Pet uvjerenja i 29 razloga protiv, 82 . 45 Blanuša, Euroskepticizam u Hrvatskoj, 11-46 . Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 513 political parties, the Social Democratic Party (Socijaldemokratska partija Hrvatske, SDP) and the HDZ, both champions of EU membership by the 2000s, advocated a gradual approach to market reforms. Among Croats, there was a clear politi - cal and social consensus on keeping certain vestiges of communist-era social security in place at the cost of foreign investment and dynamism . For instance, in advance of the 2007 elections, the economist Ljubo Jurčić declared: “I am for leftist economic policies, and not neoliberalism . It is easiest just to leave everything up to the market, but such a strategy will destroy the Croatian economy and leave people in the streets. Furthermore, no single serious country in the world runs a purely neoliberal economic policy, but instead defines its national priorities and implements state interventions to save jobs . We need to conduct ourselves the same in Croatia .”46 In its 2014 Index of Economic Freedom, the Washington-based Heritage Foun- dation gave Croatia a ranking of 78 out of 177 countries, placing it between Ghana and Uganda: “Systemic corruption continues to erode public confidence and trust in the gov- ernment . The state maintains an extensive presence in many economic sectors through state-owned enterprises [...] Deeper institutional reforms in such areas as public finance management and the labor market are critically needed. Few steps have been taken to reduce or control government spending, and the inefficient and bloated public sector severely undermines private-sector dynamism, hurting Croatia’s overall competitiveness .”47 Even in the final stages of the EU accession process, the Croatian state con- tinued to play a highly interventionist role in the economy, sustaining one of the largest public sectors in Europe . In a 2011 op-ed published in the Croatian daily Jutarnji list, economist Hongjoo Hahm of the World Bank office in Croatia urged the government to lessen its role, drawing a striking contrast with South Korea, where despite its support of industry, the state has not engaged in the kind of bureaucratic, interventionist control over the economy that continues to be the norm in Croatia .48 But such arguments by elite economists did not get much traction among ordinary Croats who stood to suffer as a result of reduced state subsidies and welfare programmes. Anti-market voices joined with renewed appeals to na- tionalism as support for the EU fell in 2009 and 2010 in the face of a deepening
46 Bajruši, Novi Promoter EU-a . 47 Terry Miller / Kim R. Holmes / Edwin J. Feulner, 2013 Index of Economic Freedom . Washington/DC, New York 2014, 179, available at
49 Interview with Sven Milekić, Zagreb, July 2014. 50 See Ailing Croatia . A Mighty Mess, The Economist, 26 July 2014, 46 . 51 Blanuša, Euroskepticizam u Hrvatskoj . Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 515
EU accession .52 And the strongest predictor of Euroscepticism in this multifac- tor analysis was found to be fears related to the state of Croatian products and farmers following accession.53
EU Accession and the Complications of State-Building
other than a rather short-lived medieval kingdom and a brief period of in- dependence as a Nazi puppet state during the Second World War, Croatia had never enjoyed sovereignty as a nation-state prior to 1991. For most of the twen - tieth century, it had been a part of Yugoslavia, first in its monarchic-centralist, then in its state-socialist, federated version .54 Both of these factors complicated the transition to independent statehood, in terms of legitimizing the state for the ethnic Serb minority, accepting diminished sovereignty so as to fulfil the requirements to join international organizations, and underscoring tensions over whether Croatia should unconditionally pursue EU membership, no matter the cost . Throughout Croatia’s post-communist transition, the national question has been much more prominent than in post-communist states whose borders did not change after 1989 55. Most critical in terms of public attitudes in a country that had achieved independence through war, however, was the difficulty of accepting diminished sovereignty so as to fulfil the requirements to join yet
52 Neboša Blanuša / Ivan Šiber, Nade i strahovi mladih prema Europskoj Uniji, in: Šiber (ed .), Hrvatska i Europa, 86-119, 94 . 53 Blanuša, Euroskepticizam u Hrvatskoj . 54 The insecurities of Croatia’s post-Yugoslav state-building project have also been reflected in an unresolved tension between its identity as a Central European state on the one hand and its historical connections to the Balkans on the other . As a result, Croatia has been pulled in different directions with regard to its international relations. On the one hand, Croatia had long been part of two South Slav unions. It had a coast with a strong Mediterranean orientation; yet large parts of Croatia also belong firmly to the Central European geographic, cultural, and trade sphere, not least due to their long period of incorporation in the Habsburg Empire . However, the presence of ethnic Croats in neighbouring Bosnia and Herzegovina meant that foreign policy was shaped in reference to the Balkan region as well. Economic networks have reflected this varied orientation, with links to the west, south, and east. Cf. Bartlett , Croatia, 63; Nataša Zambelli, Između Balkana i Zapada. Problem hrvatskog identiteta nakon Tuđmana i diskurzivna rekonstrukcija regije [Between the Balkans and the West. The Problem of Croatian Identity after Tuđman and the Discursive Reconstruction of the Region], Politička Misao 47 (2010), no. 1, 55-76; Mieczysław P. Boduszyński, Regime Change in the Yugoslav Successor States . 55 Research shows that “national pride” is significantly higher in Croatia than in other EU aspirant countries . See Marko Stojic, Between Europhobia and Europhilia. Party and Popular Attitudes towards Membership of the European Union in Serbia and Croatia, Perspectives on European Politics and Society 7 (2006), no. 3, 312-335; Branko Caratan, The European Union, South-Eastern Europe and the Europeanization of Croatia, Politička misao 48 (2009), no. 5, 171-180 . 516 Mieczysław P. Boduszyński another multinational bloc. Croatian fears, which are intimately bound up with Croatian identity, have been at the root of the country’s Euroscepticism just as much as economic fears over the past two decades. 56 This Euroscepticism crystallized in public opinion during the early efforts of Brussels to bring Croatia into the European fold, when Croatia was still ruled by Tuđman and the HDZ. Many of the conditions brought forward by the EU in the late 1990s directly complicated the state-building project: the establishment of minority rights and the right of refugee return for ethnic Serbs, cooperation with the ICTY, and cooperation with neighbouring states. And the EU’s failure to stop the war in the 1990s and protect Croatia hurt its legitimacy for many Croats and increased feelings of victimhood among them 57. Croats were furi- ous that they had just fought, and won, a bloody war on their own, and were hardly prepared to accept conditions from what was seen as a hypocritical and arrogant Europe . Similarly, other international organizations then present in Croatia and engaged in pressing for and monitoring democratic reforms (the UN, the OSCE, the IMF, and others) were also regarded with suspicion by the ruling regime and seen as infringing on the new country’s hard-won sovereignty, even as other, more liberal parts of the population welcomed their involvement. Moreover, the EU likely made a major strategic miscalculation when it formu- lated the so-called regional approach to the newly invented “Western Balkans” in 1997, for it gave Tuđman ideal ammunition to claim that the EU wanted to reconstruct Yugoslavia 58. Yet even after the democratic turnover of 2000, as the EU retreated somewhat from a regional approach, Croatian politicians still felt immensely constrained in selling cooperation with neighbouring states to the public, as is evident from the following quote from former prime minister Ivica Račan: “For me personally, and for the government, there are no problems regarding regional cooperation. However, the other thing is that we still have to explain -cer tain issues and we still have to take into account the fears which are based on our experience of being part of some other associations up until recently, and which have not ended happily .”59 As such, in its negotiations with Brussels, Zagreb consistently insisted on an individual approach to membership and simultaneously rejected being grouped
56 It should be noted that some senior clergy in the Roman Catholic hierarchy added to these fears by fretting about the possible threat EU membership could pose to Croatian national identity, cf .Stojic, Between Europhobia and Europhilia, 331. 57 Indeed, many Croats believe that Europe deliberately avoided intervention to preserve the status quo ante; that is, Yugoslavia .Jović , Croatia and the European Union, 91 . 58 Jović, Croatia and the European Union, 85f . 59 Ibid ., 95 . Euroscepticism, the Croatian Way 517 with the Western Balkans, arguing that the other Balkan states were far less prepared for accession and could only hold Croatia back . Thus, the regional approach had planted yet another seed of suspicion in the minds of many Croats, in spite of Tuđman’s attempted counter-narrative about Croatia belonging firmly to Europe and Western civilization (in contrast to its southern neighbours) .60 When the doors to the EU opened for Croatia in the 2000s, the situation was compared to that of 1918, when Croatia joined the first, royalist, Yugoslavia.61 Current ambivalence towards the EU is thus also a legacy of widespread distrust of supra-state organizations. For many Croatian veterans of the 1990s war, the idea of surrendering sovereignty to join a new multinational grouping undermines their heroic struggle, especially when the EU imposes conditions, as will be outlined below, that ostensibly challenge the legitimacy of that struggle .
The Homeland War and Euroscepticism
To understand the long-term obstacles to the adoption of European liberal norms presented by the problem of new statehood, we must also acknowledge the role of various national myths that were constructed around the struggle for independence, and in particular around the “Homeland War” (Domovinski rat), and then in turn consider how these myths became not only the primary legitimizing principles for the HDZ regime, but indeed the baseline of political competition for all Croatian political forces. The Homeland War was portrayed by the HDZ leadership as a heroic, cleanly fought battle of national liberation, a depiction which strayed from the actual conduct of the war and the fact that many had profited from it, both materially and politically. According to the myth, Tuđman and his party had defended Croatian nationhood against various
60 The HDZ, in fact, came to power promising to bring Croatia “back” to Europe. There was a concerted effort on the part of the HDZ regime to market Croatia abroad as a Central European, and not Balkan, state. Tuđman was not ideologically anti-Western, and in fact he probably would have gained politically in the long term had Croatia made progress in its accession process to the EU. But he was also a shrewd politician, and calculated that the short- term costs were too high. He knew that strong support for the EU in Croatian society was divorced from the actual process needed to join the organization and that granting more rights to Serbs or allowing for the mass return of refugees would be too high a political price to pay, as any potential benefits that Croatia would derive from such actions, i. e. EU membership, were far away. The legitimacy of the HDZ regime, in the end, rested on a nationalist project. Cf .Boduszyński, Regime Change in the Yugoslav Successor States . 61 A series of political cartoons published in 2013 portrays Croats as “geese flying in a fog”, unsure whether the EU will be akin to the fog that engulfed Croatia upon its joining the first Yugoslavia in 1918. Graffiti in Zagreb declared that the “EU” equals “YU”, meaning Yugoslavia. Thanks to Vjeran Pavlaković for sharing images of these graffiti with me. 518 Mieczysław P. Boduszyński external enemies, thereby facilitating the creation of an independent Croatian state and fulfilling the Croats’ “thousand-year dream”.62 The prevalence and symbolic power of this myth in the public imagination made it very difficult for any political leader or party operating prior to 2000 to call for any kind of reconciliation with Serbia, cooperation with the ICTY, or a host of other policies that would challenge the nationalist narrative of Croatia’s recent history.63 For instance, at one point, the HDZ opposed visa liberalization for Serbs, arguing that Serbs moving freely through the country would offend the Croats who had fought in the wars of the 1990s.64 As Horelt and Renner note, this heroic version of the war prohibits transitional justice, let alone the taking of responsibility, with regard to Croatian actors in the war. 65 Such soul-searching was simply not possible for a nation that was both victim and victor. And to the extent that the Homeland War lay at the heart of the new state’s identity, it proved impossible for many Croats, who otherwise may genuinely have wanted to join the EU, to sacrifice a core tenet of their identity. Blanuša as well as Bagić and Skoko confirm this, showing that a large number of Croats believed in the run-up to membership that entrance into the EU would lead to official revisions of the conduct and results of the Homeland War, a troubling prospect for the vast majority of Croats 66.
Euroscepticism and Cooperation with the ICTY
The myths surrounding the creation of the independent Croatian state came to constitute one of the most serious obstacles to Europeanization due to one of the EU’s primary conditions: full cooperation with the ICTY through the hand -
62 This narrative rejects any attempt to describe the recent conflict as a civil war. Rebel Serbs in the Krajina region who set up a breakaway entity are seen to have committed an act of international aggression, even though they were citizens of Croatia. 63 In October 2014, President Josipović fired one of his top advisors, Dejan Jović, amid a firestorm of controversy about an article Jović wrote, which called into question the fairness of the 1991 referendum for independence given the highly charged atmosphere in which it was conducted. The episode reminds us of the ongoing sensitivities aroused by any ostensible challenges to the way the Croatian state was formed after 1991. Cf. Dejan Jović, Samo u mitovima svaki narod želi državu. U stvarnosti – ne, Politička Misao, 29 September 2014, available at
67 For the ICTY and Croatia, see Christopher K .Lamont , International Criminal Justice and the Politics of Compliance . London 2010; and Victor Peskin / Mieczysław P. Boduszyński, International Justice and Domestic Politics . Post-Tudjman Croatia and the International Criminal Tribunal for Former Yugoslavia, Europe-Asia Studies 55 (2003), no. 7, 1117-1142. 68 Peskin / Boduszyński, International Justice and Domestic Politics . 69 It was revealed later that Del Ponte had been informed that Gotovina had been located, although not yet arrested, which certainly influenced her decision to give the green light regarding cooperation . 70 Cf . IrenaFrlan, Građani žele da se korupcija suzbija radi njih, a ne radi EU-a [Citizens want corruption fought for them, not for the EU], Novi list, 30 September 2010 . 520 Mieczysław P. Boduszyński new ICTY chief prosecutor, Serge Brammertz.71 The inclusion of the ICTY issue in a larger package of conditions for EU membership thus added to Croatian insecurities about a perceived attempt on the part of the EU to revise a funda- mental narrative about how the independent Croatian state emerged in the 1990s, thereby increasing Euroscepticism among large parts of the Croatian public . In the late 2000s, almost half the respondents in a poll agreed that cooperation with the ICTY infringes on Croatia’s sovereignty and is negative for Croatia’s national interests 72.
Conclusion
Euroscepticism, which has characterized Croatian public opinion before, during, and after accession, is a multilayered phenomenon . The economic di- mension matters a great deal in explaining popular antipathy towards the EU. Namely, the inability of the EU accession process to lift Croatia out of recession and relieve unemployment has done little to boost public support for the EU among ordinary Croats. Many Croats associate the EU with unpopular free- market policies that threaten to remove the extensive social protections of the Yugoslav era and reduce public employment . But, as this analysis has argued, economics is also related to sensitivities surrounding identity and national sovereignty in Croatia . For example, selling land and other national property to foreigners, something that the EU is seen to precipitate, is deeply unpopular in a newly independent state with a strong national identity forged in a recent struggle for independence . Whereas some other Europeans, especially those in the east and south, see hope for economic improvement in EU programmes and policies, Croats fear further economic pain and a loss of identity, which has helped to unite the left and right around Euroscepticism . But the EU project has also entailed much more direct challenges to core tenets of Croatian national identity, such as the prevailing narrative of the Homeland War, which has taken a powerful part in shaping Croatian ambivalence towards Brussels. Therefore, constructivist and materialist accounts of Euroscepticism are inextricably linked in the Croatian case . To some extent, Croatian Euroscepticism is also a factor of timing . Croats were asked to carry out reforms and decide whether their country should join the EU in the midst of a global recession, as well as an onslaught of bad news
71 Cf . SenadaŠelo Šabić, Croatia Will Be Next, EU 27-Watch 9 (July 2010), 3-5, available at
73 Jacques Rupnik, From Democracy Fatigue to Populist Backlash, Journal of Democracy 18 (2007), no. 4, 17-25. 74 Interview with Vjeran Pavlaković, Zagreb, July 2014. 522 Mieczysław P. Boduszyński
However, Euroscepticism in Croatia has never been about economic or other kinds of rationality. Rather, as this essay has shown, it has also reflected deep insecurities about its new “stateness”, which has conditioned Croats to feel a deep-seated ambivalence towards membership in any supra-national organiza- tion, especially one that implicitly or explicitly challenges national myths .75 In this sense Euroscepticism in Croatia is more substantially rooted than in other member states . And to the extent that Croatian politicians have been able to blame certain policies on EU pressure, membership means that they will have less room to do so . Besides, as noted above, part of the reason for Croatian Euroscepticism is precisely that distrust in EU institutions is associated with distrust in domestic political institutions, starting with political parties.76 If Croatian Euroscepticism is here to stay, there is a question of what it will mean for the quality of Croatia’s engagement in the EU . There is still much work to be done in educating Croatia’s public officials, not to mention the broader public, about the benefits and responsibilities of membership. If not, Croatia could easily take a nationalist-populist or even authoritarian turn, as has happened in Hungary in the last several years, with perhaps different and more adverse consequences given its recent history of conflict. This in turn will depend on whether EU structural funds and other programmes can be felt in terms of improved living standards for ordinary Croats .
75 Cf . the contributions inElbasani (ed .), European Integration and Transformation . 76 Štulhofer, Croatian Accession to the European Union .