ΕΘΝΙΚΟ ΚΑΙ ΚΑΠΟΔΙΣΤΡΙΑΚΟ ΠΑΝΕΠΙΣΤΗΜΙΟ ΑΘΗΝΩΝ ΣΧΟΛΗ Οικονομικών και Πολιτικών Επιστημών Τμήμα Πολιτικής Επιστήμης και Δημόσιας Διοίκησης ΠΡΟΓΡΑΜΜΑ ΜΕΤΑΠΤΥΧΙΑΚΩΝ ΣΠΟΥΔΩΝ Σπουδές Νοτιοανατολικής Ευρώπης: Πολιτική, Ιστορία, Οικονομία ΔΙΠΛΩΜΑΤΙΚΗ ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ The revived Serbian nationalism during Milosevic's era and the God-given answer to the Kosovo question ΙΩΑΝΝΗΣ Κ. ΜΠΟΥΡΛΕΤΟΣ Επιβλέπων Παντελής Λέκκας, Καθηγητής ΑΘΗΝΑ Σεπτέμβριος 2019 1 ΔΙΠΛΩΜΑΤΙΚΗ ΕΡΓΑΣΙΑ The revived Serbian nationalism during Milosevic's era and the God-given answer to the Kosovo question Ιωάννης Κ. Μπουρλέτος Α.Μ.: 181220 ΕΠΙΒΛΕΠΩΝ Παντελής Λέκκας, Καθηγητής Σεπτέμβριος 2019 2 Table of Contents ΠΕΡΙΛΗΨΗ ................................................................................................................... 3 ABSTRACT ................................................................................................................... 5 A. INTRODUCTION .................................................................................................... 6 B. THEORETICAL FRAMEWORK ............................................................................ 9 C. MAIN ANALYSIS ................................................................................................. 13 I. From Communism to the End of the Federal State .............................................. 13 1. Serbian Intellectuals and the Albanian Awakening Before and After Tito ..... 14 2. The Defeat of 1974 .......................................................................................... 15 II. Τhe Intellectuals as the Forefathers of the New Nationalism ............................. 18 III. The Milosevic Era .............................................................................................. 21 1. Between Left and Right ................................................................................... 22 IV. The Shaping of Collective Identity and "Kosovo Belongs to the Serbs" ......... 24 1. The Cultural Renovation and the Search for New Role Models ..................... 26 2. The Militants of the State ................................................................................. 27 V. Religion, Nationalism and the God-Given Right ................................................ 30 1. The Serbian Orthodox Church Throughout History ........................................ 31 2. Rehabilitating the Church ................................................................................ 32 D. CONCLUSION ....................................................................................................... 35 BIBLIOGRAPHY ........................................................................................................ 38 3 ΠΕΡΙΛΗΨΗ Η δεκαετία του 1990 ήταν δεκαετία αλλαγών για τη Σερβία. Η κατάρρευση του κομμουνιστικού καθεστώτος είχε ως αποτέλεσμα μια σειρά από απόπειρες για επανορισμό και επανατοποθέτηση της ύπαρξης του κάθε έθνους, υπό την προϋπόθεση της αυτονομίας τους. Ο εθνικισμός, επομένως, αποκτά πρωτεύοντα ρόλο σε όλη την έκταση της περιοχής, αφού ποτέ δε θα μπορούσε να είναι απών από μία τέτοια προσπάθεια. Αυτή η εργασία, εστιάζοντας στο συγκεκριμένο παράδειγμα του Σερβικού εθνικισμού, σπαρμένο και καλλιεργημένο καθ'όλη τη διάρκεια της εγκαθίδρυσης μίας Σερβικής διοίκησης - η οποία θα τίθεντο ως διάδοχος της προηγούμενης κομμουνιστικής διοίκησης στο σύστημα του συνασπισμού θα στοχεύσει σε μία βαθύτερη ανάλυση του ερωτήματος του Κοσόβου. Η έμφαση θα δοθεί στη σύνδεση του εθνικισμού με τις αναγεννημένες εθνικές ταυτότητες που θα έψαχναν απαραιτήτως μία πληθώρα από κοινά στοιχεία πάνω τα οποία θα αποτελούσαν το εύφορο έδαφος για δημιουργία και ευημερία, και τις οποίες παρείχαν οι πολυμήχανοι διαννοούμενοι και η Εκκλησία. Χρησιμοποιώντας κυρίως τις θεωρίες του Anderson, του Kedourie και του Gellner η παρούσα διατριβή θα δείξει πώς το ερώτημα του Κοσόβου είναι, ουσιαστικά, η προσπάθεια της Σερβικής ταυτότητας να κυριαρχήσει έναντι του πρώην αυτόνομου τομέα της Γιουγκοσλαβίας. Η εγκαθίδρυση της ενοποιημένης ιδέας κατά την περίοδο του Τίτου μετατρέπεται στον αναγεννημένο εθνικισμό του Μιλόσεβιτς, που θα συνδυάσει τελικά στοιχεία φαινομενικά ανομοιογενή και, πολλές φορές, αντικρουόμενα. Θα επιχειρήσω να δείξω πως αυτά τα αντικρουόμενα στοιχεία χρησιμοποιούνται με σκοπό την επανεγγραφή της ιστορίας και, ως εκ τούτου, την προώθηση της σερβικής ταυτότητας ως συνώνυμη με την Γιουγκοσλαβική, με τον ταυτόχρονο υποβιβασμό των υπολοίπων. 4 ΛΕΞΕΙΣ ΚΛΕΙΔΙΑ: Εθνικισμός, Σερβία, Κόσοβο, Μιλόσεβιτς, Διανοούμενοι 5 ABSTRACT The 1990s were the decade of change in Yugoslavia. The collapse of the communist regime resulted in a series of attempts to re-define and relocate each nation's existence, under the condition of their autonomy. Nationalism, therefore, obtains a prominent role throughout the region, since it could never be absent from such a venture. This paper, focusing on the specific example of the Serbian nationalism, sown and grown throughout the years of the establishment of a Serbian governance - that would pose as the heir of the previous communist one in the federal system -, will attempt a deeper analysis of the Kosovo question. The emphasis will fall on the connection of nationalism and the creation of revived national identities that would necessarily seek a plethora of common elements on which to build and prosper, ingeniously provided by the intellectuals and the Church. By mainly utilising the theories of Anderson, Kedourie and Gellner the present thesis will show how the Kosovo question is, in its essence, the effort for the Serbian identity to dominate over a former autonomous Yugoslavian province. The establishment of the unified idea in Tito's era becomes Milosevic's revived nationalism, that will eventually combine seemingly disparate and, sometimes, controversial elements. I argue that these controversial clues are used in order to revise history and, as a consequence, to promote the Serbian identity as synonymous to the Yugoslav identity and simultaneously undermine the others. KEYWORDS: Nationalism, Serbia, Kosovo, Milosevic, Intellectuals 6 A. INTRODUCTION The collapse of the communist regimes that took place during the early 1990s entirely changed the world, and the international status quo which was agreed on after the end of the WWII in Yalta (Jundt 2005: p.101) does no longer exist. For the Balkans, the end of communism is synonymous with the break of Yugoslavia, among other things.1 The collapse of Yugoslavia and the creation of the nation states is only the result of a long-term process which took place within the federal state. The establishment of a common identity which aimed to the cohesion of the different nationalities proved to be fruitless, and led to a new wave of nationalisms throughout Europe. In post-WWII Yugoslavia, Tito's governance tried to enforce a policy of unification to overcome the conflicts among the national group. He emphasised the creation of a narrative that promoted Brotherhood and Unity amongst the different ethnicities in the socialist federal state. He, therefore, tried to formulate an identity that would pertain in both the national and socialist traits of the people. To achieve that he organised a network of institutions which contributed to the establishment of the "new Yugoslav socialist culture" (Ramet 2006: p.xiv). This was an effort for the common national identity to be based on the glorious past of Resistance while still maintaining at its forefront the partisan ideas. Apart from the utilisation of the prolific partisan writers to ensure the creation of the unified idea (Ramet 2006: p.xiv), Tito's policy also included the ban of ethnic-nationalist rhetoric. In general terms this enforced a balanced policy in order to face the nationalities' separating demands. This was not the first time in history when the establishment of a unified idea took place, but it certainly was outstanding. The search of the common elements which could connect people living in the area created a historical conundrum, whose importance dramatically escalated during the establishment of the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. However, the logic behind the creation of a common identity after the WWI differed from the one during Tito's governance. In contrast to the Kingdom of Serbia, as Scholar Dinka Corkalo Biruski observed, it was more than the ideology of brotherhood that kept ethnic tensions at bay during Tito's era ( Biruski 2012: p.332). It was the inter-communal ties in social networks (Biruski 2012: p.332) which tried to restrict the dominance of Serbia over the other nationalities. In spite of the successful coexistence under Tito, the establishment of the unified idea did not actually occur and the peaceful years were succeeded by uprising nationalisms which led to the war in the 1990s. One of the main issues of the collapse of the federation correlated with the character of the autonomous provinces and especially with the territory of Kosovo, where numerous traumatic military expeditions took place. The Kosovo 1 See Mazower's The Balkans: A Short History. 7 question still remains in the centre of the international community nowadays, and the present thesis will make an attempt to delve into it, drawing on the connection and the continuity of the Yugoslav identity to the Serbian one, and most importantly, from the perspective of the Serbian nationalism. According to what was mentioned above, a crucial issue for the unification of the Yugoslav people was the position of the Serbs in it. The other nationalities felt that the