On Thursday I learned a lot in terms of Bosnia-Herzegovina as a country and the current situation that exists in Sarajevo at the moment. Bosnia-Herzegovina was established as a new country in 1995 with the Dayton Agreements, as a peace agreement Dayton has worked wonders because there has not been any serious violence since 1995 in Bosnia-Herzegovina. The constitution that Dayton created for Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) was far from a simple arrangement. Those who have taken George Rabinowitz’ POLI 100 know that he emphasizes the inefficiency of the American system of government. Bosnia-Herzegovina makes America look like the most-efficient well-oiled machine in the world. In 1995 BiH was divided into two entities – the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina (FBiH) and the Republica Srpska (RS). Because Dayton was a peace agreement – it made a lot of concessions based on accommodation. The Federation is further divided into ten cantons, and also into municipalities. The Republica Srpska is further divided into municipalities. What makes BiH very complicated is that many state competencies are decentralized to the entity or even cantonal level. In education, for example, each of the ten cantons in FBiH has a minister of education, as does each entity, as does the state of BiH. The minister of education and the various committees do not have serious power over any of the other twelve ministers and the other twelve are not at all accountable to the main minister of education or even the state of BiH. This means that framework agreements and laws that are enacted on the state level are not implemented on the cantonal level because they don’t have to be.
Additionally, Dayton set up an office of the High Representative which had executive powers called the Bonn powers in 1997. Up until 2005 reforms in this country were going really well and there was a good chance that the international community (that had had a strong presence for ten years) would be able to remove its influence. Unfortunately, while the international community has decreased in the last four years, the positive reforms that were made have been replaced with downfall after downfall. While the Bonn powers were still in existence (to ensure that reforms were passed in BiH and in each entity) the high representatives opted to not use them, which leads us to today. On May 14 the national assembly in Republica Srpska made a conclusion that the state of BiH had taken away too many of the entities capacities over the last fourteen years and as such determined that they would take them back. In the national assembly any conclusion is binding, and thus this conclusion could be effectively seen as a declaration of war. The current high representative opted to not use his Bonn powers immediately but instead wrote a letter to the national assembly requesting that they change the decision by June 11. Today is June 19 and not only has the RS not revoked its conclusion but the Bonn powers have not been used. This morning was a meeting of one of the High Representative’s Steering Boards with members of the international community. There are currently no updates on what he will decide to do.
In addition, the International Monetary Fund announced this week that it would give BiH 1.2 million euros if they did a 10% cut in spending across the Board. Yesterday was the first day of demonstrations that are scheduled for the rest of the month. While there was some violence, business as normal exists in the rest of the city and we have not been threatened at all.
It is a fascinating time to be in Sarajevo because we are right in the middle of this change and because we are talking to the organizations that will be effected by any change in OHR policy or in demonstrations by nationals. I also did a lot of YouTube watching yesterday. If you’re interested you should look at Joe Biden’s 2003 speech to the Western Balkins, Sarajevo under siege, or Miss Sarajevo by U2 Official Video. The last two were hard to watch because it showed the city that I am in now, fifteen years ago, under constant attack. It looks nothing like that presently, but it was still shocking to see a road that I walk down every day (that is not yet even in perfect condition) in complete shambles.
I am off for three briefings today, but I hope to update you all more on the daily life in Sarajevo (and my day yesterday and today shortly)
With love,
Lauren
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