Reconsidering East European Minority Policy: Liberal Theory and European Norms
Reconsidering East European Minority Policy: Liberal Theory and European Norms

Summary/Abstract: Over the past decade, minority policies and minority demands in Eastern Europe have too rarely been considered against the framework of liberal democratic theory and European norms. The combination of the high degree of ethnic mobilization at the moment of transition and the horrors of the wars in the former Yugoslavia raised fears of wide-scale ethnic violence. Many western governments, international institutions, and nongovernmental organizations (NGOs) therefore encouraged states in the region to adopt generous minority policies in the name of ethnic reconciliation. As a result, they often endorsed, or at least acquiesced in, policies that institutionalized national and ethnic identities in the state. These approaches also were justified by a wide range of academic writings on nationalism and ethnic conflict, consociationalism, communitarianism, and accommodating difference. [...]

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