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Kažu da je na vest o izbijanju pariske revolucije 1848. Nikolaj Prvi uleteo u dvor, prekinuo ples i izdao kontrarevolucionarnu zapovest: „Na konje! Na Pariz!“
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The paper assesses Romanian legislation regarding the representation of national minorities (except the Hungarians) in local councils. Most minorities are still seriously underrepresented in the local decisional fora, despite the existence of a special provision in the electoral law of 2004, that grants some sort of affirmative action for minority organizations. In order to evaluate the utility of this special provision, I re-analyzed the results of the last two local elections, comparing the actual results of the minority organizations to the hypothetical results they would have obtained in the absence of the special rule, that is, if they had been treated alike to the mainstream political parties. This allowed the identification of those cases when the minorities indeed benefited from the affirmative action provided by the law. Unfortunately, the scope of applicability of the special rule proved to be very limited, the minority organizations would have obtained most of their seats also without the application of the special provision. Moreover, the provision may have even adverse effects, as it may prevent some organizations from obtaining seats even if they obtained a number of votes that would have been sufficient for getting represented if they had been treated alike to the political parties. This is due to the logic behind the special provision, which advantages a single minority organization, often to the expense of the others. The net gain of seats due to the regulation is so small that one can conclude that there is no point for retaining the regulation in its present shape. The minorities have realized this too, and they initiated a bill in order to replace the current system with something very similar to the regulations in force at the level of the Chamber of Deputies. The paper briefly assesses this proposal too, however, the conclusions are not very optimistic in this regard either.
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The paper consists of two main parts. The first part reviews the evolution of the most important aspects of Romanian electoral legislation concerning the representation of national minorities, both at the national and the local level. The second part presents the results obtained by the organizations of 19 minorities from Romania at the national elections (1990-2008) and the elections to the local and county councils (1996-2008). During the two decades that passed since the fall of Communism, Romanian electoral legislation underwent multiple changes, with both positive and negative consequences on the participation of minorities. Among the negative changes we have to mention the introduction (and subsequent raising) of electoral thresholds, and the adoption of double standards regarding candidatures for organizations represented in Parliament and those outside Parliament (obviously, with way more difficult conditions for the latter category). The higher thresholds introduced after 2000 had a negative impact on the number of minority representatives in the local councils, and with the exception of Hungarians and Germans, the minorities disappeared from the county councils. The double standards regarding candidature considerably watered down political competition within the minority communities, almost to the extent of granting political monopoly for the organizations in Parliament over the communities they claim to represent. On the other hand, Romanian electoral laws also contain special rules that provide electoral affirmative action for minorities. In the Chamber of Deputies the presence of minorities is almost guaranteed, due to the existence of special seats that can be obtained by reaching a symbolic alternative threshold. Affirmative action is present at the level of the local councils too, but it is far from being efficient. On the contrary, the special rule at the local level is ill-conceived: it is unable to counteract the underrepresentation of minorities, moreover, it can even deprive them of some seats they would have obtained, had they been treated like the political parties. Taking into account the underrepresentation of minorities (and the negative trend concerning this), the discriminatory nature of the candidature conditions and the inefficiency of the special electoral rule, the conclusions of the study call for a thorough redesign of the Romanian system of minority representation.
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Transylvania, annexed to Romania in 1920, is a place of continuous Romanian-Hungarian conflicts. There is always a domain of conflict between the Hungarian minority and the Romanian majority represented by the construction, the invention and commemorative use of the past. In my ethnographic and socio-anthropologic analysis I focus on the "memory entrepreneurism", and foreground those interethnic relations and symbolic behaviours that stand behind it in the social context of the multiethnic Cluj-Napoca. The change of regime of 1989 brought along not only a political closure, but also one with on the framework of the imagined past. On the social level this resulted in the drama of the diminuation of belief in the institutions and authorities. The past constructed up to that point naturally lost its political legitimacy. There were two kinds of attitudes emerging within the self-legitimating strategies regarding the past. On the one hand the denial of continuity, the rejection of the past constructed by previous societies in the interest of the new historical order. This new historical order didn't wish to continue the previous economical, social and political relations. But on the other hand, in there was a rising need for historical depth: how can one legitimate the present and create a continuity in the historical space? Nevertheless, the new system considered it necessary to deduce the new social order from history. It had a need for the past also because it defined itself against the past, distancing itself from it: thus the past became surpassed and at the same time an example to follow. The period between 1989 and 2008 proved to be one of the most productive regarding the local construction of memory. Therefore my paper analyses the tendencies of post-1989 past construction. What previously exposed component of the past was made invisible by the new system? What was overtaken and what kind of new components were brought to the surface? What kind of conflicts were revealed, what kind of identity strategies, legitimating processes and national discourses were put into motion by the construction of the (new) memory?
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Situated on the border of Latin and Orthodox Christianity, in a region where the infrastructural and the economical possibilities were limited, the Romanian village Seuca became an internationally known place for pilgrimage due to a blind Gypsy women's public visions about Virgin Mary in the first years of the new millennium. The author presents both the history of the ethnical and confessional co-existence in the village and the economical and social problems which affected the whole community. Then, the attitudes towards the apparition of the different denominations will be highlighted by presenting also the way the seer attempts to question the different denominational opinions. The legitimating strategies of a gypsy woman influenced very much the aspects of Virgin Mary vision from Seuca.
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The present study is a primary effort to identify and decript the identitary dynamics of the two most ancient ethnic communities of Romania, the Turks and Tatars. As a context framing, the paper shows the historic and demographic evolution of the Turks and the Tatars all throughout the 20th century. Chronologically, the emphasys falls upon the communist period, to better envisage the way in which political, economic and social changes in the era were reflected in the ethnic and religious structures of the Turks and the Tatars in Dobrogea and consequently to extend on identitary evolutions after 1990. By adding the archive research to journalistic text analysis and field research (interviews, participative observation), the study traces the memory patterns of the communist period, the types of relations and attitudes created in relation to the regime, together with the evolution of self-image and image of the other (Turk-Tatar), generated by the main identitary landmarks: ethnicity, religion, origins, mother tongue and traditions, inside the socialist society as well as after the fall of the communism.
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U rujnu 1994. godine tadašnji dalmatinski župan Kruno Peronja, član HDZ-a, poslao je općinskim načelnicima interni dekret čiji je sadržaj bio sljedeći: „Pošto dobijete potrebito stručno mišljenje, temeljem istog na sjednici Vašeg poglavarstva donesite odgovarajuće odluke o skidanju spomen ploča i obilježja s javnih mjesta, te sukladno dobijenom stručnom mišljenju, njihovom sklanjanju u odgovarajuće prostore radi svjedočenja o vremenu koje je, na sreću, iza nas. Poglavarstva za tu namjenu trebaju osigurati sredstva za pokriće troškova skidanja i sklanjanja u namijenjene prostore, te odrediti poduzeće, radnju ili djelatnika koji će za te poslove biti ovlašteno te ih obaviti najkasnije do 31. listopada 1994.“
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Ako postoji nešto što je suvremena Hrvatska patentirala kao vlastiti izum, s čitavim nizom inovacija, to je obračun s neželjenom spomeničkom baštinom. Jasna stvar je da neželjenu spomeničku baštinu predstavljaju u prvom redu spomenici posvećeni Narodnooslobodilačkoj borbi, potom oni koji se odnose na baštinu Srba u Hrvatskoj, zatim oni koji na bilo koji način slave jugoslavensku ideju te na koncu oni posvećeni lijevoj tradiciji i ljudima s ljevice. Ukoliko je pak riječ o kombinaciji dva ili više navedenih faktora, što je prilično čest slučaj, takvi se spomenici uklanjaju s dodatnim guštom. Povod za nastanak ovog teksta su dva aktualna slučaja. Prvi, u kojem je HDZ-ov načelnik ličke općine Perušić, koristeći sumanute i kontradiktorne izgovore, odlučio iz središnjeg gradskog parka ukloniti partizanski spomenik, koji je ujedno kosturnica, zbog navodne rekonstrukcije parka i pretvaranja istog u dječje igralište, s idejom da ga premjesti na zabačenu lokaciju. Drugi se odnosi na Zadar, u centru kojeg je, ako ste sumnjali, u sklopu projekta rekonstrukcije parka upravo uklonjen spomenik osnivanju prve ćelije KPJ u tom gradu, ovdje pak s idejom gradonačelnika da se spomenik smjesti u muzej.
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The transformation of the former state-controlled Radio-television Zagreb into a broadcaster serving the public interest in Croatia, and its subsequent reform to comply with the European standards and principles is the main focus of this paper. Croatian-Radio Television (Hrvatska radiotelevizija, or HRT) - as the reformed broadcaster was named after the first multi-party elections in 1990 - underwent several developing stages. The analysis provided within the study reflects on the process of its evolution against the backdrop of specific political, social and economic factors, also taking into account challenges of a substantial and technological nature. In recent years, as Croatia moved towards full membership of the EU, the status and operation of the PSB, as well as its broadcasting regulatory mechanisms and media policies, were reviewed to bring them in line with the new EU regulations. Croatia’s case seems somewhat unique compared to other countries that were once part of the former Socialist Republic of Yugoslavia, but it also shares some similar contextual characteristics. First and foremost, the funding model is what sets apart the Croatia’s PSB from other Western Balkan post-socialist states. Considered one of the most successful models, HRTs license fee collection system has been continuously and systematically improved since the 1960s when it was first introduced. Albeit the level of editorial independence and financial sustainability has seen frequent oscillations at different points in time, HRT maintains its financial sustainability, and manages to drive its internal development. Like the other countries, Croatian PSB is under permanent political pressures, while its program has been commercialized, becoming less distinctive from content provided by commercial competitions. In order to assess the transformation of HRT into a public service, considering the challenges to its current operation and further development, the paper intends to answer the following questions. The first is related to the development of regulation and media policies in regard to PSB, including the various actors involved, the political setting, and internally or externally driven reforms. The second question targets the current regulation, status and role of the PSB in Croatia, with special attention to the PSB remit, funding model, formal and de-facto independence, market share, and the progress regarding technological innovations and digitalization. Finally, the paper deals with the challenges to the PSB operation in Croatia, taking into account ongoing debates on the global level, and country-specific discussions. This research draws upon the ongoing debates on the status and operation of PSB in a changing media environment. Technology developments, commercialization processes and the growing role of the market in defining media roles and audience tastes, information abundance, and audience fragmentation significantly define what we know today as ‘media ecology’. In such a context, the status and role, funding model and social role of PSB, and its relation with the audience, are contested. To evolve into a genuine public media, Croatian Radio-Television has to face these challenges both internally and externally. This study follows recent and ongoing debates on the future of PSM, and builds its analytical framework on concepts and ideas developed by contemporary PSM scholars such as Donders, Lowe, Moe and Van den Bulck, also taking into account theoretical accounts of media and PSB developments in the post-socialist area, including Jakubowicz, Sukosd, Splichal, and others. This research paper is divided in four main sections. The following section outlines the main theoretical concepts and the key debates in regard to the future of PSB. The third section reflects on the country background including political and economic factors, the development of the media system in Croatia and its PSB. The final section summarizes the main findings and discusses them in relation to the socio-political context and contemporary trends related to regulation, funding and the technological developments related to PSB in general. A discussion of the main trends and dilemmas on the European and regional level is presented within the final section.
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As part of a general study on the role and impact of constitutional adjudication in transitional countries of South East Europe, this paper analyses the operation of the Constitutional Court of the Republic of Croatia after the dissolution of the Yugoslav federation. It aims to answer the posed research questions as to the extent of the Court’s activism in the field of transitional constitutional justice and, consequently, the Court’s success/failure in promoting the legal transition from a socialist order to a modern constitutional democracy. In that view, a narrow but paradigmatic selection of the Court’s case-law is analyzed. Factors that have contributed to the Court’s performance (e.g. political conditioning, personal features) are taken into account, as well as public opinions and attitudes toward its rulings. The first part of this paper presents an overview of the Court’s history, composition and competences, while the next chapter explains three distinct periods of the Croatian constitutional reality, that are detectable from 1991 to 2016. The third part, containing a presentation of particular rulings, tackles: the development of a standard constitutional test (3.1.); post-war justice in relation to popular expectations (3.2.); the clash between social justice and budgetary constraints (3.3.) and the constitutional boundaries of democracy (3.4.). The final part contains an in-depth analysis of incentives for, methods of and threats to the Court’s activism/transformative role. It will be argued that while the Court managed to protect core constitutional values and principles (even during the Homeland War), its greatest success is detectable in the process of the Europeanization of the Croatian legal order. Recent overall detrimental social occurrences (the economic crisis and socio-political radicalization) coupled with certain objective shortcomings of the Court have led to a deterioration of its status and have put its very existence in peril.
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Corruption is directly impeding rule of law, demolishing moral of society and shattering stability and economic progress of state. Not only it is in contrast with positive legal regulations, it represents also a deviation of fundamental social principles. Therefore, fight against corruption represents a precondition for development of democratic society. Corruption is also one of key challenges that Montenegro is facing, and consequently adequately addressing corruption must be a key task of state administration, including also units of local self-government. According to researches, of both international and national organizations, fight against corruption in Montenegro remains at unsatisfactory level and additional efforts are needed in order to achieve sustainable results in this area. Unlike at national, corruption at the local level has not been recognised for a long time as an issue that must be paid attention to. Precisely lack of efficiency and responsibility at the local level has resulted also in enormous debt of Montenegrin local self-governments, which has at the end of 2016 amounted to 143,091 million EUR, whereby system of responsibility does not exist in practice, and there are rare examples of effective processing of corruption cases at the local level by authorised organs.
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Istraživanje javnog mnjenja o znanju i stavovima građana i građanki Crne Gore o ratnim zločinima i tranzicionoj pravdi sprovedeno je radi dobijanja godišnjeg presjeka podataka. Podaci su upoređivani, u dijelu istih pitanja, sa prošlogodišnjim sličnim istraživanjem Centra za građansko obrazovanje (CGO). Dodatno, po prvi put su unešena i pitanja koja osvijetljavaju percepcije građana i građanki o odnosu pravosuđa i određenih državnih institucija prema ratnim zločinima. Ovakvo redovno praćenje znanja i stavova javnosti daje i koristan uvid o efektima rada različitih društvenih subjekata u procesu suočavanja s prošlošću. Takođe, na ovaj način se dobija empirijska građa o ključnim pitanjima koja su obilježila politički i društveni životu protekloj godini, a vezana su za ova proces, i kakav je to uticaj imalo na društvo.
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Један од основних предуслова за миран и просперитетан живот у савременом друштву је мир. Мир обезбеђује услове за економски и привредни развој и општи друштвени напредак. Доприноси том циљу могу бити различити, а један од њих је могућ кроз образовање за мир. Учење о миру обухвата знања о мировним покретима, антиратним иницијативама, алтернативним начинима превазилажења и решавања сукоба, чињенице о разоружању, животној средини и одрживом развоју, људским правима, другим културама и религијама, различитостима и др.
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Od samog početka ratnih dešavanja na prostoru bivše Jugoslavije, crnogorske vlasti su se stavile na raspolaganju režimu Slobodana Miloševića. Sprovodeći politiku zvanične Srbije i JNA (kasnije Vojske Jugoslavije) crnogorsko rukovodstvo se oštro obračunavalo sa političkim neistomišljenicima i svojim oponentima. Osudama vladajućeg režima bili su izloženi protivnici rata (“domaći izdajnici”), zagovornici crnogorske nezavisnosti (“separatisti”) i kritičari aktuelnih političkih trendova.
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A public opinion poll on the knowledge and attitudes of Montenegrin citizens about war crimes and transitional justice was conducted in order to obtain annual cross-sectional data. The data were compared, in the part of the same questions, with last year’s similar survey conducted by the Centre for Civic Education (CCE). Additionally, for the first time, questions were introduced that shed light on the perceptions of citizens about the attitude of the judiciary and certain state institutions towards war crimes. Such regular monitoring of the public’s knowledge and attitudes also provides useful insight into the effects of the work of various social actors in the process of dealing with the past. Also, in this manner, an empirical base is obtained concerning key issues that marked the political and social life in the past year, concerning this process, and the impact it had on society. For example, the issue of attitudes towards the genocide in Srebrenica marked the second quarter of the political life in Montenegro in 2021 and led to the first dismissal of a minister in the new Montenegrin Government, which was formed in December 2020. However, it is only this research that indicated that the dominant majority of Montenegrin citizens state that they know what happened in Srebrenica in 1995 (86%), than that twothirds of them define it as genocide, while the rest believe that it is a great war crime, but not genocide, or that there was a war in which people were killed on all sides. It is also interesting that with the controversial position of the former Minister of Justice, Human and Minority Rights, Vladimir Leposavić, that he is “ready to admit that the crime of genocide was committed in Srebrenica once it is unequivocally established “, more than half of the citizens did not agree, which could have been instructive for political decision-makers as well. However, on the other hand, the research indicated the overall complexity of Montenegrin society. Hence, the opposition parties, which initiated the impeachment of this minister due to his position on Srebrenica, are not significantly recognized by the citizens as political entities that advocate transitional justice. That points that their inadequate relation towards the issues of facing with past from the period when they had power has not been forgotten. The research is part of the “Dealing with the Past for the Future” project, which the Centre for Civic Education (CCE) is implementing with financial support from the U.S. Government, through the State Department’s Bureau of International Narcotics and Law Enforcement Affairs (INL).
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Since its foundation, along with field visits of places of suffering, the Association for Social Research and Communication has been working on collecting data on monuments built in local communities, which are dedicated to the wars of the 1990s. Thus, in 2016, UDIK presented the Central Register of Monuments in Bosnia and Herzegovina, which contains data on more than 2,100 memorials, while in 2017 UDIK's team mapped over 1,200 memorials in the Republic of Croatia. This booklet provides a brief overview of developments on the issue of memorialization and the basic findings of UDIK's research on monuments in both countries.
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Chancellor Olaf Scholz’s visit to India in February this year was unlike his other foreign trips. This visit was important not only politically but also economically: the German chancellor was accompanied by managers of companies such as Siemens, ThyssenKrupp, Deutsche Post and SAP. This once again proves Germany’s growing interest in building stronger relations with India. In June 2022, Scholz invited Prime Minister Narendra Modi to a G7 meeting at Schloss Elmau. Only two months earlier, Modi had paid an official visit to Berlin during the sixth bilateral intergovernmental consultations. In February this year, in addition to the chancellor himself, Christian Lindner (FDP) and Annalena Baerbock (Greens) visited India. Their visits were part of meetings of the finance and foreign affairs ministers of the G20 group.
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On 24 August 1991, Ukraine proclaimed independence, and a few months later (together with Russia and Belarus) it brought about the dissolution of the USSR. At the time of its foundation, the Ukrainian state was a continuation of the Ukrainian Soviet Socialist Republic; on the one hand, this delayed the de-Communisation of the organisational and legal system, but on the other, it saved the country from having to build up state institutions from scratch. After nearly a quarter of a century, the hour of its greatest trial arrived – revolution and war with Russia. Ukraine passed this test: it did not unilaterally implement the political part of the Minsk agreements which posed a direct threat to it, nor has it fallen into the group of ‘failed states’. The main threat to its future is not so much the ongoing conflict in the Donbas or the weakness of the economy, but rather demographic collapse: during its nearly thirty years of independence, it has lost a fifth of its population.
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Over the past two and a half decades multiple problems have been identified in the implementation of the Dayton peace agreement. The process of development of the BiH society has generated some visible achievements that could lead to a stable development of the state of Bosnia and Herzegovina. However, at the same time, some halts in development of the BiH society and state are also notable. These halts have led to the deepening of the crisis in economic development, particularly since 2015. Namely, since 2015, several dozen thousands of young people have left Bosnia and Herzegovina and went to European counties in pursuit of economic prosperity.
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In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the seventh local elections since the signing of the Dayton peace agreement were held on 15 November 2020. The elections brought about tectonic changes on the political scene and are a prelude to the announced political changes at the parliamentary elections, scheduled to take place on 2 October 2022. Political changes had also led to success in North Macedonia, with the arrival of Zoran Zaev (SDSM) to power. Zaev took his country to membership in NATO and it is expected that Macedonia will soon open the accession talks with the European Union. The Brussels Dialogue between the official Belgrade and Priština is entering its final phase. In Montenegro, the recent parliamentary elections resulted in the fall of the 31- years long regime headed by Milo Đukanović (DPS), which was an introduction into groundbreaking political changes and stabilization of the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
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