Aspects of Identity

2005 ◽  
Author(s):  
George Williamson
Keyword(s):  
Federal Republic ◽  
Ethnic Differences ◽  
Social Attitudes ◽  
International Community ◽  
The Other ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Latin Script ◽  
Political Choices ◽  
Dayton Agreement ◽  
Republika Srpska

Amodern Example May Help to Clarify some of the issues to be discussed in this chapter. Formerly one of the six republics forming the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), Bosnia- Hercegovina has since 1995’s Dayton Agreement been an uneasy international protectorate, divided into a Croat-Muslim Federation, and the Serbian ‘Republika Srpska’ (RS). Bosnia’s coinage speaks powerfully about the paradoxes of a state created through a bloody war of identity and ethnic cleansing. These two entities—the Federation and the RS— and three communities—Serbian, Croatian, and Bosnian Muslim—display strong and sometimes aggrieved senses of their own individual identities, and ethnic divisions can arise over the simplest of everyday differences. For example, car registration stickers until recently identified cars as registered either in the Federation or in the RS. The International Community felt compelled to design a coinage in which ethnic differences were avoided. The currency itself is a paradox—known as the ‘Convertible Mark’ (KM), it converts to another currency, the Deutschmark, which no longer exists. But it is in the choice of iconography that the Bosnian KM is most striking; these are some of the least attractive coins ever issued, more akin to subway tokens than to genuine coinage. One side of the 1 KM coin displays the stylized shield motif of Bosnia-Hercegovina, a device approved by the International Community. The other bears the denomination and the words ‘Bosne i Hercegovina’ twice, in one language, and two alphabets, though Serbs, Muslims, and Croats might deny that the Latin script of Catholic Croatia, and the Cyrillic of Orthodox Serbia represent the same language. Aside from this need for linguistic even-handedness, no other motifs are to be found. An iconographic void appears to be the only means of compromise. What does this tell us? First, any minting authority can use coins to send an ideological and iconographical message. Coinages represent both political and economic acts. Second, coinage is in no sense an unmediated or direct guide to the ethnic identities of communities; it represents deliberate political choices made by those in control and may therefore mirror social attitudes of those not in control, attempt to modify them, or ignore them outright.

Interlude

2020 ◽  
pp. 109-112
Author(s):  
Andrew C. Gilbert
Keyword(s):  
International Community ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Institutional Practices ◽  
Physical Evidence ◽  
Social Settings ◽  
Return Home ◽  
Minority Return ◽  
Republika Srpska ◽  
Return Process

This interlude presents the sites, methods, and social settings of the author's fieldwork in northwestern Bosnia. The municipalities of Prijedor in the Republika Srpska and Sanski Most in the Muslim-Croat Federation were an ideal place to investigate intervention encounters because of the intensity of the refugee-return process there. The international community paid special attention to Prijedor because it had been iconic of the tactics of “ethnic cleansing” ever since the summer of 1992. The violence in the camps was accompanied by systematic efforts throughout the region to eliminate the physical evidence of the presence and culture of its substantial non-Serb population. It is for this reason that foreigners were initially bewildered by the desire of tens of thousands of Muslim refugees from Prijedor to return to their prewar homes. Though the institutions of the international community were reluctant to do what it would take to make such “minority return” successful, this did not stop those who wanted to return home. Across these sites of encounter, the author explored the discursive and institutional practices through which foreigners came to understand Bosnian society and politics, as well as their roles in Bosnia.

scholarly journals Constitutional restructuring of Bosnia-Herzegovina: Initiatives and possibilities

2004 ◽  
Vol 56 (2-3) ◽  
pp. 305-321
Author(s):  
Dragan Djukanovic
Keyword(s):  
Political Parties ◽  
International Community ◽  
The Other ◽  
The Political ◽  
Political Situation ◽  
Specific Activities ◽  
The One ◽  
Dayton Agreement ◽  
Constitutional Construction ◽  
Made In

The revision of the Dayton agreement implies only the restructuring of the Annex 4 of the Constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina or actually the present constitutional construction and territorial composition of Bosnia-Herzegovina. The unfavourable economic and political situation in Bosnia-Herzegovina shows that the achievements resulting from the implementation of the Dayton agreement have been modest so far. The author substantiates this by presenting the data on a very small number of persons who managed to achieve their right to repatriation to their pre-war homes (in the 1995-2003 period). In addition, he notices that many changes of the Dayton agreement have already been made in the last seven years since it has been implemented, presenting the specific activities and decisions taken by the High Representative in Bosnia-Herzegovina. In the period after signing of the Dayton agreement there were several different ideas on the future of Bosnia-Herzegovina - to be established as a centralist state, as a decentralised country, as the one organised in cantons keeping up the two-entity structure at the same time. Therefore, the political parties in BH took different positions regarding the necessity to change some constitutional solutions. The Boshniak, Croatian and civil political parties are pleading for restructuring of the constitutional solutions in the form they are provided for by the Dayton agreement. On the other hand, the Serb political parties speak in favour of keeping up the existing constitutional construction. As the author assesses the new initiatives for constitutional reconstruction of Bosnia-Herzegovina are based on the proposals for decentralisation, regionalisation and (finishing of) cantonisation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, as well as abrogation of entities. Analysing the positions of the leading factors of the international community the author points out that they have not reached consensus on the initiative for restructuring of the existing constitution of Bosnia-Herzegovina. On the contrary, the leading factors of the international community mostly emphasise that citizens/peoples of BH should be the ones to decide on the constitutional construction of their country. The author concludes that it would be unrealistic to expect that the minimum of social and national consensus would be reached on the constitutional restructuring of Bosnia-Herzegovina, as well as on holding of the new international conference (Dayton II). As the author says it seems most realistic that the representatives of the international community will change some of its provisions in the field while implementing the Dayton agreement.

Historical Writing in the Balkans

2018 ◽  
Author(s):  
Ulf Brunnbauer
Keyword(s):  
Freedom Of Expression ◽  
The Other ◽  
Former Yugoslavia ◽  
Ethnic Cleansing ◽  
Historical Writing ◽  
The Balkans ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Balkan Countries ◽  
The One ◽  
The Way

This chapter analyzes historiography in several Balkan countries, paying particular attention to the communist era on the one hand, and the post-1989–91 period on the other. When communists took power in Albania, Bulgaria, Romania, and Yugoslavia in 1944–5, the discipline of history in these countries—with the exception of Albania—had already been institutionalized. The communists initially set about radically changing the way history was written in order to construct a more ideologically suitable past. In 1989–91, communist dictatorships came to an end in Bulgaria, Romania, Yugoslavia, and Albania. Years of war and ethnic cleansing would ensue in the former Yugoslavia. These upheavals impacted on historiography in different ways: on the one hand, the end of communist dictatorship brought freedom of expression; on the other hand, the region faced economic displacement.

scholarly journals The transferability of handwriting skills: from the Cyrillic to the Latin alphabet

2021 ◽  
Vol 6 (1) ◽  
Author(s):  
Thibault Asselborn ◽  
Wafa Johal ◽  
Bolat Tleubayev ◽  
Zhanel Zhexenova ◽  
Pierre Dillenbourg ◽  
...  
Keyword(s):  
Experimental Situation ◽  
Recent Change ◽  
The Other ◽  
Fine Motor ◽  
Skills Transfer ◽  
Short Text ◽  
Latin Script ◽  
Quasi Experimental ◽  
Cross Lingual

AbstractDo handwriting skills transfer when a child writes in two different scripts, such as the Latin and Cyrillic alphabets? Are our measures of handwriting skills intrinsically bound to one alphabet or will a child who faces handwriting difficulties in one script experience similar difficulties in the other script? To answer these questions, 190 children from grades 1–4 were asked to copy a short text using both the Cyrillic and Latin alphabets on a digital tablet. A recent change of policy in Kazakhstan gave us an opportunity to measure transfer, as the Latin-based Kazakh alphabet has not yet been introduced. Therefore, pupils in grade 1 had a 6-months experience in Cyrillic, and pupils in grades 2, 3, and 4 had 1.5, 2.5, and 3.5 years of experience in Cyrillic, respectively. This unique situation created a quasi-experimental situation that allowed us to measure the influence of the number of years spent practicing Cyrillic on the quality of handwriting in the Latin alphabet. The results showed that some of the differences between the two scripts were constant across all grades. These differences thus reflect the intrinsic differences in the handwriting dynamics between the two alphabets. For instance, several features related to the pen pressure on the tablet are quite different. Other features, however, revealed decreasing differences between the two scripts across grades. While we found that the quality of Cyrillic writing increased from grades 1–4, due to increased practice, we also found that the quality of the Latin writing increased as well, despite the fact that all of the pupils had the same absence of experience in writing in Latin. We can therefore interpret this improvement in Latin script as an indicator of the transfer of fine motor control skills from Cyrillic to Latin. This result is especially surprising given that one could instead hypothesize a negative transfer, i.e., that the finger controls automated for one alphabet would interfere with those required by the other alphabet. One interesting side-effect of these findings is that the algorithms that we developed for the diagnosis of handwriting difficulties among French-speaking children could be relevant for other alphabets, paving the way for the creation of a cross-lingual model for the detection of handwriting difficulties.

scholarly journals Diminishing the Legal Impact of Negative Social Attitudes Toward Acquaintance Rape Victims

2010 ◽  
Vol 13 (4) ◽  
pp. 644-664 ◽  
Author(s):  
Michelle J. Anderson
Keyword(s):  
Legal Reform ◽  
Social Attitudes ◽  
Acquaintance Rape ◽  
The Other ◽  
Rape Victims ◽  
Male Control ◽  
Legal Reforms ◽  
The Past ◽  
Rape Law ◽  
The One

Rape law often condemns females who are not chaste and excuses males who act with sexual entitlement. Rape law has been a significant site for the valorization of female chastity and constraint, on the one hand, and male prowess and freedom, on the other. It continues to reflect the sexism of a culture resistant to ceding male control over sexuality. Legal reform of rape law over the past forty years has greatly helped those who experience stranger rape that includes violence extrinsic to the rape itself. However, this generation of reform did not sufficiently help those whose experiences are more common: those raped by acquaintances without extrinsic violence. To tackle this larger problem, the law must undergo another generation of renewal, one that works affirmatively to diminish the legal impact of negative social attitudes toward acquaintance rape victims. Tis article proposes a range of legal reforms to that end.

scholarly journals The Struggle for Leadership of the Qatari-Turkish Alliance in Somalia

2022 ◽  
Vol 17 (4) ◽  
pp. 187-200
Author(s):  
T. R. Khayrullin
Keyword(s):  
Foreign Policy ◽  
Federal Republic ◽  
Presidential Elections ◽  
Arab Spring ◽  
Central Government ◽  
The Other ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
Regional Leadership ◽  
Autonomous Regions ◽  
The Arab Spring

The article examines the struggle of the Qatari- Turkish alliance for regional leadership in the Federal Republic of Somalia. The analysis revealed that the foreign policy activity of Turkey and Qatar in Somalia began during the events of the Arab Spring. Ankara and Doha used diplomatic, military and fi nancial instruments to strengthen their infl uence in the country. Moreover, Qatari money played an important role in promoting pro-qatari candidates to power during the 2012 and 2017 presidential elections. However, the eff orts of the Turkish- Qatari alliance to strengthen its position in Somalia have clashed with the interests of the Saudi- Emirati bloc seeking regional dominance. On the other hand, the inability to close the main cooperation with the central government in Somalia forced the UAE to support such autonomous regions as Somaliland, thereby intensifying the destabilization processes in the country.

scholarly journals Representation of an Unrecognized State under International Law – Example of the Republic of Artsakh

2020 ◽  
Vol 8 (1) ◽  
pp. 45-63
Author(s):  
Stefania Kolarz
Keyword(s):  
International Law ◽  
International Community ◽  
The Other ◽  
Legal Representative ◽  
The Core ◽  
Other Hand ◽  
The Republic

Since the late 80s, the Armenian inhabitants of Nagorno-Karabakh, a region situated within the internationally recognised borders of the Republic of Azerbaijan, have been struggling for creating their own state – the Republic of Artsakh. The fact that this self-proclaimed entity was not recognised by any of the international actors has not prevented it from constantly committing to intervene on the international plane, separately from Yerevan and Baku. For instance, it is the co-signatory of the Bishkek Protocol. On the other hand, it was refused participation in the core undertaking of the international community designed to settle the dispute – the OSCE Minsk process. The aforementioned situation raises the question as to who shall act as a legal representative of this quasi-state on the international plane? Azerbaijan, as the official centre of authority within the region, Armenia, or rather the separatist government of Nagorno-Karabakh?

European Defence Community

1954 ◽  
Vol 8 (4) ◽  
pp. 599-601
Keyword(s):  
Federal Republic ◽  
Foreign Minister ◽  
The Other ◽  
German Federal Republic ◽  
National Assembly ◽  
French Government ◽  
Foreign Ministers ◽  
European Defence Community

The six signatories of the European Defense Community Treaty — France, the German Federal Republic, Italy, Belgium, Netherlands, and Luxembourg —met in Brussels from August 19 to 22 to consider changes in the treaty which the French Premier, Pierre Mendès-France, felt were essential if it were to be ratified by the French National Assembly. Such a meeting had been proposed by Mr. Spaak, Belgian Foreign Minister, and endorsed by the other Foreign Ministers of the Benelux nations on June 22. After a meeting with Mr. Spaak in Paris on June 30, Mr. Mendes-France agreed on the usefulness of such a meeting as soon as the French government had made known its views on the treaty as it stood at that time and before the French National Assembly voted on its ratification.

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