National Deconstruction: Violence, Identity, And Justice In Bosnia

T This page intentionally left blank National Deconstruction Violence, Identity, and Justice in Bosnia David Campbell University of Minnesota Press Minneapolis London Copyright 1998 by the Regents of the University of Minnesota All rights reserved. No part of this publication may be reproduced, stored in a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means, electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording, or otherwise, without the prior written permission of the publisher. Published by the University of Minnesota Press 111 Third Avenue South, Suite 290 Minneapolis, MN 55401-2520 http://www.upress.umn.edu Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data Campbell, David, 1961National deconstruction : violence, identity, and justice in Bosnia / David Campbell. p. cm. Includes index. ISBN 0-8166-2936-6 (hardcover : alk. paper). — ISBN 0-8166-2937-4 (pbk. : alk. paper) 1. Social psychology. 2. War — Psychological aspects. 3. Fear. 4. Yugoslav War, 1991- —Bosnia and Hercegovina — Psychological aspects. I. Title. HM291.C277 1998 302 —dc21 98-17006 CIP Printed in the United States of America on acid-free paper The University of Minnesota is an equal-opportunity educator and employer. 10 09 08 07 06 05 04 03 02 01 00 99 98 10 9 8 7 6 5 4 3 2 1 For Elena, Amira, Ziad, our Sarajevo taxi driver, and the many others This page intentionally left blank Contents Preface: Problematizing Bosnia Acknowledgments 1. Ethics, Politics, and Responsibility: The Bosnian Challenge ix xiii I 2. Violence and the Political 17 3. Qntopplogy: Representing the Violence in Bosnia 33 4. Violence and Identity in Bosnia 83 5. Responding to the Violence 115 6. Oeconstruction and the Promise of Democracy IBS 7. Bosnia and the Practice of Democracy 2D9 Note on Sconces 245 Notes 24B Index 299 This page intentionally left blank Preface Problematizing Bosnia The morning after the assassination of the Bosnian deputy prime minister, Hakija Turajlic, the UN's commander in Sarajevo, General Philippe Morillon, read a statement to the assembled press corps. "Bosnia Herzegovina is afflicted by a human illness — fear of others, fear of the other," he said. One journalist wondered whether this statement, which "sounded like a college term paper on existentialism," was an indication of the general's "madness or enlightenment."1 Foregrounding the question of the relationship to the other in order to explore provocations called up by the Bosnian war and occluded by more conventional accounts, this book moves beyond the journalist's puzzlement and the general's views. Although suggestive, Morillon's observation captures barely half the picture. Fear of others is not a pathology possessed by others alone. It afflicts "us" as well. Indeed, the relationship to the other that can sometimes turn septic encompasses "us" and "them," for the relationship to the other is the condition of possibility for the self. Justice is the relationship to the other; it is justice when we are open to the surprise of the other, acknowledge the other's summons, or are willing to be unsettled by our encounters with others. The relationship to the other is the context of the political, it is the site of an irreducible responsibility, and yet it is in the relationship to the other that responsibility is often suppressed or effaced by violence. Although emphatically concerned with Bosnia, this book is not, however, about Bosnia per se. While it details often underappreciated events and issues implicated in the course of the violence, it offers (assuming such things might be possible) neither a comprehensive account of the c