Читать книгу Divided We Stand: Discourses on Identity in ‘First’ and ‘Other’ Serbia - Ana Omaljev - Страница 8

How has Serbia, its people and its place in the world, been seen in recent decades by its respective public figures and political leaders? There is a vast literature in the fields of sociology, political science and anthropology written on the subject of Serbia being in between two worlds, between East and the West, between Austro-Hungarian and Ottoman Empires and between Western level-headedness and Eastern irrationality. This book is a much-needed effort to understand how such an “in-between” narrative is played out in contemporary Serbian politics and society. The friction between the two most common conceptions of Serbian national identity in response to this question, which have come to be known as “First” and “Other” Serbia, is by now a familiar topic. It can be said that these two camps are conceptualized as two responses to the idea of the modern political community and offer two different narratives of Serbian collective identity. More specifically, after the fall of Slobodan Milošević in October 2000, the groups self-identifying as the First and Other Serbia opened an ongoing dialogue in the public sphere about many topics, including the dissolution of Yugoslavia, Serbia’s obligations to the Hague Tribunal, and the future of Kosovo. This book takes First and Other Serbia public discourses[2] and their construction of “Europe” as two case studies. I have been concerned for some time now with discourses that explore Serbia’s identity, mission and place in the world, as well as that of Europe. So far, such empirical scrutiny of Serbian national identity as has been conducted would appear to largely confirm Ole Wæver’s comment that a nation or a state’s vision of Europe has to be compatible with its vision of itself.[3] Do First and Other Serbia[4] political approaches to Europe differ significantly? When did Serbia become a democracy and establish its first government? Do its culture, sport and music possess any significant weight of soft power in terms of Europe? In simple terms, does the vicinity of Europe bring Serbia more harm than good? This book will consider these questions.

Since the wars of the 1990s Serbia has attempted to regenerate itself as the antithesis of the hostility, bloodshed and loss of war. But has that been the experience of Serbians? In fact, was Serbia officially even involved in the war? How, then, does a country deal with the legacy of a war that it was not officially involved with? The hasty exercise of democracy just after 2000 generated a sense of Self among Serbians, and particularly a Self that desires democracy, but it also resulted in social relations being reorganized in a dichotomized way, reducing the relationship between pro-European and anti-European groups to one of enmity. In recent years, with the changes of the very framework of international politics wrought by the economic recession in 2008 and the rise of the Middle and Far East, it has become increasingly clear that the world stage is again shaped by international superpowers. Serbia, as a successor to Yugoslavia, wishes to be taken seriously again on the world stage, yet realistically will only achieve that aim through attachment to one or more powerful states or blocs. This book considers that Serbia’s best hope for such an alliance lies with Europe. Serbia might also take into account certain other options, especially given that it had, at one point, four pillars of foreign policy: the EU, Russia, the US and China. By way of illustration, the current US Ambassador to Serbia Michael Kirby notes that “Alexander Vučić is trying to lead [Serbia] onward toward the European Union but the Serbs are slightly schizophrenic—their heart pulls them toward the East, while at the same time their head pushes them toward the West.”[5] A certain representation of Serbian national identity in terms of being truly part of neither the East nor the West but, rather, being considered by the West as being part of the East and being considered by the East as being part of the West (“East for the West, West for the East”), is not difficult to find as these images and ideas are commonly employed both in diplomatic and common speech. Also, perspectives on Serbia’s belonging either to the East or the West differ significantly whether they come from First or Other Serbia. First Serbia wishes Serbia to be a particular type of entity: turbulent but with a clear desire to be economically and politically stable; defeated in the last wars but still dignified and proud; tolerant but only toward those we see as “ours”. It wishes Serbia to be rather isolationist and neutral, not global enough in its outlook to integrate with the modern globalized economy nor European enough in the modern sense to meet the expectations demanded of an aspiring future EU member state. It sees Serbia as part of Old Europe, and implores Serbs not to let themselves lose their identity. Nonetheless, First Serbia recognizes Serbia as dominant in the Balkan region, with such dominance exerted principally through soft power in Serbian-populated parts of Bosnia and Croatia, the so-called our lands.

In contrast, Other Serbia understands Serbia to be a defeated country: still too hesitant and apprehensive to repent for its recent sins; bellicose toward its closest neighbors. For Other Serbia, the answers to Serbia’s woes lie in winning over allies outside Serbia, for fear that by itself Serbia might not succeed in fully democratizing itself, facing corruption, improving its bureaucratic apparatus and conducting other necessary reforms. Other Serbia argues that, because the whole Balkan region is so turbulent and explosive, joining Europe is the only hope for redemption through positive change.

Additionally, it is important to recognize that these disparate political visions are each a product of the manner in which other states and political actors recognize Serbia. Does the European perception of Serbs differ or overlap with their own self-understanding? Malksoo maintains that Eastern Europe has often been seen by the Western states of the continent as being in many ways different and inferior, and that this has in part constituted the image that elites in Eastern European states have of themselves and their position in the modern European polity.[6] The principal focus of this book is the examination of one such dominant perception: how Serbs see and understand Europe. As a result of such “politics of becoming European”[7], one needs to ask if Serbia wants to be part of the EU? If Serbia considers itself as already part of Old Europe? Do Serbs desire to be “proper” Europeans? This book will explore the various practices of differentiation employed by First and Other Serbian actors with regard to the nation, Europe[8] and the EU, and analyze the inter-relationships between these groups of actors. I will explore the practices of differentiation implicated in the confrontation between Self (Serbian Subject/State) and Other (Europe), and reveal the representational paradigms used by both the First and Other Serbia groups which, in Hamilton’s view, represent the whole repertoire of imaginary effects through which difference toward Europe is represented at any historical moment.[9] The operation of exclusionary practices by both First and Other Serbia groups, which will be analyzed in Chapters 3, 4 and 5, are fundamentally at odds with the declared motivation for positive and enduring European integration professed by both major political groupings in Serbia: the Progressives and the Democrats. These arguments about Europe, and Serbia’s place in it, are not only arguments about the Serbian nation, its national self-reflection and its territorial integrity, but also about the value of the form of governance that the EU tends to promote as the ideal, and about the value that is placed upon European ideals by Serbians.