Osteuropa
Osteuropa
2007-11-30
Abstracts Osteuropa 11/2007
Minorities in Europe. Aspirations, Rights, Conflicts
Egbert Jahn
Ethnic, Religious, and National Minorities
Definitions and Status Options
For a long time, ethnic, religious, and national minorities were seen by the majority as disruptive elements to be assimilated into a nation-state that was as homogenous as possible. In a few states, several minorities that have long been resident are considered to have the same rights as the majority; in others, they enjoy federal or autonomous status; and in many others, they face dis-crimination or oppression. New immigrants and naturalized minorities have fewer rights everywhere. The pattern of settlement and political-geographic position of ethnic minorities within states is of considerable significance for the level and type of eventual mobilization and radicalization within national movements. A differentiated range of definitions for types of minorities makes it easer to develop different options for the social, political, and legal interaction between majority and minorities.
Bruno Schoch
Learning from Helvetia?
Switzerland -- Model or Special Case?
When the pacification of conflicts between nationalities in a multi-lingual, multi-ethnic environment is at stake, the reference to Switzerland is not far away. But the Swiss modelıs transferability is limited. Without the support of society, the will of the state, and the consensus of the elite, the institutions of conflict resolution as they developed in Switzerland in a long process of state-building do not allow themselves to be transferred. But Switzerland remains at any rate an example of a political order where the cantons represent the key to linguistic peace, where the term minority has nothing pejorative about it, and where institutions and values were developed that release an enormous integrat-ing force.
Sabine Riedel
Ambivalences of Minority Protection
International Organisations Put to the Test
After the East-West conflict, international organisations expanded minority protection and in doing so established new, legal collective minority rights. The situation in the Republic of Macedonia, Serbia/Kosovo, Belgium, and France shows, however, that neither the OSCE High Commissioner on Na-tional Minorities, nor the Council of Europe could solve inter-ethnic conflicts with this instrument. Instead, they created an asymmetrical system of protec-tion with different legal standards, which inevitably entailed additional de-mands for more minority rights and created new potential for social conflict. The conceptual weakness of contemporary minority protection could be cor-rected by drawing on individual human rights as developed by the Council of Europe and the European Union.
Bruno Coppieters
Dimensions of Conflict Resolution
The EU and Georgia's Renegade Territories
The European Union is trying to mediate in the secession conflicts between Georgia and South Ossetia as well as Abkhazia. In doing so, it is relying on conflict prevention, conflict transformation, international conflict manage-ment, and conflict resolution. Its efforts, however, are being thwarted. Geor-gia would like settlement immediately, the leaderships of the separatist territo-ries, on the other hand, are playing for time with Russia's support. Tbilisi is trying to break the blockade by escalation, but with that, it is undermining confidence building and the prospects of a status settlement acceptable for Georgia.
Uwe Halbach
Frozen Conflicts in the Southern Caucasus
Problems and Limits of Europeanisation
With the European Security Strategy and the Neighbourhood Policy in the greater Black Sea area, regional conflicts in the southern Caucasus came to the fore of EU foreign and security policy. Since then, the "Europeanisation" of these "frozen conflicts" has been discussed. Both terms are controversial. The "frozen state" of unsolved conflicts of secession from Abkhazia to Nagorno-Karabakh is being called into question by diverse developments. "Europeanisa-tion" has taken place on the level of perception, but less on the level of ac-tion.
Martina Fischer
Civil Society and State-Building
Integrated Approaches in Bosnia-Herzegovina
Peace is more than the absence of war. It requires overcoming the ethno-political divisions that the war deepened, opening up economic perspectives for the people, creating security, and building a functioning democratic and just polity. The experiences of more than a decade of state-building in Bosnia-Herzegovina show that the international community can achieve this neither alone from the outside, nor from top to bottom. It must instead incorporate as many forces as possible from civil society. The advancement of peace, con-flict transformation, and economic development as well as European pros-pects for the people in the region must go hand in hand.
Wim van Meurs
Frozen Conflicts
What Is to Become of the Virtual States?
The first interpretations of ethnic conflicts in Eastern Europe after 1989 have been proven wrong in many issues. The number of conflicts that escalated into violence has been smaller than expected, but finding a solution for them has been harder. The virtual states that have come into being such as Kosovo, Transnistria, or Abkhazia have proven more capable of surviving than was predicted at the start of the 1990s. Furthermore, it has turned out that these virtual states are not only lucrative elite projects. They cannot get around of-fering a minimum of the state's re-distributional function or establishing a regional or national identity. The study of causes and conflict management must be reconsidered.
Bruno Coppieters
The Criteria for Just Secession
Kosovo as a Model Case?
International efforts to find a solution for the Kosovo conflict have reached a dead end. Eight years after NATO put an end to the violence, Serbs and Kosovo Albanians have yet to reach an amicable solution regarding Kosovoıs future status. However, the international community is also split. Russia and China are blocking a United Nations Security Council resolution that would recognize the independence of Kosovo. Even the EU members are divided. If one weighs all the criteria for a just secession, then the best of the bad solu-tions at the moment is only the postponement of the status question.
Andreas Heinemann-Grüder
One Step Forward, Two Steps Back
From Ethno-Federalism to "Russia of Russians"
The federalisation of Russia starting in 1992 and the de-federalisation under Putin have taught us that federal institutions do not reproduce themselves on their own. They depend on a federal political culture, federal-integrative parties, effective institutions of conflict regulation, an independent constitutional court, and the combination of federalism and democracy. Russia is lacking in all of these. De-federalisation under Putin was facilitated by a lack of democracy in the regions, centralist norms, and Russophilism in public discourse as well as the fact that political parties do not need federalism in order to gain power.
Michael Edinger, Mindaugas Kuklys
Ethnic Minorities in Parliament
Representation in East European Comparison
Ethnic minorities are represented in many parliaments in East Central and Eastern Europe. The extent and type of representation vary from state to state and have changed considerably since 1989. In addition to a minority's share of an overall population, citizenship, laws governing political parties, and the electoral system influence the possibilities for parliamentary recruitment and representation. Bulgaria, Slovakia, and Romania have accomplished an excep-tional degree of integration. There, the minority parties have become accept-able coalition parties and have provided ministers for various cabinets.
Thomas von Ahn
State, Nation, Europe
Hungary and the Foreign Hungarians
More than two million ethnic Hungarians live outside the Hungarian nation-state. Budapest counts these foreign Hungarians among the Magyar nation and feels responsible for them. In the first half of the 1990s, Budapest cham-pioned human rights in international organisations and tried to set an example based on its own rules. For several years, Hungary has also been granting the Magyars from Romania, Ukraine, Slovakia and Serbia special rights for enter-ing and residing in Hungary. A controversial referendum on dual citizenship has failed, however. Slovak and Romanian fears of Hungarian irredentism are therefore unfounded.
Ludwig Elle
Minority Protection in Germany
The Sorbs of Lusatia
The Sorbs of Lusatia as a Western Slavic ethnic group are recognized and pro-moted as a national minority in the Federal Republic of Germany. The constitu-tions of their home states of Brandenburg and Saxony as well as other legal regulations guarantee them the freedom to declare themselves a part of this minority, the right to use the Sorbian language in the public sphere, and political interest representation. Efforts are underway to counter the strong linguistic tendency to assimilate. In particular, these measures include action in the field of language policy and safeguards for a political and financial framework to counter-balance the structural disadvantages that minorities face.
Monika Wingender, Katarzyna Wisniewiecka-Brückner
The Boom in Minority Languages
Poland's Language Policy and Kashubian
The political departure of 1989-1991 in Eastern Europe brought about an about-face in language policy. In many of the Soviet successor states, national languages appreciated in value vis-à-vis Russian. In East Central Europe, the rapprochement with the European Union created better conditions for promot-ing minority languages. The attitude of the community of speakers is more important for the development of these languages than legal and political safeguards. This is shown by the example of Kashubian. Poland legally rec-ognizes it as a regional language and promotes its preservation. But only be-cause a large number of people in Kashubia embrace this small Slavic lan-guage is Kashubian once again playing a larger role in society.
Katrin Bergholz
The Return of Minorities
Integration in Bosnia-Herzegovina
At first glance, the return of wartime refugees to Bosnia-Herzegovina reads like a success story. According to the registers, two thirds of refugees have returned home, even if they are a part of the local ethnic minority. But con-temporary investigations show that only a few actually live in the places where they are registered, because they cannot find work there and face dis-crimination on the part of the authorities, schools, and hospitals. The rap-prochement between Bosnians, Serbs, and Croats is taking place on a personal level at best. The public sphere still consists of mono-ethnic blocs held to-gether solely by the international community.
Joachim Krauss
The Integration of the Roma in Romania
More than Opportunism for EU Accession?
Romania has the largest Roma population in Europe. The Roma life in pre-carious social conditions and are hardly integrated into society. The EU and international institutions have already provided considerable financial means to improve the situation of the Roma. The Romanian government may have also enacted its own programmes and projects for integrating the Roman, but discrimination, discreditation, and exclusion of the Roma as well as racism in politics and society remain structural problems.
Sonja Haug, Lenore Sauer
Russian Germans
The Problems of Professional, Linguistic, and Social Integration
Russian Germans make up the largest immigrant group in Germany and with that one of the most important target groups of communal integration assis-tance. As a survey of experts and affected persons shows, the integration of this group has proved difficult primarily in the labour market, whereby most Russian Germans cope with everyday life relatively easily where language is concerned. To a large extent, social integration proceeds through church in-volvement or athletic activities.