A Citizenship Beyond the Nation-State: Dilemmas of the 'Europeanisation' of Bosnia and Herzegovina

Abstract

The paper deals with the tension between the predominant ideas of citizenship in Bosnia and Herzegovina and those imposed upon the country by the EU integration dynamic. It tries to argue that the tension between citizenship as a concept moulded within the historical and conceptual parameters of the European nation-state and the complex sociopolitical reality of Bosnia and Herzegovina that clearly diverges from the nation-state model creates frictions and erodes the democratization process. The paper offers an analysis of citizenship legislation in Bosnia ad Herzegovina and a variety of historical, political and social determinants that have shaped the existing citizenship regime in the country. By doing this, it aims to examine the character of citizenship in contemporary Bosnia and Herzegovina, to question the social and political underpinnings of its historical development, to assess the possibility for the establishment of a liberal democratic citizenship framework and to chart a way for explaining new developments, driven by European integration processes.

Keywords: citizenship, Bosnia and Herzegovina, nation-state, ethnicity, Europeanisation

JEL Classification: P30, K10, K19