The EU Approach to Conflict and Governance: Meeting with Civil society and Local NGOs in Sarajevo

The Role of Governance in the Resolution of Socioeconomic and Political Conflict in India and Europe – CORE project (http://www.pria.org/core-project-description-events-resources) envisages breaking new ground by exploring the interface between governance and conflict. The arena of governance is mapped through the state of democratic institutions, management of resources, human rights, rule of law, policing and civil society in selected conflict areas across India and Europe.

The Sarajevo meeting to discuss preliminary results of the project provided an opportunity for cross-national understanding of how governance impacts conflicts and vice-versa and to improve the knowledge and understanding of partners on the cultural dynamics of current governance practices in Europe.
The purpose of the meeting was to look at the way people within Bosnia perceive and understand EU governmentality and initiatives, and the actual impact of these so-called stabilizing initiatives on the everyday lives of the people.

The one-day conference had two sessions. 

Session I focused on the EU in the Balkans and Beyond and was chaired by Sumona DasGupta from PRIA. The questions centred around the issue of a distinct EU approach to conflict resolution, the EU’s interpretation of the goals and means of liberal peace building and its actual peace building practices in the Balkans, Cyprus and Georgia, and the effects of ‘governance’ on conflict resolution practices. 
Session II focused on prescriptions for EU governance for conflict resolution specifically related to the case of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It was a closer look at the EU’s approach to conflict resolution in that country – the benefits of the EU’s approach and the negative consequences. 

The discussions highlighted that the EU’s approach to conflict resolution is guided by its self-perception as a peace project and its approach to conflict resolution is based on a rights and security approach – securing ceasefires, demobilization, security sector reforms, judicial reforms, transitional justice, civil society development, socio-economic development. It is not a united foreign policy player so cannot act as mediator. It has therefore interacted with conflict parties at multiple levels through an external governance agenda. The EU thus has no approach to conflict resolution – only to individual agendas from individual countries.

Specific reference was made of how politics in Bosnia continues to be driven by ethnic divisions. Political parties ignore voices from civil society, which is viewed as a nuisance, raising an important point about politicians “buying” social peace vis-à-vis the EU money that comes in. Peace in Bosnia is now simply an absence of violence – there is no civil peace.

Preliminary research findings were shared in the meeting. There is frustration with programme driven strategies, with donors, with a lack of understanding of the context, history and culture of the conflict region. The project has shown how governments pacify rather than engage with conflict.

Yet, the view of the future is hopeful: Different societies have shown conflict stabilization with many unhealthy situations and no return to open violence. Thousands of lives have been saved, for many reasons, including actors learning a little from previous experiences. A lack of return to mass violence is to be celebrated.