Journal on Ethnopolitics and Minority Issues in Europe (Oct 2003)
What Belgium Can Teach Bosnia: The Uses of Autonomy in 'Divided House' States
Abstract
Belgium and Bosnia can be understood as 'divided house' states, which contain proportionally similar groups with opposing views regarding whether the states should be more unitary or more decentralized. The Belgian example demonstrates that even where groups disagree on state structure, a mixture of various forms of group autonomy may facilitate stability and compromise within the state. Belgium addresses this dilemma in two ways: 1) non-territorial autonomous unites in the form of linguistic communities and 2) exclusive competencies for different units within the diverse Belgian state. this article argues that in Bosnia the rights of minorities in different territorial units, as well as refugee returns to areas where they are minorities, might be improved by structures with non-territorial autonomy that are similar to Belgian linguistic communities. Similar to Belgium, these non-territorial units might hold exclusive competencies for educational, linguistic, cultural, and religious matters, and enable more political representation of minority individuals. The author concludes by proposing that analysts should more carefully examine actual examples from states with similarly divided populations in order to advocate working models for Bosnia.
