First Poland, now Serbia (“Serbia election victory for Tadic“). Bravo.
Turning Their Backs on Destructive Nationalism
5 Responses to “Turning Their Backs on Destructive Nationalism”
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First Poland, now Serbia (“Serbia election victory for Tadic“). Bravo.
Tom,
Perhaps your interpretation of the specific outcome of this election is right but I’m afraid implications from the approach taken with the Kosovo issue may well come back to haunt Europe in the not so distant future.
As much as libertarians like clear cut solutions, these almost never exist when it comes to border and sovereignty issues and the type of external pressure that was applied to alter the status quo may yet prove to have unintended consequences.
Andre,
I wasn’t actually taking a position on Kosovo per se. Both candidates are opposed to Kosovar independence, in any case.
But the Radical party represents aggressive nationalism, ethnic cleansing, and socialism and plunged the Balkans into several disastrous wars. It’s a good thing that a majority of Serbian voters turned their backs on them.
“I wasn’t actually taking a position on Kosovo per se.”
Tom,
I understand that but I think both the election and the result cannot be interpreted without considering the Kosovo issue and the associated external pressures, particularly from (part of) the EU and from the US.
That said, from what I know of the candidates and parties (which is not much) I’m inclined to share your view.
I just wanted to emphasize that regardless of our preferences there’s potentially a very big problem for Europe that will not solved by this result.
No doubt the Kosovo issue played a big role, but there was a bigger issue of which that was an element; a decision was made by the majority of voters to put war behind them. Serbian control over the bulk of Kosovo is not going to happen again, barring another war of conquest, which would certainly fail. Even were the Kosovars not to declare independence (which is supported by the overwhelming majority of the population there) and were they to remain in Serbia, it would be a matter of “sovereignty in name only,” rather than actual control over the territory by the Serbian government.
Albanian nationalism can be just as vicious and nasty as the Serbian variety and Albanian nationalist terrorists certainly committed crimes against innocent Serbs. No one should deny that, just as no one should deny the crimes of Serbian nationalist terrorists (or Bosnian or Croat). But it is time to draw a line between the past and the present and to look forward.
The Radical Party is viciously nationalist and its leaders launched a series of wars (against Slovenia, which didn’t go on for long, against Croatia, against the Bosnians, and against the Kosovars) that left poor Serbia in tatters. A majority of Serbs voted against a repeat of those disastrous decisions.
This vote leaves many problems unsolved. But it also removes from the stage — for now, at least — one of the worst problems of the Balkans, which is aggressive, chauvinistic, socialistic nationalism.
The bad news is that Tadic had to please the voters by moving to the right and towards nationalism himself.
If the insistence on formally keeping Kosovo can be called nationalism at all. To me it looks more like an irrational obsession with history. Sunk cost.