The Bosniacs, the Croats and the Serbs in Bosnia-Herzegovina: Their Experiences of Yugoslavia; In Permanent Gap

Abstract

Now that integration into Europe is on the public agenda, the discourse in Bosnia-Herzegovina is tending to build up a narrative about Bosnia-Herzegovina that is not actually integrating but returning to Europe from which it was “torn away” when it joined the Yugoslav state in 1918. Similar narratives, characteristic of Croatia and Slovenia, may have found their way into Bosnia-Herzegovina too. Indeed, what happened to Bosnia-Herzegovina from 1918 up to 1992, and was it really "abducted" from Europe where, as part of the Habsburg Monarchy, it had spent the last decades of the 19th and first decades of the 20th century? Has Bosnia-Herzegovina returned to the Balkans since 1918, where it had been up to 1878 and wherefrom, now in the early 21st century, it is trying to join Europe or - in line with this new narrative - is it once again “"making a break" for it? What, in this sense, are Bosniak, Croat and Serb experiences of Yugoslavia and what memories of Yugoslavia are they building in Bosnia-Herzegovina?