Speaker: Peter Sanfey, European Bank for Reconstruction and Development
Chair: Jonathan Scheele. St Antony’s College, Oxford
Discussant: Adis Merdzanovic, St Antony’s College, Oxford
The impact of Brexit on the UK, Europe, and the world are discussed almost daily in the press and much uncertainty remains. Yet, often lacking from such discussions are its indirect impacts on third countries, such as those in the Western Balkans. In his talk, Peter Sanfey presented new research carried out by the European Bank for Reconstruction and Development on the impact of Brexit on Serbia, Montenegro, Bosnia, Albania, FYROM and Kosovo. His remarks were followed with a brief analysis of the political implications by Adis Merdzanovic from St Antony’s College.
The Western Balkans face an important convergence challenge. Currently, their income is around half of that of other Eastern European countries, and only a quarter of that of Western European countries. Yet, there have been some positive developments, with growth projected to average 3% in 2017, a stable macroeconomic situation, and declining non-performing loans. Over the medium term a set of factors enhance their attractiveness to investors: the prospect of EU membership, good relations with the IMF, a geographic location at a crucial point of China’s New Silk Road, the diverse range of economic activities, and favourable tax and labour costs.
Reporting on what's happening at SEESOX, the topics being discussed, the theories put forward, and the points made
Tuesday, 15 November 2016
Monday, 7 November 2016
Bosnia’s Paralysed Peace
Adis Merdzanovic (Junior Research Fellow, St Antony's College, Oxford)
Two decades after the Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA) ended the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), the country once again finds itself in a precarious situation. While the war has certainly stopped, BiH faces deep political, social, and economic crises that threaten the stability of the state and its structures. But why has BiH, which received enormous institutional and financial aid from the international community, not become a self-sustaining democracy?
This question is central to Christopher Bennett’s new book Bosnia’s Paralysed Peace, which the author presented at a SEESOX seminar on 3rd November 2016. The event was chaired by Adis Merdzanovic (St Antony’s College) and Richard Caplan (Linacre College) acted as discussant.
As Bennett explained, the book presents an analysis of the breakdown of Yugoslavia, the war in BiH, and all the political developments since the Dayton Peace Agreement. It was written with the deep conviction that there exists a solution for what Bennett has termed the ‘Bosnian Question’, namely a way for Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats to peacefully live together within a political framework that actually works. In order for this to happen, however, one needs to understand the structural preconditions for the current challenges.
Two decades after the Dayton Peace Agreement (DPA) ended the 1992-1995 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), the country once again finds itself in a precarious situation. While the war has certainly stopped, BiH faces deep political, social, and economic crises that threaten the stability of the state and its structures. But why has BiH, which received enormous institutional and financial aid from the international community, not become a self-sustaining democracy?
This question is central to Christopher Bennett’s new book Bosnia’s Paralysed Peace, which the author presented at a SEESOX seminar on 3rd November 2016. The event was chaired by Adis Merdzanovic (St Antony’s College) and Richard Caplan (Linacre College) acted as discussant.
As Bennett explained, the book presents an analysis of the breakdown of Yugoslavia, the war in BiH, and all the political developments since the Dayton Peace Agreement. It was written with the deep conviction that there exists a solution for what Bennett has termed the ‘Bosnian Question’, namely a way for Bosniaks, Serbs, and Croats to peacefully live together within a political framework that actually works. In order for this to happen, however, one needs to understand the structural preconditions for the current challenges.
Friday, 4 November 2016
Turkey before and after July 15: The story of a failed coup
Yaprak Gürsoy (Academic Visitor, St Antony’s College, Oxford and Associate Professor, Istanbul Bilgi University)
On 2 November, four senior members of SEESOX at St Antony’s College, Ezgi Başaran, Mehmet Karlı, Deniz Ülke Arıboğan and Yaprak Gürsoy, spoke on the 15 July 2016 coup attempt in Turkey. The director of SEESOX, Othon Anastasakis, chaired the seminar, which mostly focused on the events of the coup, but also touched upon the political, economic and social aspects of Turkey before and after the botched putsch.
The seminar started with Ezgi Başaran, a prominent Turkish journalist, describing in detail the events of the night of the coup. The presentation was particularly rich in providing facts and in explaining the surprise and disbelief of many Turkish citizens in the first few hours of the coup. Başaran summarized the main differences between the July 15 putsch and the previous coups in Turkey, pointing out that people going out to the streets to protect the elected government, as well as the unanimous resistance against the coup among the political parties, were unique to the recent attempt. Although opposition to the coup was common, there is still no consensus over political issues, which results in the continuation of political conflict. In her talk, Başaran referred to some of the groups that are part of the conflict, namely the AK Party government, the Gülenists, and those who were charged in the Ergenekon and Balyoz trials based on fabricated evidence. The relationship between these groups has taken several twists and turns over the last decade. The government and the Gülen network are in a power struggle today and the coup attempt was the latter’s last effort to unseat the former.
On 2 November, four senior members of SEESOX at St Antony’s College, Ezgi Başaran, Mehmet Karlı, Deniz Ülke Arıboğan and Yaprak Gürsoy, spoke on the 15 July 2016 coup attempt in Turkey. The director of SEESOX, Othon Anastasakis, chaired the seminar, which mostly focused on the events of the coup, but also touched upon the political, economic and social aspects of Turkey before and after the botched putsch.
The seminar started with Ezgi Başaran, a prominent Turkish journalist, describing in detail the events of the night of the coup. The presentation was particularly rich in providing facts and in explaining the surprise and disbelief of many Turkish citizens in the first few hours of the coup. Başaran summarized the main differences between the July 15 putsch and the previous coups in Turkey, pointing out that people going out to the streets to protect the elected government, as well as the unanimous resistance against the coup among the political parties, were unique to the recent attempt. Although opposition to the coup was common, there is still no consensus over political issues, which results in the continuation of political conflict. In her talk, Başaran referred to some of the groups that are part of the conflict, namely the AK Party government, the Gülenists, and those who were charged in the Ergenekon and Balyoz trials based on fabricated evidence. The relationship between these groups has taken several twists and turns over the last decade. The government and the Gülen network are in a power struggle today and the coup attempt was the latter’s last effort to unseat the former.
Monday, 24 October 2016
Sarajevo’s Holiday Inn: On the Frontline of Politics and War
Adis Merdzanovic (Junior Research Fellow, St Antony's College, Oxford)
The Holiday Inn hotel in Sarajevo has a particular place in Bosnia and Herzegovina’s history. Designed by the Bosnian architect Ivan Štraus, and built before the 1984 Winter Olympics to house foreign dignitaries such as the former IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch, it gained particular notoriety in the lead up to, and during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war. It was a regular meeting place for political elites – it was, for example, where Alija Izetbegović formally launched the Party of Democratic Action (SDA) in 1990 and, later, the informal headquarters of the Serb Democratic Party (SDS) under the leadership of Radovan Karadžić. The SDS used the hotel as a meeting place and by February 1992 it had become home to their ‘crisis headquarters’, from where party leaders organised barricades on ‘referendum weekend’ of 29 February/1 March 1992. And on 6 April 1992 the fateful sniper shots fired into the protesting crowds heralding the beginning of the conflict, are alleged to have come from somewhere in the building. Finally, during the war, the hotel was omnipresent in international media, for it hosted hundreds of international journalists reporting on a regular basis from the besieged city of Sarajevo.
Despite the hotel’s importance, only isolated stories about it have made it into the public sphere, and a comprehensive history was lacking. This is precisely what Kenneth Morrison, professor in Modern South East European History at De Montfort University, provides in his new book Sarajevo’s Holiday Inn: On the Frontline of War and Politics. On 19th October, he presented it at a SEESOX seminar chaired by Elizabeth Roberts (Trinity College, Oxford).
The Holiday Inn hotel in Sarajevo has a particular place in Bosnia and Herzegovina’s history. Designed by the Bosnian architect Ivan Štraus, and built before the 1984 Winter Olympics to house foreign dignitaries such as the former IOC President Juan Antonio Samaranch, it gained particular notoriety in the lead up to, and during the 1992-1995 Bosnian war. It was a regular meeting place for political elites – it was, for example, where Alija Izetbegović formally launched the Party of Democratic Action (SDA) in 1990 and, later, the informal headquarters of the Serb Democratic Party (SDS) under the leadership of Radovan Karadžić. The SDS used the hotel as a meeting place and by February 1992 it had become home to their ‘crisis headquarters’, from where party leaders organised barricades on ‘referendum weekend’ of 29 February/1 March 1992. And on 6 April 1992 the fateful sniper shots fired into the protesting crowds heralding the beginning of the conflict, are alleged to have come from somewhere in the building. Finally, during the war, the hotel was omnipresent in international media, for it hosted hundreds of international journalists reporting on a regular basis from the besieged city of Sarajevo.
Despite the hotel’s importance, only isolated stories about it have made it into the public sphere, and a comprehensive history was lacking. This is precisely what Kenneth Morrison, professor in Modern South East European History at De Montfort University, provides in his new book Sarajevo’s Holiday Inn: On the Frontline of War and Politics. On 19th October, he presented it at a SEESOX seminar chaired by Elizabeth Roberts (Trinity College, Oxford).
EU, Turkey and Refugee Policy
Altuğ Günal (Academic Visitor, St Antony’s College, Oxford)
Gerald Knaus, founding chairman of the European Stability Initiative and father of the EU-Turkey Deal, gave a well-attended lunchtime seminar on October 19th, 2016, with Ezgi Başaran in the chair. The main focus of discussion was whether the deal could be properly implemented by the parties.Knaus began by criticising the tale Hungarian PM Viktor Orban had been telling throughout Europe. Orban’s main target on the refugee issue was Germany, whose citizens he labelled as emotional, incompatible, sentimental and confused; he had criticised Germany’s refugee policy as insincere, believing that Europeans should have fought against accepting refugees from Germany or anywhere else. The EU had also been a target of Orban’s attacks, as he claimed that “the people in Brussels” were trying to destroy nation states by settling large number of foreigners against the will of their voters.
Knaus also regretted Orban’s and his allies’ limited understanding of the refugee issue, with their belief that it could be solved by strict control of the borders; indeed, Orban had argued that a new border should, if necessary, have been established to the north of Greece. In his view, European Civilization could melt away if large numbers of refugees were not prevented from entering.
A further concern of Knaus was Orban’s attitude to the Refugee Convention. In 2015, the Hungarian PM had maintained that the right to live prevailed over all other rights; therefore, protecting his citizens was more important for him than either the Refugee Convention or any other convention. Knaus saw Marine le Pen’s Front National, the Swedish Democrats, and the other European far-right parties, as among Orban’s natural allies, while Angela Merkel and Dutch-EU Presidency constituted the two biggest obstacles to Orban’s refugee “solutions”. But Knaus warned that it was the mainstream political parties that Europe needed to watch.
Gerald Knaus, founding chairman of the European Stability Initiative and father of the EU-Turkey Deal, gave a well-attended lunchtime seminar on October 19th, 2016, with Ezgi Başaran in the chair. The main focus of discussion was whether the deal could be properly implemented by the parties.Knaus began by criticising the tale Hungarian PM Viktor Orban had been telling throughout Europe. Orban’s main target on the refugee issue was Germany, whose citizens he labelled as emotional, incompatible, sentimental and confused; he had criticised Germany’s refugee policy as insincere, believing that Europeans should have fought against accepting refugees from Germany or anywhere else. The EU had also been a target of Orban’s attacks, as he claimed that “the people in Brussels” were trying to destroy nation states by settling large number of foreigners against the will of their voters.
Knaus also regretted Orban’s and his allies’ limited understanding of the refugee issue, with their belief that it could be solved by strict control of the borders; indeed, Orban had argued that a new border should, if necessary, have been established to the north of Greece. In his view, European Civilization could melt away if large numbers of refugees were not prevented from entering.
A further concern of Knaus was Orban’s attitude to the Refugee Convention. In 2015, the Hungarian PM had maintained that the right to live prevailed over all other rights; therefore, protecting his citizens was more important for him than either the Refugee Convention or any other convention. Knaus saw Marine le Pen’s Front National, the Swedish Democrats, and the other European far-right parties, as among Orban’s natural allies, while Angela Merkel and Dutch-EU Presidency constituted the two biggest obstacles to Orban’s refugee “solutions”. But Knaus warned that it was the mainstream political parties that Europe needed to watch.
Friday, 21 October 2016
The Geopolitics of Fear: South East Europe in a Triangle of Uncertainty- Russia, Middle East, North Africa
David Madden (Senior Member, St Antony's College, Oxford)
A team from SEESOX presented on this theme to the Global Strategy Forum at the National Liberal Club on 18 October. This followed on from a seminar in Athens on 27 September on a similar theme, funded by the Public Diplomacy Division of NATO. This was the fourth in a series of SEESOX presentations with the GSF.
David Madden set the scene. Traditionally South East Europe had its own long-running internal geopolitical challenges: in Cyprus, in former Yugoslavia, or between Turkey and Greece. But the region was now an importer of crises. To the East there was Russia, with a more assertive and unpredictable policy. To the South East, there was violent conflict, in particular the cataclysmic civil war in Syria, foreign intervention, extremism, inter-Muslim cultural wars and failed hopes: and with a resulting flood of refugees, affecting most directly the countries least able to cope. To the South, there was North Africa, with Libya as its foremost failed state, and another route of Mediterranean refugees. Even to the North and West, the soft power of the EU was hampered by economic and political weaknesses. From both inside the region and from outside, there were the perverse influences of populism and demagoguery. The post-truth era was pervasive in public and political discourse. The Middle East was in turmoil. There were cold wars (Iran/Saudi Arabia, Israel/Palestine), hot wars (Syria, Libya, Yemen) and legacy wars (Afghanistan, Iraq). Russia had clear interests and strategy, because of Syria’s unique position as a Russian client. Syria and the war in the Ukraine had effectively brought to an end the post- Cold War settlement. Russia believed in a system of great powers, with zones of influence.
A team from SEESOX presented on this theme to the Global Strategy Forum at the National Liberal Club on 18 October. This followed on from a seminar in Athens on 27 September on a similar theme, funded by the Public Diplomacy Division of NATO. This was the fourth in a series of SEESOX presentations with the GSF.
Wednesday, 20 July 2016
Migration and the prospects for transitional justice in Cyprus
David Madden (Senior Member and Distinguished Friend of St Antony's College)
On 2 June, Dr Rebecca Bryant spoke on the subject “Forced Migration and the Prospects for Transitional Justice in Cyprus”. David Madden chaired.
Bryant explained that transitional justice consists of a number of measures intended to help post-conflict communities transition to peace. She observed that there are already aspects of transitional justice in Cyprus: the Committee on Missing Persons (though its mandate was limited), the cultural heritage committee, and inter-faith meetings being a few of those. But overall, divisive narratives of the conflict have not changed much on either side, despite the opening of the checkpoints. Moreover, surveys show that crossings to the other side, especially by Greek Cypriots, are few. There are large numbers of Greek Cypriots who have never crossed. There instead is a tendency to wait for a settlement to think about reconciliation.
Given around fifty years of negotiations and the leaders’ agreement on a bizonal, bicommunal federation, the outline of a settlement is already reasonably clear. Because that federation would be composed of two ethnically based states, it is clear that in any federal scenario Turkish Cypriots would be a majority in the north. As a result, not all Greek Cypriot displaced persons would return to the north, and those who return would be a minority. Polls also show that almost no Turkish Cypriots would choose to return to the south. Moreover, we know from other studies that post-conflict minority return tends to be problematic.
Bryant said that her premise and concern is that any political settlement of the Cyprus conflict would entail some remixing of populations, and that the goal in implementing that remixing must surely be to ensure that it will lead to peace rather than to further conflict. For this, she suggested that transitional justice measures may be helpful, and that such truth-seeking relating to displacement may make other transitional justice measures more effective. Her concern, she said, was a general misperception in both communities about potential movements of people in the event of a federal settlement.
On 2 June, Dr Rebecca Bryant spoke on the subject “Forced Migration and the Prospects for Transitional Justice in Cyprus”. David Madden chaired.
Given around fifty years of negotiations and the leaders’ agreement on a bizonal, bicommunal federation, the outline of a settlement is already reasonably clear. Because that federation would be composed of two ethnically based states, it is clear that in any federal scenario Turkish Cypriots would be a majority in the north. As a result, not all Greek Cypriot displaced persons would return to the north, and those who return would be a minority. Polls also show that almost no Turkish Cypriots would choose to return to the south. Moreover, we know from other studies that post-conflict minority return tends to be problematic.
Bryant said that her premise and concern is that any political settlement of the Cyprus conflict would entail some remixing of populations, and that the goal in implementing that remixing must surely be to ensure that it will lead to peace rather than to further conflict. For this, she suggested that transitional justice measures may be helpful, and that such truth-seeking relating to displacement may make other transitional justice measures more effective. Her concern, she said, was a general misperception in both communities about potential movements of people in the event of a federal settlement.
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