The easy solution to Bosnia

A few days ago, former NATO commander Wesley Clark and former ambassador Swanee Hunt took to the New York Times op-ed page with a worthy reminder that post-war Bosnia remains dysfunctional and politically volatile. Because Bosnia’s dysfunctionality has not turned into renewed violence, however, "the international community has mostly turned its back on its own handiwork." Clark and Hunt offer a three-pronged strategy for breaking the deadlock:

First, the American and European governments must help Bosnia change the Constitution we helped create.

Second, after the Constitution has been revised, the European Union should reward Bosnia by granting it membership. Serbia, after all, was given candidate status — a critical step toward full membership — in March, and Croatia is scheduled to become a full member next year. Europe should also extend more financial and technical assistance to implement the reforms needed to re-establish a pluralistic society and secure candidate status for Bosnia (which the European Union treats as a “potential candidate” for membership).

Third, NATO needs to offer the country a clear path for joining the alliance; it will have an opportunity to do so later this month when NATO holds a summit meeting in Chicago. Many Bosnians of all ethnicities look at membership in NATO as a guarantee of security, prosperity and stability. In addition, the military is the one Bosnian institution in which ethnic differences have mattered least; recently, when Serbian veterans’ benefits were cut, Bosniak veterans raised money to give to the people who once fought against them.

Other than somehow changing the Bosnian constitution, the Clark/Hunt answer to Bosnia is to shove the troubled nation into the arms of successful multilateral institutions. They calculate, perhaps correctly, that the embrace of these institutions will smooth the still jagged edges of Bosnian politics. More broadly, they seem to wager that the central question of whether Bosnia is a coherent political community will become less pressing–and therefore more amenable to compromise–once the troubled country is part of these broader, liberal organizations. This is nation-building by membership card. 

It’s a tempting strategy, particularly for Americans. But my experience is that the European perspective is quite different, and the real hangup is EU membership. It is Europeans who would have to live with the economic, social, and political consequences of admitting Bosnia to their ranks (and, in so doing, according Bosnia’s politicians veto power over certain EU decisions). You can forgive EU members living through the current crisis for not being enthused about admitting another troubled member to their ranks.