More than two decades after the break-up of former Yugoslavia, there is no consensus on the causes of the conflict, the nature of the violence, or the appropriate redress and attribution of responsibility for the atrocities, with little attention being paid to the memorialisation of victims belonging to other ethnic groups. Thus, reconciliation in the Western Balkans remains an aspiration.
There is no one agreed definition of reconciliation due to the complexity of the term and its context-based meaning. Bloomfield, Barnes and Huyse (2003, p. 12) define reconciliation as “a process through which a society moves from a divided past to a shared future” through which the position, experiences and the needs of victims are acknowledged. Through the process of reconciliation, conflicting groups achieve social cohesion, and the relation between previous enemies is redesigned to ensure peace. This, however, does not imply that victims should forgive their perpetrators or that societies should forget past atrocities, but rather that different groups learn how to peacefully co-exist. In short, reconciliation prevents the past from being used in future conflicts, consolidates peace, strengthens the newly established institutions in cases involving regime change, and breaks cycles of violence.
The lack of meaningful reconciliation negatively reflects on general trends regarding the opinion of youth related to the break up of former Yugoslavia. A recent study conducted by the United Nations Development Programme has highlighted that, across the Western Balkans, 15-63% of youth (aged 15-29) say they are unwilling to forgive others for past deeds, as seen in Figure 1 below. Similarly, 42% of youth noted that it is common to see offensive content related to their societal or ethnic group on social media. Moreover, youth across the region expressed concerns about the possibility of an armed conflict occurring in their countries or elsewhere in the region. Youth who expressed these concerns predominantly belonged to minority groups within their respective countries, which points to a lack of social cohesion between different ethnic groups.
Despite these trends measuring the average opinion of youth across the Western Balkans, youth organisations and initiatives have been identified as an important group and force for sustaining peace and fostering reconciliation in the Western Balkans. This article assesses the benefits and shortcomings of regional youth-led organisations and initiatives. It concludes that while regional youth organisations experience significant challenges - the scope of their initiatives, withstanding political pressure, and difficulties in securing long-term funding - they are crucial in transcending ethnic boundaries, ensuring the inclusion of youth in decision-making and fostering a more peaceful future.
Youth: The source of hope
Youth in the Western Balkan region tend to distinguish between those individuals who are most responsible for the crimes that occurred on the territory of former Yugoslavia and the people in general, especially youth who are too young to bear any responsibility. Thus, the majority of youth organisations aim to work with their peers across the region to create a common narrative of the past events by focusing on a joint, peaceful future. The two most prominent youth organisations in the Western Balkans are the Youth Initiative for Human Rights (YIHR) and the Regional Youth Cooperation Office (RYCO).
The YIHR is a network of non-governmental organisations that aims to connect youth across the Balkans, regardless of their ethnic groups, religion and country of origin, to increase the participation of young people in the transitional justice process and advance their human rights agenda. The YIHR works extensively on organising exchange programmes between youth across the region, where young people interact and participate in various cultural activities. Since 2005 when the Initiative was established, more than 15,000 young people have participated in the exchange programmes. These exchange programmes are crucial, as studies have shown that out-group contact increases trust and social cohesion while decreasing stereotypes and biases. Indeed, between 61% and 91% of young people agree that exchange programmes can increase intra-group trust and have a positive impact on regional relations. The YIHR also organises Human Rights Schools for high school and university studies that introduce youth to regional advocacy networks and human rights agenda. By aiming to educate young people about the legal proceedings before the International Tribunal for former Yugoslavia and specific events which remain regionally contested, the YIHR insists on respecting the legal convictions and condemnations of responsible war criminals while fostering a dialogue on the connections between the past atrocities and future democratic developments of the Western Balkan societies.
The RYCO is a regional organisation established by Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo*, Montenegro, North Macedonia and Serbia, which aims to promote reconciliation, trust and cooperation through youth exchanges, regional volunteer opportunities, various festivals, and multi-cultural learning initiatives. The RYCO has various projects aimed at equipping teachers and high schools across the region with training materials and manuals for intercultural exchange, peacebuilding and dealing with the past. It also focuses on reaching vulnerable youth by establishing youth peer trainers in the field of peacebuilding and supporting innovative ideas of and for youth in the region on an annual basis. Overall, the RYCO is considered the most impactful youth-led organisation in the region due to its extensive work on transitional justice processes and youth peacebuilding.
With many young people across the region being attracted to the newly emerging nationalistic political parties alongside the lack of a unified, regional understanding of historical events, the work of RYCO, YIHR and other similar youth organisations is crucial in fostering peace. By creating strong linkages between youth across the region, these organisations are forming a new generation of people in the Western Balkans that will not privilege people based on their religion, language, ethnic origin, or nationality. Their potential for fostering reconciliation is far-reaching as their focus on increasing intra-group contact and building a joint future aims to prevent the past being used for future conflicts. Unlike their parents’ generation, youth in the Western Balkans can break the cycles of violence by working against the structural violence embedded in the social structures of the region.
Challenges to youth-led reconciliation processes
Besides the potential of youth organisations to foster meaningful reconciliation in the Western Balkans, there are three challenges noted in their work. Firstly, it is necessary to consider the scale of youth-led reconciliation processes. The level of youth participation in the Western Balkans remains low as, in 2020, 19.5% of youth in the region were involved in civic engagement or civil society activities, ranging from 8.5% in Albania to 32.9% in Montenegro. Thus, a significant proportion of youth remains outside the reconciliation activities and youth organisations. Arising from the lack of trust in the government and public institutions, 47% of youth believe that their engagement will not make a difference, while 21.5% fear prosecution if they become politically active and engage in advancing the human rights agenda. These numbers point to a larger structural problem in the Western Balkans related to public institutions and governments failing to create an enabling environment for youth to engage and be active agents of change. Therefore, while the youth-led reconciliation processes have extreme potential for fostering peace in the region, these processes have a limited reach.
Secondly, youth organisations are not immune to political pressure. For instance, RYCO is funded by the governments of the Western Balkan countries, which implies that the direct political influence can come from withholding and controlling funds, placing pressure on the Governing Board Members or simply excluding youth from the Governing Board meetings. Similarly, the cancellation of the 9th RYCO Governing Board meeting in Pristina in 2019 due to the dispute between Serbia and Kosovo* undermines RYCO’s independence and shows that the organisation can hardly be excluded from the on-going political processes. This mixture of the pressure of different governments could lead to the political instrumentalization and the lack of independence of this regional body.
Thirdly, sources of funding for youth-led organisations remain a challenge. With the exception of RYCO, which is funded by the Western Balkan countries, the majority of the youth initiatives are funded by what is referred to in the Balkans as “Western donors” (the European Commission, the Federal Government of Germany, the USAID, or the Norwegian MFA Fund). The source of the funding becomes a double-edged sword for youth-led organisations. On the one hand, funding from external donors allows the organisations to be independent in their work. On the other hand, external funding removes the regional-owned character of some organisations and can easily result in organisations being subjected to political misrepresentations and manipulation in the public discourse by different political parties and governments. Another issue is securing long-term funding for organisations supported by external donors that would allow youth to organise long-term projects at scale instead of running short-term projects with no follow-ups.
Conclusion
More than two decades after the break-up of former Yugoslavia, peace in the Western Balkan region remains fragile. With the increasing authoritarian tendencies of the Western Balkan governments, rising ethno-nationalism, and the growing influence of right-wing parties, the space for addressing the atrocities and initiating transitional justice processes is shrinking. In this space, regional youth organisations facilitating reconciliation through exchange programmes, multi-cultural and regional initiatives are crucial. Despite facing political pressure and challenges related to the scope of their activities and long-term funding, youth-led reconciliation processes have an enormous potential to decrease stereotypes and foster peace and social cohesion by transcending ethnic boundaries. Most importantly, these youth organisations facilitate the formation of a new generation of young people in the Western Balkans that will not judge people on the basis of their religion, nationality and ethnicity, but instead focus on a joint peaceful and democratic future.
To further support the work of youth organisations in the Western Balkans, it is necessary to provide greater visibility of their work within the public discourse. However, their work cannot be intertwined with the different – nationalistic or not – goals of the Western Balkans’ governments. Youth organisations are not ‘Western agents’ or ‘traitors’ – as labelled by some politicians and right-wing groups in the region – but simply a group of people trying to avoid the wars their parents experienced. Furthermore, the task of changing structural violence and deeply-rooted perceptions of the past is a massive burden to be placed on youth’s shoulders. The responsibility to address past atrocities and establish facts about the break-up of former Yugoslavia rests with the Western Balkan governments. Until these governments meaningfully engage in a dialogue to foster reconciliation and ensure peace, youth remains the last hope for the reconciliation of the Western Balkans.
*This designation is without prejudice to positions on status, and in line with UNSCR 1244 and the ICJ Opinion on the Kosovo Declaration of Independence.
Disclaimer: The views and opinions expressed in this blog are personal to the author(s) and do not reflect the official policy or position of any other agency, organisation, or employer.
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