File spoon-archives/marxism-thaxis.archive/marxism-thaxis_1998/marxism-thaxis.9803, message 343


Date: Thu, 12 Mar 1998 12:41:52 +0000
From: James Heartfield <James-AT-heartfield.demon.co.uk>
Subject: Re: M-TH: Balkan conflicts


In message <l03020919b12d758b5456-AT-[130.244.113.41]>, Hugh Rodwell <m-
14970-AT-mailbox.swipnet.se> writes

>The people of Bosnia were forced into this position by the
>reactionary chauvinist policies of Serbia and Croatia which wanted nothing
>more than to divide Bosnia up between them and cannibalize it.

Which 'people of Bosnia'? This state is evenly divided between those who
favour independence, union with Croatia and the maintenance of the
Yugoslav federation. The referendum for national independence was
supported by a minority of the population. Independence was led by a
political leadership whose explicit hostility to its Serb minority
guaranteed that they could never willingly embrace an independent
Bosnia.

>The question is not German/US rivalry, although that has a part to play.
>The question
>is what was the effect on the class struggle in this region with the
>collapse of the Stalinist bureaucracy and its capitulation to imperialism?
>What leaderships were there with what policies to lead the popular and
>working-class struggles against imperialist exploitation and repression?
>Thanks to the dereliction of most currents of the left, there was a vacuum
>of revolutionary leadership with any understanding of the unsolved
>bourgeois democratic issues involved -- national liberation, democratic
>rights etc. The vacuum was filled by bourgeois and petty-bourgeois forces
>creating the carnage and filth we've been witnessing ever since.

Translation: 'The question is not what happened, but how can we force
these real events into the strait-jacket of rigid formula taken from the
past'.

But the class struggle was of a necessarily underdeveloped character in
this backward part of Europe, and subject to the excessive influence of
the Western powers. Elites in the former Yugoslavia sought out Western
sponsorship as Croatia did with Germany and Haris Siladzic did with the
US. Trying to force these real-world events into these dry formulae only
succeeds in turning class itself into an empty abstraction - and one
that lets imperialism off the hook by heaping the blame on 'Serb
aggression'.

>National oppression can never be justified by the "peace of the graveyard"
>argument that at least Soviet, US, British or Yugoslav domination kept
>things quiet while it was in place. 

Here Hugh is letting his imagination get the better of him. There was no
popular national movement in Bosnia, Croatia or Slovenia throughout the
post war years. What the partisan movement represented was the unity of
the South slavs against imperialist intervention. Imperialism sought to
divide the Yugoslavs to rule them, but failed. The post-war settlement
was built upon the enduring popular appeal of Yugoslav unity. However,
Tito's inability to develop the region meant that his authority depended
more and more on the distribution of offices and resources along
national lines. The national movements within the Yugoslav federation
were of an entirely elite character, and only realy emerged in the
seventies. The impact of the market under 'liberalisation' policies, and
in particular German investment, meant that the wealthier regions of
Slovenia and Croatia developed an increasingly hostile attitude to the
Yugolsav federation. The principle complaint of these Slovene and Croat
nationalists was that they were being bled dry by excessive taxes to
fund underperforming regions like Serbia, Macedonia, Montengro and
Bosnia.

As to Bosnian 'nationalism' this is the most artificial of all movements
in the region. Apart from some Islamic movements in the seventies and
eighties, Bosnia was relatively free of national sentiment, largely
because of its mixed character. The demand for independence was entirely
a product of the elites in Sarajevo orienting themselves towards the
West. An independent state appealed to them only because it would have
made a better platform from which to negotiate aid directly with the
Western powers. This weas a movement that was entirely sponsored in
Washington, that failed to enjoin the support of even a majority of the
population caught within the administrative region called Bosnia. 


>James is singing a hymn to the
>imprisonment of nations and making an implicit demand for the return of the
>Raj -- I mean look at all the bloodshed between India and Pakistan, between
>Hindu and Muslim that a continued British presence would have avoided!

Hugh's rhetoric inverts reality. In the real world, the minority Bosnian
'goverment' appealed to the West to intervene and occupy Bosnia. Today
Bosnia is a UN protectorate with the blessing of the muslim leadership
in Sarajevo. Under constitution imposed by Siladzic's US sponsors, the
highest authority in the land is the 'UN High Representative'. This
constitution sets out the proviso that the president of the national
bank may not be a Bosnian national. The demand for 'Bosnian
independence' turns out to be nothing more than a demand for a UN
occupation.

>How to organize, how to intervene, what policies to put forward and what
>slogans to mobilize around.

Well, if we want slogans, lets start with no western intervention.
-- 
James Heartfield


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