Apologising for Srebrenica: the declaration of the Serbian parliament, the European Union and the politics of compromise

Abstract

In March 2010, the Serbian parliament adopted a declaration on Srebrenica as a formal apology for the 1995 genocide committed by the Bosnian Serb Army and paramilitary units of Serbia's Ministry of Internal Affairs. The compromises necessary to pass the declaration – along with the opinions expressed in the parliamentary debate – show that this event was not a turning point in Serbia's process of confronting the past, but a confirmation of the country's deep ideological and political divisions. The declaration's principal aim was to satisfy the European Union's expectations and bolster Serbia's project of seeking EU membership. The EU's conditionality policy has thus been effective in achieving official gestures of atonement like the Srebrenica Declaration. However, the EU's approach also diverts from the long-term domestic process of value transformation and the building of a civic public culture to a narrow focus on short-term instrumental measures aimed foremost at satisfying external demands.