Abstract
The question of how governments deal with ethnic diversity is fundamental to the future of peace and democracy in Europe. The way this question is articulated and addressed has changed significantly, as European governments and social actors respond to problems of regional security, domestic political contestation, and economic well-being. After the collapse of the Soviet Union in 1991, the collaborative efforts of European organizations – primarily the Council of Europe (CoE), the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), and the European Union (EU) – provided a historic opportunity for the development of common European standards about minority inclusion across the whole spectrum of political and economic rights and opportunities available to state majorities. Europeanization – which involved the deepening of transnational institutional structures in member states, the enlargement of the EU to include an increasing number of countries from the former Soviet bloc, and the diffusion of European norms and practices in the EU and its neighbourhood – had a profound impact on the evolution of state-minority relations across the continent. Although Europeanization reaches all aspects of life in EU member and aspiring member states, the governance of ethnic diversity has evolved in diverse directions across the continent, rather than gradually converging toward common standards.
Highlights
Employing the concept of minority inclusion as a broad category for describing the diverse spectrum of laws, policies, and practices that define state-minority relations, we focus on changes and continuities in Central and Eastern Europe (CEE) one decade after the completion of the European Union (EU)’s major ‘Eastern Enlargement’ project of 2004-2007, which provided European actors and institutions with unprecedented leverage for influencing state constitutions and policies in Eastern Europe
In the absence of a robust and common European minority rights regime, the terms of minority inclusion remain up for grabs in ethnopolitics ‘on the ground,’ as actors adapt to local institutional settings
The common European framework offers an opportunity for political actors to move beyond a zero-sum perspective on state-minority relations
Summary
The rich body of scholarship about the evolution of European norms and institutions related to minority protection places great emphasis on the formative role of security concerns. No consistent normative framework for minority rights claims emerged, EU institutions had to give a meaningful interpretation of ‘respect for and protection of minorities,’ which formed part of the Copenhagen accession criteria. Political stability remained a primary consideration, yet both the European Commission and the European Parliament anchored their decisions and recommendations in emerging international minority rights law – primarily the Council of Europe’s 1995 Framework Convention for the Protection of National Minorities (FCNM), and major statements and recommendations adopted by the Organization for Security and Cooperation in.. The overlap and close co-operation between the different international organizations involved – i.e., the CoE and its FCNM Advisory Committee; the OSCE and its High Commissioner on National Minorities (HCNM); and the EU – have generated a more consistent interpretation of minority rights at the international level. An important notion underlying these critical approaches is that minority members should be regarded not merely as recipients of policies designed for them but as participants of policy design and as actors that influence policy outcomes; in other words, as political agents
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