Muted differences: Entrenching legitimacy of the Bosnian statehood?

Abstract

The UNDP report The Silent Majority Speaks (2007) demonstrates widespread consent and a popular desire for change while promoting a single state with strong regions as a compromise model for Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH). Surprisingly, our own research (2009) on political legitimacy reveals quite the opposite tendencies, where political entities such as the Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina (FBiH) and the Republika Srpska (RS) more often drift apart than merge together. What strikes us is the fact that the FBiH, which advocates a more integrated state, does not necessarily have more legitimate grounds for achieving that goal than the secessionist counterclaim of RS in its own right. The two entities remain worlds apart on a range of issues and agree only on rather abstract principles of an ideal political order.