Sociology

This paper draws upon a variety of empirical sources to start critically examining the concept of civil society in the context of both (post-)Yugoslav anti-war and pacifist activisms and the civic engagement stemming from them in the nationally fragmented post-Yugoslav space. I argue that civil society can no longer be meaningfully used for understanding the complex geometry of social, political and personal interactions, cooperations and resistances within the regional civic spheres characterised by appreciable power asymmetries. Its definitional volatility and logical incoherence allow civil society to incorporate ideologically and historically extremely divergent phenomena. Due to its conceptual elasticity, civil society is a cognitively easily available device and a de-politicised theoretical paradigm convenient for masking power networks frequently conditioned by foreign political agendas. This paper points to possible alternative perspectives that might prove more productive for analysing (post-)Yugoslav bottom-up civic engagement.

The Belgrade-based activist group Women in Black
has been for twenty years now articulating a feminist anti-war stance in an inimical socio-political climate. The operation of this anti-patriarchal and anti-militarist organization, which has resisted numerous instances of repression, has not been until now systematically approached from a social movement perspective. This paper draws upon a range of empirical methods, comprising life-story interviews, documentary analysis and participant observation, to address the question as to how it was possible for this small circle of activists to remain on the Serbian/post-Yugoslav civic scene for the last two decades.My central argument is that a consistent collective identity, which informs the group’s resource mobilization and strategic options, holds the key to the surprising survival of this activist organization. I apply recent theoretical advances on collective identity to the case of the Belgrade Women in Black
with the view of promoting a potentially fruitful cross-fertilization between non-Western activism and the Western conceptual apparatus for studying civic engagement.

Keywords:
Women in Black; Serbia; collective identity; anti-war activism

Positioned at the interface between historical sociology, anthropology and social movement studies, We Were Gasping for Air: [Post-]Yugoslav Anti-War Activism and Its Legacy follows the (post-)Yugoslav anti-war protest cycle which unfolded throughout the 1990s. This book — based on extensive fieldwork in the region — illuminates the broader trajectories of activist group constitution, protest expansion and demise. The author argues that the Yugoslav anti-war activism cannot be recovered without appreciating the inter- and intra-republic cooperations and contestations, occurring in the context of Yugoslavia's socialist experience. The (post-)Yugoslav anti-war undertakings appropriated and developed the already existing social networks created through student, feminist and environmentalist engagement. In turn, different forms of anti-war dissent were instrumental for the establishment of present-day organisations devoted to human rights protection across the ex-Yugoslav space.

By examining anti-war activism in Serbia and Croatia, We Were Gasping for Air is a welcome contribution to the story of Yugoslavia’s violent dissolution. Its focus on civic forms of mobilisation, rooted in the experience of socialist Yugoslavia, complements the many studies of elite-led nationalism and fills an important gap in the literature. Theoretically informed and empirically rich, Bilic’s study helps us to understand the sources and complexities of political contention in a wartime context.
Jasna Dragovic-Soso, Goldsmiths, University of London

This study is the first to trace the origins and development of the anti-war movement in the former Yugoslavia, from its prehistory in the alternative engagement of the socialist period to its post-history in the professionalised NGO sector. Bojan Bilic uses insights from political sociology to explain why anti-war activists mobilised, the forces that encouraged, divided and demoralised them, the successes and failures of the movement, and the legacy it leaves in the long post-war. This book is essential for understanding politics and intellectual life in the former Yugoslav states in the 1990s and afterwards.
Eric Gordy, School of Slavonic and East European Studies, University College London

Bojan Bilic’s book provides a comprehensive analysis of anti-war contention in the post-Yugoslav space. A tour de force of historical sociology, the book, based on rich interview material and thorough archival research, explores the dynamics of activism in ways which challenge existing explanations framed in the context of methodological nationalism and/or idealist conception of civil society. Bilic reconnects the activisms of the 1990s with earlier civic engagements in Yugoslavia, notably student, feminist, and ecological initiatives. Written in an accessible style, Bilic's book confronts key questions regarding the meanings of the movements for the main protagonists and their implications for the wider public sphere and for social and political change. It is a “must read” for anyone interested in the region and in activism and social movements more generally.
Paul Stubbs, The Institute of Economics, Zagreb

The 20 th CEI International Summer School for students enrolled in the Democracy and Human Rights in South East Europe Master's Programme (ERMA), jointly offered by the University of Bologna and the University of Sarajevo, provided the framework for a one-day academic-activist workshop on the relationship between Europeanisation and LGBT activism in the post-Yugoslav Space. The workshop took place at the University of Bologna Residential Centre in Bertinoro, Italy, on 5 September 2014. For the purposes of this event,

This paper follows the almost contemporaneous emergence of the two primary antiwar initiatives in Belgrade and Zagreb to explore how they acted as hotbeds from which permanent human rights organizations appeared in the newly created nation-states. Drawing mostly upon in-depth interviews with antiwar activists from Serbia and Croatia, I argue that the dominant patterns of protest expansion were different in the two countries. While cooperation and tensions existed within both antiwar groups, the Antiwar Campaign of Croatia acted as a broker, leading toward the multiplication of civic initiatives; on the other hand, the Belgrade Center for Antiwar Action was characterized by ideological, professional, and personal divisions, which caused a rapid fragmentation of antiwar undertakings. This paper outlines the main reasons for such expansion patterns (scale-shift processes) and discusses them in the light of recent theoretical advances in political contention studies.
Keywords: Antiwar Campaign of Croatia; Center for Antiwar Action; Croatia; Serbia; scale shift

Smeštena na raskršću istorijske sociologije, antropologije i studija društvenih pokreta, knjiga Borile smo se za vazduh napušta široko rasprostranjene paradigme nacionalizma i civilnog društva i analizira (post)jugoslovenski antiratni aktivizam u poslednjoj deceniji 20. veka. Pozivajući se na empirijski korpus prikupljen u toku višegodišnjeg terenskog rada, autor tvrdi da se (post)jugoslovensko antiratno organizovanje ne može razumeti ukoliko se u obzir ne uzme kompleksna geometrija (među)republičkih saradnji i otpora u socijalističkoj Jugoslaviji. (Post)jugoslovenski antiratni poduhvati su prisvojili i osnažili društvene mreže nastale kroz studentski, feministički i ekološki angažman. Tako artikulisane antiratne akcije su na celom prostoru bivše države kasnije poslužile za stvaranje simboličkog, društvenog i materijalnog kapitala koji je omogućio osnivanje današnjih nevladinih organizacija posvećenih zaštiti ljudskih prava, tranzicionoj pravdi i mirovnom obrazovanju.

Prevod s engleskog: Bojan Bilić

Ovo je prva sociološka studija koja prati razvoj antiratnog pokreta u bivšoj Jugoslaviji, od njegovih početaka u alternativnom angažmanu socijalističkog perioda sve do pojave profesionalizovanog NGO sektora. Bilićeva knjiga je ključna za razumevanje politike i intelektualnog života u zemljama bivše Jugoslavije u 1990-im i kasnije.
Eric Gordy, Škola slovenskih i istočnoevropskih studija,
Univerzitetski koledž London

Knjiga Borile smo se za vazduh – tour de force istorijske sociologije – ispituje dinamiku antiratnog aktivizma na postjugoslovenskom prostoru problematizujući postojeća objašnjenja formulisana u okviru metodološkog nacionalizma i/ili idealističke koncepcije civilnog društva. Ova studija je obavezna literatura za svakog ko je zainteresovan za postjugoslovensku regiju, ali i za one koji se bave pitanjima aktivizma i društvenih pokreta uopšte.
Paul Stubbs, Ekonomski institut, Zagreb

Hailed as the event that "removed the last brick of the Wall" (J. Fischer), Serbia's democratic revolution marked the end of an era in the country's recent history. This book is devoted to the student movement Otpor (Resistance) that was instrumental in ousting Slobodan Milošević's regime. It is an interview-based study representing one of the first attempts to explore how the movement activists think about their participation in these memorable changes as well as how they account for the difficulties Serbia has been facing in its transition towards democracy. The interviews reflected a plethora of positions that the interviewees assumed towards the issues that are symbolically charged, suggesting that both the student movement and the Democratic Opposition of Serbia were ideologically heterogeneous organizations with constant internal tensions. They thus could not possess a clear-cut political strategy that would go beyond immediate Milošević's removal, leaving their members and supporters rather unsatisfied with the revolution's final outcome. This study could be of interest to those working on the processes of socio-political transition in the region.

Während der Jugoslawien-Kriege der 1990er Jahre wurden sie in der westeuropäischen Öffentlichkeit kaum wahrgenommen: Diejenigen Menschen und Gruppen in Jugoslawien und deren Nachfolgestaaten, die versuchten, die Gewaltdynamiken zu verhindern oder ihnen entgegenzutreten. Auch die Wissenschaft hat dieses Thema -mit wenigen Ausnahmen -lange vernachlässigt und sich primär für die Kriege als solche und die damit verbundenen staatlichen und gesellschaftlichen Gewaltformen in den Ländern Jugoslawiens interessiert. Als um so wichtiger ist die Arbeit des jungen Soziologen Bojan Bilić zu bewerten, der sich seit mehreren Jahren mit den (post)jugoslawischen Antikriegs-Bewegungen auseinandersetzt und der mit dem Buch "We Were Gasping for Air" eine überarbeitete Version seiner Doktorarbeit zu diesem Thema vorlegt.

Una storia poco conosciuta, quella dei movimenti pacifisti e di resistenza civile sorti in Jugoslavia contro le guerre degli anni '90. Due volumi contribuiscono a raccontarne le vicende. Una recensione Il 2012 ha visto la pubblicazione di due nuovi testi nella collana Southeast European Integration Perspectives diretta da Wolfgang Petrisch e Christophe Solioz: un progetto volto a offrire un quadro dei recenti processi di transizione e democratizzazione registrati nei paesi del Sud-Est europeo. Viene in questo modo messa a disposizione degli studiosi una coppia di volumi di alto valore scientifico e di potenziale interesse per chiunque voglia esplorare aspetti meno noti delle vicende jugoslave.