BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA: THE PERILS AND PITFALLS OF MEMORIALIZATION IN DIVIDED POST-CONFLICT SOCIETIES
BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA: THE PERILS AND PITFALLS OF MEMORIALIZATION IN DIVIDED POST-CONFLICT SOCIETIES

Summary/Abstract: Transitional justice has viewed memorialization primarily through its capacity to support societies in their efforts cope with a difficult past. Memorials can be sites of public mourning, outlets for grief and terrain where memories of the past can be confronted. Yet, memorialization is a contested and divisive social and political process in societies that are recovering from identity-based intrastate conflicts. The immense symbolism of memorials is deployed to construct exclusive identities, underline ethnic differences, mark territory and to provoke in a manner that can impede inter-group reconciliation. This paper examines the perils of memorialization in Bosnia and Herzegovina and analyzes the causes and manifestations of competitive memorialization among the country’s three largest ethnic communities. It argues that legally binding regulation on the construction of memorials can be a feasible strategy to encounter the problems they pose on divided post-conflict societies.

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