CITSEE Studies

In my terms, ‘perceived co-ethnics’ are defined as people who are recognised by the citizenship (or ethnizenship) conferring state as belonging to its main ethnic group although they themselves not only do not embrace that definition but have a distinct national project of their own. In other words, this imagined political community is seeking recognition in its own right under a different name and with different claims from that of the self-fashioned kin-state. However, the self-fashioned kin-state offers citizenship to them.

This study shows how particular politics of return are often a result of negotiations among political actors within citizenship constellations – a term first used by Rainer Bauböck to denote structures in which individuals’ statuses are dependent on individuals’ being concurrently connected to several political entities. For instance, host states are interested in reducing economic burdens that displaced populations put on their shoulders and, if they are powerful enough, they can impose return to countries of origin by way of conditioning it with state recognition, financial assistance, accession to international organizations, visa free regime etc.

In post-Yugoslav states, intergenerational solidarity networks based on family ties have become a safety net for many citizens, and particularly for women, who are traditionally in charge of child caring and social reproduction, while at the same time being often the main breadwinners in the household. The devaluation of women’s labour and the precarity of women on the labour market in the post-Yugoslav space reinforce women’s dependency on extended family networks. While the importance of family networks in informal economic practices was common during socialism as well, in post-socialist times, however, when job security in the public sphere has largely faded, the family – as well as informal economic practices - have an even stronger significance for everyday survival.

Despite the constitutionally and legally enshrined promise of equality in Kosovo, differentiated citizenship together with a political context defined by an ethnic divide and past structural inequalities, as well as uneven external citizenship opportunities, contributed to the emergence of ‘hierarchical citizenship’, where some groups (communities), or ‘rights-and-duty-bearing units’, are ‘more equal than the others’. In other words, the formal equality of citizens and communities is contradicted by the socio-political reality where some communities are better off, thus leading to the emergence of a hierarchy of communities in Kosovo. 

Although the language policies in the six states are broadly consistent with the multicultural conception of citizenship granting cultural and linguistic group rights in education, the promotion of the mutual respect principle and interethnic contact are limited, as are individual choices for the language of instruction by both majorities and minorities. The problem with homogenising groups for policy purposes – even where there is a degree of interaction between the groups – is that interactions take place between individuals who classify each other exclusively in terms of belonging to specific ethnic or cultural communities. 

At the moment, based on the summarised trends of reporting on citizenship, it is obvious that the leading print media in these four countries do not offer enough space for discussion and open participation on citizenship and related topics. Print media, due to the uncertain future of the press, are strongly dependent on their political or economic patrons, and rather serve as legitimizers than informers, observers, or watchdogs. It is slightly different with the online media. Due to the penetration of Internet use in the region, and the opportunities it offers for citizens to take part in content creation and discussion, it could play a much important role in discussing the problems and issues related to the citizenship. But the impact of online media in the region of the former Yugoslavia is still uncertain and unexplored, and this could be the subject of future research.

The changing citizenship regimes in Serbia illustrate the ways in which various narratives of nationhood run parallel to political changes, at times reinforcing them, at times creating obstacles for their implementation, but nevertheless providing a means by which they may be interpreted.

The Croatian citizenship legislation reveals the ongoing process of Croatian invention of, in the words of Rogers Brubaker, ‘the tradition of nationhood’ which is based on the idea that the Croatian state is a product of the “centennial” aspirations of the ethnic Croat community to have its own national state.

Citizenship in the former Yugoslav and the Macedonian context is yet to have its dimensions of status, rights and equality strengthened and its dimension of membership/belonging weakened in importance.

Citizenship has been a central issue in Kosovo’s state-building agenda, which aims to serve as a link between a war-torn community of people and a new polity based on principles of equality and all inclusiveness, and as a tool of political integration within the new political entity, which aims at replacing ethnic, religious and social divisions.