Balkan melting pot of cultural security – radicalization in Bosnia and Hercegovina

After the end of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1995, radical Islam spread in the country. The process of radicalization was influenced by the activity of Islamic charities and development assistance from Saudi Arabia and the settlement of former Arab fighters in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
The article aims to argue the importance of the problem of cultural security and radicalization in the Balkans, and in particular in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In Bosnia and Herzegovina, the authorities try to implement educational policy that tackles multiculturalism and religion, as well as to open a dialogue with radicals who have become a threat to the majority of residents. Nonetheless, there are many people in Bosnia and Herzegovina who are vulnerable to radical ideology, which in extreme cases resulted in them taking a journey to Syria and Iraq and joining the so-called Islamic State. The reasons behind this decision were, among others: unemployment, poverty and lack of faith in a better future for the young generation.

Neo-Ottomanism Policy in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Its Impact on Ethnic Relations in the Country

Turkish foreign policy for many years has been based on the concept of strategic depth formulated by Ahmet Davutoğlu. Nowadays, the concept remains a base of Turkish softpower diplomacy addressed to many countries, including Bosnia and Herzegovina. The main sources of the foreign policy are the traditional historical experiences of the Ottoman empire and islamic culture. This article analyzes the Turkish softpower diplomacy in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Nowadays, Turkey is focusing on the Ottoman past, as well as on the events of the 1990s: the civil war and genocide. By This way Ankara is gaining just Bosnian-muslim community support. The main question is why Turkey is leading the foreign policy in such a way? And what impact does this have on Bosnian contemporary ethnic relations?

Museum as a Medium of Collective Memory. The Case of Sarajevo

This article explores the relationships between memory politics and museums. It shows the institutionalisation of the past, which supports both the creation of historical narratives and the visibility of national identity. Analysing the Sarajevo museums dedicated to the 1992–1995 war in Bosnia and Herzegovina, the author shows how contemporary institutions have become carriers of collective memory and incubators of the national identity of Bosnian Muslims.

„Hatred feeds us with a goblet”: the break-up of Yugoslavia in the 1990s in geopolitical imaginations of the Polish popular music

The article focuses on the interference of Polish popular music and geopolitics after 1989. Songs selected from various trends of the Polish popular music made the source material of the text. The basic study method involved critical discourse analysis of the lyrics. The hierarchical East-West axis, which was also applied to the Balkans and Yugoslavia, was fundamental to Polish geopolitical perceptions. The musical image of Yugoslavia from the 1990s seemed repulsive with its strangeness and “Easternness”, which were proven by bloody wars and crimes in Bosnia and Kosovo. In the name of superiority of the Western world and geopolitical interests, musicians appealed to Western countries for military interventions in the former Yugoslavia. At the same time, they strengthened the direction towards the occidentalization of Poland as a condition for its security and development at the price of submission to the dominance of the West in the world and in Europe.

In this article, I would like to show that the “Siege of Sarajevo” is one such fragment of the past that has grown into a national myth. It will not be an abuse to say that today this city, by the fact that it constantly bears the marks of war, has become a kind of sanctuary for the Bosnian ethnos.