The Good

"It brought an end to violent conflict that has been maintained for thirty years, not just through the peace implementation efforts of the international community but chiefly by the deeply founded desire of the people of BiH to avoid ever experiencing such violence again."

"One could talk about potential and/or actual achievements on various levels, from those that are now almost forgotten but which, upon implementation, had extremely positive effects on people's everyday lives (common currency, anonymized vehicle license plates...) to the paradoxical one in the field of politics - the former "fiercest" opponents of the agreement are today the "most ardent" advocates of its implementation."

"The Dayton Peace Agreement brought what no military power could - an end to the bloodshed. In one sentence, it saved lives and gave space for Bosnia and Herzegovina to breathe, even if in tattered constitutional clothes. It was the moment when people heard silence for the first time after years of killing, and that is no small thing. Silence, then, was synonymous with life."

"The single most positive achievement, which probably overwhelms the large catalogue of failures of Dayton, is that it ended the violence. As critical as anybody may be of the basic assumptions of the agreement or its implementation, this single fact cannot be ignored."

"The greatest achievement of the Dayton Peace Accords is, of course, that it brought the war to an immediate end once agreement was reached. Equally remarkable, and less spoken of, though, is how quickly violence subsided after its signing. In comparative perspective, this is almost unprecedented: in many post-conflict settings, high levels of violence persist even after peace agreements are concluded, yet Bosnia and Herzegovina proved different. Post-war violence was relatively low—peaking briefly in 1996 before falling rapidly to negligible levels. While there were isolated acts of retribution and intimidation of returnees, these were limited in scale given the brutality of the war and the potential for revenge. As Michael Boyle notes in Violence after War (2014), Bosnia stands out as an encouraging exception, demonstrating that a negotiated peace can, under certain conditions, effectively suppress renewed violence. And yet we miss analyses why violence went down this quickly."

"The main positive outcome was the establishment of peace with (legally valid and declarative, though not presently credible) international guarantees - and with it, the demonstration that the BiH citizenry has a very pronounced aversion to a return to interethnic violence. This underscores the fact that the war was a top-down endeavor for those who initiated and sustained it. This fact alone provides potential for bottom-up change (though such efforts are inherently difficult - see below)."

"The most significant achievement of the Dayton Peace Agreement during its thirty-year implementation is the establishment of peace, which, regardless of continuous political tensions, manages to be maintained by creating space for solving problems through political means."

"When I look back on the past three decades, I would say that the biggest positive achievement of the implementation of the Dayton Agreement is peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The fact is that it is about peace, which is more the absence of war, because the legacy of the war has not been overcome, nor have the war goals of the big-state actors been buried. However, peace is the greatest value. Although the challenges are numerous, the fact that Bosnia and Herzegovina has maintained itself as a state and that no new conflict has broken out is a significant contribution that should not be underestimated. This stability, however fragile, is a necessary prerequisite for any progress in the country, and there has been some. New institutions were built and some international integrative processes started. Despite the obstructions and constant efforts to diminish its sovereignty, Bosnia and Herzegovina and its society have proven to be much more resilient than many expected."

"The most important positive achievement resulting from the implementation of the Dayton Agreement is the stopping of the war in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the establishment of peace, which still reigns today, 30 years later. This fact is too often overlooked by domestic or foreign officials and experts. However, the increasing political chaos that reigns on the domestic, regional and global scene in recent years, the collapse of democracy, respect for human rights, the rule of law and other key principles of the modern world, puts the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina in a completely different context. Against the growing chaos on the global scene and despite the conflicts and suffering from the 1990s, as well as the constant political turmoil in the past 30 years, the situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina today can still be considered relatively stable. It can be said that Bosnia and Herzegovina is an example of human resilience and the ability to overcome life's enormous challenges, because despite the continuous nationalist and hegemonic tendencies of local politicians, its citizens retain their humanity in accordance with traditional values."

"Peace and hope of the population that things will get better. There was much more optimism and enthusiasm after the end of the war than today. Years of crushing that same agreement have passed, and today people do not believe that it will ever get better."

"Freedom of travel, movement and not avoiding encrypted license plates that could have had consequences for citizens - too many heated politicians had bad intentions."

"Dayton ended a terrible war and the prospect of large-scale hostilities breaking out again."

"The most important positive achievement of the Dayton Peace Agreement is the establishment and preservation of permanent peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina. The agreement ended the armed conflict and created a basic institutional framework that, despite numerous shortcomings, enabled the reconstruction of society, the return of refugees, the development of democratic institutions and the gradual strengthening of the civil sector. This gave Bosnia and Herzegovina the opportunity to replace the devastation of war with a process of political stabilization and long-term transformation of the conflict into a democratic dialogue. It is a completely different matter that none of the above was properly, rationally and consistently implemented."

"While imperfect, the Dayton Peace Agreement provided a foundation for the reconstruction of the country’s infrastructure, institutions and social fabric following a war imposed on the country with the aim of catalyzing a process of disentangling and destruction. The war was so bloody because it took work to tear apart a society with a long tradition of joint living and the mixing and intermixing of cultures and traditions. The institutions that were established, particularly in the first decade after the end of the war, continue to provide a level of fiscal stability and basic state-level functionality that was hard to imagine in 1995. And the integration of the right to return into the piece agreement, while very imperfectly implemented, was a recognition at the time that ethnic cleansing and expulsion should be viewed as a thing of the past."