“The wars of the 1990s continue to this day”

Prof. dr. DUBRAVKA STOJANOVIĆ - historian, professor [Serbia]

GENERATION OF LIVED HISTORY

The war does not end with the cessation of the conflict. Survivors continue to carry it deep inside them. The way post-war society relates to war affects individuals and shapes transgenerational memory.

• How has the generation that lived in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the region during the wars in the former Yugoslavia – and especially during the genocide in Srebrenica – experienced and shaped this history in the past 30 years: through personal memories, reflections, but also through narratives in the media, films, books, textbooks and rituals of remembrance?

"Information about the crimes in Srebrenica began to arrive in Serbia through independent media relatively quickly, in the second half of July 1995. Those who wanted to know what was happening could find out. Until the end of Milošević's rule, this was not discussed in the media with national coverage. The problem is that the democratic authorities did not want to face it either. The farthest we went was when RTS played a video showing the Scorpions unit killing a group of Srebrenica residents. This caused shock to viewers. But they quickly suppressed the shock, while the authorities persistently denied the legitimacy of the Hague Tribunal and denied the crime. After the verdict of the International Court of Justice, according to which genocide took place in Srebrenica, a stronger wave of denial began, especially after Aleksandar Vučić came to power. There was a particularly strong campaign in May 2024, at the time of the adoption of the Declaration on the Srebrenica Genocide at the UN. Thanks to the powerful campaign of the last 30 years, the citizens of Serbia can calmly forget everything they knew about the genocide, ignoring the media, intellectuals, NGOs that talk about it all the time. It is a devastating realization that, despite all the data and judgments of international courts, a large number of citizens refuse to accept the facts. So the facts don't speak."

A GENERATION BORN IN HISTORY (Those born in 1995)

Thirty years later, we are once again witnessing the shaping of history amidst political manipulations of narratives. That is why transgenerational memory is required to carry a culture of remembrance and responsibility to the truth – in the name of future generations who must learn how peace is built and preserved.

• How does a generation born in the year of the Srebrenica genocide today understand this history? And how did growing up in this heritage shape their sense of identity, memory, and responsibility?

"They live in a society that does not want to know about the genocide in Srebrenica. At school, they explain to them that this did not happen, that the courts are anti-Serb, that "we" do not agree with these verdicts. The leading narrative is that Serbs are the only real victims of the wars of the 1990s, from Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina to Kosovo. There is no place for other victims in this narrative, just as there is no basic empathy or humanity. It is a narrative that blocks society, fixes it at some point in the past, does not let it progress, nor does it think about the future. The narcissism of the victim in which they are put deprives them of basic humanity."

TRANSGENERATIONAL MEMORY DYNAMICS (1995-2025)

Society in Bosnia and Herzegovina is still marked by war traumas. Prevailing ethno-national policies keep citizens in fear, under constant threat of a new war – for their own interests. Politics has instrumentalized trauma.

• How – and whether – generations from Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the regions that lived through the wars in the former Yugoslavia, especially the events of 1995, and the generation born that same year have shaped mutual understanding of the past? To what extent are their views aligned today – and how do they differ?

"Everyone was trying to make their own, national memory. In Croatia, it is specific because it is a combination of victor and victim, which gives enormous strength to the memory of the Homeland War, which is still too often at the heart of politics. In Serbia, the combination of defeat and victimhood, which strengthens the need for rematch, attempts to change the result of the war after 30 years. Bosnia and Herzegovina is blocked, both by its own divisions, and by the undiminished ambitions of Serbia and Croatia. Montenegro is in agony between pro-Serb and pro-Montenegrin forces. Macedonia is constantly trapped by its neighbours. The wars of the 1990s are still going on. So is the hypnosis of societies, which were then made up of ruling elites. It is enough to see that in almost all countries in power are those who fought wars to understand how they are kept in power by the constant maintenance of the 1990s."

REGIONAL FUTURE: TRANSGENERATIONAL MEMORY, HERITAGE OR TRAUMA (2025-2055)

Thirty years after the war, ethnic identity still dominates the civic. In post-war society, the structure of ethnically divided space often makes civic initiatives impossible, as they are automatically attributed an ethnic sign.

• How could political, social, educational and cultural development in Bosnia and Herzegovina – and more broadly in the region – affect how transgenerational memory will be preserved, reinterpreted or denied in the next 30 years?

"The dissolution of Yugoslavia began in the field of culture, among intellectuals, during the 1980s. That is why it is necessary for the opposite wave to start from there – one that will ask everyone to face themselves and say - enough is enough. This is already done by writers, filmmakers, theatres…They have to take their lapel societies and shake them well. They have to wake them up from collective hypnosis and put a mirror in front of their face. As students in Serbia have been doing for six months. Those of us who lived during the wars tried to throw the crumbs of reason to them. If they don't pick them up and throw them back in their societies' faces, I'm afraid there won't be much left of the future."

GLOBAL FUTURE: TRANSGENERATIONAL MEMORY, INDIFFERENCE OR REVISIONISM (1995-2025-2055)

In the modern world, geopolitics is rapidly conditioning historical narratives and transgenerational memory – openly trading influence in conflicts and party choices through daily-political revisionism.

• How could global political disruptions, conflicting international historical narratives, and changing norms on justice and human rights shape the ways in which knowledge of wartime events from Bosnia and Herzegovina, and the region will be transmitted, challenged, or withheld across generations over the next 30 years?

"It's very dark. We live in a time when everything becomes possible. In such a time, all criteria are lost. We lost them a long time ago, but we were held by the world around us. Now, it seems as if the rest of the world has gone our way, where truth is not truth, crime is not crime. Let's make a trick, to be avant-garde again! If in the 1990s we took to killing each other when the world was uniting, let us now be the first to understand all the evils that come out of it and go the opposite way again. This time in the right direction."

The opinions and insights expressed in this text reflect solely the views of the author. We publish these contributions to encourage reflection and open space for diverse perspectives on the topic of transgenerational memory in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the wider region.