Abstract
This chapter focuses on a very particular aspect of the democratic reform of police forces that took place in Bosnia-Herzegovina as part of the post-conflict reconstruction efforts.1 It provides an account of the ‘certification process’ - or vetting - of all police officers, carried out by the UN Mission in Bosnia-Herzegovina (UNMIBH) and the International Police Task Force (IPTF). This process, which officially was completed at the end of 2002 when the United Nations (UN) mission left the country, was kept alive - at least in part - by the activities of two groups (Association of Decertified Policemen of the Federation of Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Republika Srpska Association of Decertified Policemen), which contested the outcome of the process on the basis that it suffered from operational and, more importantly, structural shortcomings. In other words, they considered that the process had been undemocratic and its outcomes were having adverse repercussions for the rights of decertified police officers. The two associations engaged in a legal battle, and a political fight, for the policy and related legislation to be changed. Their efforts failed to yield the desired response from national actors due to the powers enjoyed by the UN during its mission in Bosnia. However, the matter was referred to the UN Security Council, which ultimately was forced to overrule its policy of UN decisions being final and binding, and reach a negotiated solution.
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Notes
‘Bosnia’ is used throughout the chapter to refer to Bosnia-Herzegovina. The expression in the subtitle of the chapter is taken from R. Caplan (2005) ‘Who Guards the Guardians? International Accountability in Bosnia’, International Peacekeeping, 12(3), pp. 463–76. The author is indebted to the editors of this volume and the anonymous reviewers, to participants in a seminar held in May 2010 at the London School of Economics and Political Science and in May 2011 at the Universitat Pompeu Fabra (Barcelona, Spain), and to Christopher McDowell and Cynthia Little for comments and suggestions that helped to improve the arguments developed in this chapter. The author is also particularly grateful to the many interviewees in Bosnia who prefer to remain anonymous but have provided invaluable assistance during the research process for the themes developed here. All errors and omissions are the author’s responsibility alone.
M. Caparini (2004) Civil Society and Democratic Oversight of the Security Sector: A Preliminary Investigation, Working Paper 132 (Geneva: DCAF - permission to cite received from the institution and the author), p. 25.
T. Edmunds (2007) Security Sector Reform in Transforming Societies: Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro (Manchester: Manchester University Press), pp. 33–4.
For a detailed exploration of the meaning and impact of ‘unintended consequences’ in security governance, see C. Daase and C. Friesendorf (eds) (2010) Rethinking Security Governance: The Problem of Unintended Consequences (London: Routledge). This volume focuses primarily on the gap between intentions and outcomes observed during the implementation of international policies.
An explanation of the motivation for this NGO focus is beyond the scope of this chapter. For a discussion of this issue, see R. Belloni (2001) ‘Civil Society and Peacebuilding in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, Journal of Peace Research, 38(2), pp. 163–80; C. Simmons (2007) ‘Women’s Work and the Growth of Civil Society in Post-War Bosnia’, Nationalities Papers, 35(1), pp. 171–86; D. Chandler (1999) Bosnia: Faking Democracy after Dayton (London: Pluto Press), pp. 135–53; A. Fagan (2010) Europe’s Balkan Dilemma: Paths to Civil Society or State-Building? (New York: I. B. Tauris), pp. 1–17.
USAID (2010) The 2009 NGO Sustainability Index for Central and Eastern Europe and Eurasia, 13th edition (Washington, DC: USAID), p. 74.
A. Fagan (2005) ‘Civil Society in Bosnia Ten Years after Dayton’, International Peacekeeping, 12(3), p. 410.
R. Belloni (2007) State Building and International Intervention in Bosnia (London: Routledge), p. 112.
Fagan (2005), op. cit., p. 407. According to Yannick du Pont, OSCE support for civil society development in Bosnia was based on the assumption that, in part due to its universal citizenship, it would act as a ‘counterforce’ to nationalist authorities. Y. du Pont (2000) ‘Democratisation through Supporting Civil Society in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, Helsinki Monitor, 11(4), p. 8.
S. Sampson (2003) ‘From Forms to Norms: Global Projects and Local Practices in the Balkan NGO Scene’, Journal of Human Rights, 2(3), p. 334.
Belloni (2001), op. cit., p. 178. See also Chandler (1999), op. cit., pp. 152–3; F. Bieber (2002) ‘Aid Dependency in Bosnian Politics and Civil Society: Failures and Successes of Post-War Peacebuilding in Bosnia-Herzegovina’, Croatian International Relations Review, January-June, p. 27.
V. Pupavac (2005) ‘Empowering Women? An Assessment of International Gender Policies in Bosnia’, International Peacekeeping, 12(3), p. 397.
A. Fagan (2008) ‘Global-Local Linkage in the Western Balkans: The Politics of Environmental Capacity Building in Bosnia-Herzegovina’, Political Studies, 56(3), p. 648; Fagan (2010), op. cit., p. 189.
Centre for European Perspective and EUPM (2009) Seminar on Police Reform in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Sarajevo, 4–6 June 2008 (Ljubljana: Centre for European Perspective), p. 23.
Anonymous interview with a senior member of a Bosnian civil society organisation, Sarajevo, September 2010. See also M. Fittipaldi (2006) Security Sector Reform and the Media in Bosnia, February (Sarajevo: Centre for Security Studies BiH); M. Merlingen and R. Ostrauskaite (2005) ‘ESDP Police Missions: Meaning, Context and Operational Challenges’, European Foreign Affairs Review, 10(2), p. 232.
For an elaboration of this point, see G. Collantes-Celador (2005) ‘Police Reform: Peacebuilding through “Democratic Policing”?’ International Peacekeeping, 12(3), p. 370.
For examples, see M. Berdal, G. Collantes-Celador and M. Zupcevic Buzadzic (2011) ‘Post-War Violence in Bosnia’, in M. Berdal and A. Suhrke (eds) The Peace in Between: Post-War Violence and Peacebuilding (London: Routledge), pp. 79–82, 87.
For an elaboration of this point, see Collantes-Celador (2005), op. cit., p. 371; G. L. Naarden (2003) ‘Nonprosecutorial Sanctions for Grave Violations of International Human Rights Law: Wartime Conduct of Bosnian Police Officials’, The American Journal of International Law, 97(2), pp. 342–52.
According to Alexander Mayer-Rieckh, the appeals panel was set up following a legal opinion from the UN’s Office of Legal Affairs in New York. A. Mayer- Rieckh (2007) ‘Vetting to Prevent Future Abuses: Reforming the Police, Courts and Prosecutor’s Offices in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, in A. Mayer- Rieckh and P. de Greiff (eds) Justice as Prevention: Vetting Public Employees in Transitional Societies (New York: Social Science Research Council), p. 16.
Council of Europe (2005) Opinion on a Possible Solution to the Issue of Decertification of Police Officers in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Opinion No. 326/2004, Adopted by the Venice Commission at its 64th Plenary Session, Strasbourg, 24 October; Council of Europe (2006) op. cit.
N. Ahmetasevic (2007) ‘Sacked Police Hope for Justice at Last in Bosnia’, BalkanInsight, 9 May.
B. Bliesemann de Guevara (2008) ‘Material Reproduction and Stateness in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, in M. Pugh, N. Cooper and M. Turner (eds) Whose Peace? Critical Perspectives on the Political Economy of Peacebuilding (London: Palgrave Macmillan), p. 375.
M. Cox (2003) ‘Building Democracy from the Outside: The Dayton Agreement in Bosnia and Herzegovina’, in S. Bastian and R. Luckham (eds) Can Democracy be Designed? The Politics of Institutional Choice in Conflict-Torn Societies (London/New York: Zed Books), p. 272.
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© 2013 Gemma Collantes-Celador
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Collantes-Celador, G. (2013). Civil Society and the Bosnian Police Certification Process: Challenging ‘the Guardians’. In: Bojicic-Dzelilovic, V., Ker-Lindsay, J., Kostovicova, D. (eds) Civil Society and Transitions in the Western Balkans. New Perspectives on South-East Europe Series. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/9781137296252_11
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