To call Bosnia-Herzegovina a complicated country is an understatement. The country in the Balkan Peninsula divides its economic, administrative and political responsibilities between the multiethnic central government, the self-governing neutral Brcko district and two semi-autonomous entities that, for the most part, operate independently — the Muslim-Croat Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Serb-run Republika Srpska.
Both semi-autonomous entities are further split into several cantons and communities, home to mostly Bosniaks and Bosnian Croats in the central-western federation and Bosnian Serbs in Republika Srpska, to the north and east.
This principle of ethnic nationalism is key to the country’s central constitutional and political organization. The Bosnian constitution recognizes Bosniaks, who are predominantly Muslim, the largely Orthodox Bosnian Serbs and primarily Catholic Bosnian Croats as “constituent peoples” with equal rights.
Today, the country has a population of around 3.1 million people. Around half are Bosniaks, while 31% are Serb and 15% are Croat. The rest of the inhabitants belong either to one of the 17 officially recognized minorities, like the Roma and Jews, or chose not to identify with any ethnicity at the last official census. Bosnian, Croatian and Serbian are all recognized as official languages.
The central government is led by rotating three-way presidency, made up of one representative from each of the three main constituent groups. The upper house of parliament and key government offices are also divided according to this principle.
This strict balance between the three groups is always maintained, both politically and socially, often leading to ethnic interests and political gridlock dominating the decision-making process.
Dayton Peace Accords brought an end to war
This complex, convoluted and oft dysfunctional structure was set up during the 1995 Dayton Peace Accords, and then anchored in the constitution. It was intended to bring an end to the Bosnian war — sparked by the breakup of Yugoslavia in the early 1990s — and legally secure the balance of power between the three feuding ethnic groups.
During the war, from 1992 to 1995, the armed forces of the Bosniaks and the Bosnian Croats initially fought each other, before all three groups began to clash. Later, the Bosniaks and the Bosnian Croats joined forces to take on Republika Srpska. Throughout the war, neighboring Serbia and Croatia were actively involved in the fighting.
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The fighting devastated wide swaths of the country, and resulted in countless war crimes — among them the nearly four-year siege of Sarajevo and the Srebrenica genocide, in which thousands of Bosniaks were killed at the hands of Serb forces.
By the end of the war, some 100,000 people had been killed. A further 2.2 million were displaced by so-called “ethnic cleansing,” forced from their homes by expulsions and violence to flee to other communities or abroad.
The fighting only ended after the international community, especially the United States, stepped up its involvement, culminating in the peace deal agreed at a military base near Dayton, Ohio in November 1995.
International oversight — essential, or no longer relevant?
Although Bosnia-Herzegovina has been recognized on the international stage since the signing of the Dayton agreement, and is also represented at the United Nations, the country itself is still, in effect, only partially independent.
The Office of the High Representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina, an international institution responsible for overseeing the civilian aspects of the Dayton agreement, has been in place since a UN Security Council resolution in 1995.
The high representative — Christian Schmidt of Germany until this past June, and currently filled by acting head Louis J. Crishock of the US — has sweeping powers. He can dismiss elected officials, pass laws, establish new government agencies and overrule all the country’s democratic institutions.
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This authority is often referred to as the Bonn Powers, as they were negotiated during a meeting of the Peace Implementation Council in Bonn, Germany in December 1997. From 2002 to 2011, the high representative also acted as the EU special representative for Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In recent years, there’s been much discussion over whether the office is still relevant. Supporters have said the high representative remains a necessary guarantor of the country’s unity and functionality. But critics have pointed out the negative impact on Bosnia-Herzegovina’s democratic culture, turning the country into a de facto protectorate that, to an extent, frees local politicians of responsibility for their actions.
Separatist ambitions surface once more
The sharpest criticism has come from the Republika Srpska and Milorad Dodik, its most influential leader. Dodik, in office as prime minister and president of the Serb entity until 2025, views the office and the international backing it provides for a unified Bosnia-Herzegovina as an obstacle to his separatist ambitions.
With strong support from the Serbian capital, Belgrade, Moscow — and, increasingly, the Trump administration — Dodik has flirted with several different scenarios to split his Republika Srpska from Bosnia-Herzegovina. In his interpretation, and that of Republika Srpska’s political elite, Bosnia-Herzegovina is highly centralized and unitary, which undermines the independence and sovereignty of the Bosnian Serbs.
A similar sentiment prevails among the political representatives of Bosnia’s Croats. Although they aren’t considering separation, they are trying to squeeze more independence from the central government in Sarajevo — not least with the creation of a third, Croatian, entity. The plan, incidentally, also has the support of the government in neighboring EU member Croatia.
EU support aims to ‘foster regional integration’
A potential path out of the current economic and political paralysis is rapprochement with the European Union — the “European perspective,” as it’s called in Bosnia-Herzegovina, officially supported by all the relevant political actors.
Bosnia-Herzegovina formally submitted its application for EU membership in 2016, and the European Council gave the green light for negotiations to begin in early 2024. But the actual start of membership talks hinges on the prior implementation of numerous reforms, notably in the areas of rule of law, fighting corruption, the prosecution of organized crime and the functionality of state institutions.
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The EU has been financially supporting Bosnia-Herzegovina since 2007 in the framework of pre-accession assistance, and the country is also expected to benefit from the European Commission’s Economic and Investment Plan for the Western Balkans. The plan aims to “foster regional integration” — and as a result, infrastructure funding for the Republika Srpska has been partially suspended due to its ongoing separatist rhetoric and policies.
This article was originally written in German.
