Why rights should not be considered (entirely) constricted and why identities are not exactly imagined

Abstract

In their recent article “Constricted Rights and Imagined Identities: Peace and Accountability Processes and Constitution-Making in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” Alma Begicevic and Jennifer Balint argue that underlying reasons for the seemingly sudden establishment of the complex constitutional arrangements in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BH) are associated with the abrupt adoption of the Dayton Peace Agreement and its Annex IV (the Constitution of BH) that introduced the ethnoterritorial setup and the lack of accountability of the neighboring countries for the atrocities committed during the Bosnian War. As a consequence, the country cannot effectively (re)construct a nation state and, instead, suffers from a lack of homogeneity. Moreover, post-conflict institutional and procedural arrangements appear to be comparatively uncharted territory. This article scrutinizes and counters these claims with the thesis that territorial accommodation of differences is a rather frequent approach in fragmenting systems with competing identities. To substantiate the thesis, the article draws on the concepts of cohesion and stability linked to adaptiveness and coordination. It then analyzes the role of the power ratio during the Bosnian War and the internal building blocks that contributed to the ethnoterritorial setup. Finally, the article focuses on the concept of equality in complex systems linked to mutual respect, solidarity, and trust to analyze the necessity for plural equality in BH.