While different actors have different roles to play in building social capital in Bosnia and Herzegovina, all parties must sing the same tune to truly build social capital between different communities.
What’s next for BiH?
The idea of social capital involves communities, multiple parties and individuals. It is therefore impossible for BiH to truly build social capital when different actors across the various levels of society fail to forge a common vision and work with one another. In particular, the ethnic divide among the political strata of BiH, as legislated in the Dayton Peace Agreement, poses a huge barrier to the building of social capital in BiH in the near future. Greater cooperation from the micro to the macro level, which arises when all stakeholders have a common goal, is required to improve the social capital in BiH.
Moving forward, our group proposes that all actors must have a coordinated effort and that BiH should focus on building bridging capital and linkages among all its citizens. Among the three categories of social capital as set out in our first post, BiH certainly has high levels of bonding capital, which is defined based on similarities in terms of culture and ethnicity. This (excessive) level of bonding capital among the Bosniaks, Serbs and Croats poses a threat to the negative peace in BiH.
This is certainly a recipe for conflict to occur (Vervisch 2013) in BiH in the future.
It is also crucial for all actors to recognise the benefits of building social capital, specifically bridging capital and linkages, in the divided society of BiH. Building social capital, especially among those with different ethnicity, lays the foundation for BiH to continue rebuilding its society, economically and socially. Greater social trust, often associated with economic development (Norris 2002) and lower crime rates, forms denser networks among Bosnians and this ultimately spur greater cooperation among the locals regardless of ethnicity. For a brighter future, BiH have to change, and they must change fast.
No doubt, the efforts undertaken by schools, NGOs and external actors in building social capital in BiH are commendable. Our group has examined closely the initiatives put forth by them in this blog. These ground initiatives are slowly taking roots among the youths and society-at-large, based on what we have seen and heard during our trip. These actors must not lose heart in helping the divided society to rebuild trust with one another after the deadly war, no matter how long it takes.
To conclude, no one actor can work in isolation to build bridges between ethnic groups and form strong linkages across communities. Building social capital in BiH will remain a huge challenge when there is a lack of impetus for the actors, especially politicians, to move towards ethnic-neutrality. The current lack of trust among ethnic group seems to be manufactured, and perpetuated, by politicians to remain in power. They should, and must, compromise by accepting the risk of losing their political power for the betterment of Bosnians, instead of only the Serbs, Croats or Bosniaks.
Bibliography
Norris, Pippa. 2002. Harvard international journal of press/politics 7 (1). doi:10.1177/1081180X0200700101.
Vervisch, Thomas. 2013. “Social Capital and Post-Conflict Reconstruction in Burundi: The Limits of Community-based Reconstruction.” Development and Change 44 (1): 147-174. doi:10.1111/dech.12008.
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