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SEESOX Seminar Series

Abstract: How do we explain the differences in which victim groups are recognized and redressed in a post-war state? Opening with a puzzle about the diverse patterns of recognition and redress across victim groups in Bosnia and Herzegovina after 1995, this chapter introduces the topic of the book, its key concepts and arguments. Bosnian survivors of sexual violence and torture, families of the missing and killed persons, paraplegics and sufferers from other injuries have been granted varied types of redress across Bosnia. This piecemeal approach to redress and recognition seems haphazard and inconsistent with victims’ needs and rights. However, as this chapter argues, this—at first glance inexplicable—complexity of redress can be traced to the intricate developments in post-war Bosnia and the differing patterns in victim capital of each of the studied groups. This chapter introduces the key components of victim capital as international salience, moral authority and mobilization resources, as well as how they combine. Finally, it describes the used methods and conducted fieldwork, before outlining the structure of the book.

Speaker: Jessie Barton-Hronešová (University of Oxford) is ESRC Postdoctoral Fellow at the Oxford Department of International Development. Her research focuses on post-war dealing with the past in East and South East Europe. She authored and edited several studies on identity politics (e.g. Post-War Ethno-National Identities of Young People in Bosnia and Herzegovina, 2012) and retributive transitional justice (e.g. East European Politics, Journal of Peacebuilding & Development). She is the author of The Struggle of Redress: Victim Capital in Bosnia and Herzegovina (2020, Palgrave Macmillan). Jessie previously worked for the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia, for the OSCE and for the Balkan Investigative Reporting Network in Sarajevo and Belgrade. She is an Associate Fellow at SEESOX, the Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict and of Chatham House's Europe Programme.

Discussant 1: Jasna Dragović-Soso (Goldsmiths) is a Professor of International Politics and History at Goldsmiths, University of London. She is currently working on transitional justice and processes of memory construction of the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s. She is the author of Saviours of the Nation’: Serbia’s Intellectual Opposition and the Revival of Nationalism (C. Hurst&Co, 2002) and the co-editor of State Collapse in South-Eastern Europe: New Perspectives on Yugoslavia’s Dissolution with Lenard J. Cohen (Purdue University Press, 2008), among many other publications. She co-edits the Palgrave Macmillan book series on Memory Politics and Transitional Justice.

Discussant 2: John Alderdice (University of Oxford) is a psychiatrist by profession, but as Leader of the Alliance Party of Northern Ireland, he played a significant role in the Talks on Northern Ireland including the negotiation of the 1998 Good Friday Agreement. He was the first Speaker of the new Northern Ireland Assembly and has held many international positions including as President of Liberal International. He is currently Director of the Centre for the Resolution of Intractable Conflict at Harris Manchester College, Oxford, Chairman of the Centre for Democracy and Peace Building in Belfast.

Chair: John Gledhill (University of Oxford) is Associate Professor of Global Governance in Oxford's Department of International Development, and a Fellow of St Cross College. John investigates diverse themes of peace and conflict, including peacekeeping and peacebuilding, conflict processes, state formation and dissolution, and (transnational) social mobilisation. His recent academic writings have appeared in journals such as the European Journal of International Security, Civil Wars, International Studies Perspectives, and Globalizations. He is a member of the Steering Committee of OxPeace and sits on the Advisory Board of the Conflict Research Society.