The quest for legitimacy in independent Kosovo: the unfulfilled promise of diversity and minority rights

When Kosovo declared its independence in 2008, it did so not as a nation-state, but as a “state of communities,” self-defining as multiethnic, diverse, and committed to extensive rights for minorities. In this paper, this choice is understood as a response to a dual legitimation problem. Kosovo experienced both an external legitimation challenge, regarding its contested statehood internationally, and an internal one, vis-à-vis its Serb minority. The focus on diversity and minority rights was expected to confer legitimacy on the state both externally and internally. International state-builders and the domestic political elite in post-conflict Kosovo both pursued this strategy. However, it inadvertently created an additional internal legitimation challenge, this time from within Kosovo’s majority Albanian population. This dynamic is illustrated by the opposition movement “Lëvizja Vetëvendosje” (Self-Determination Movement), which rejects the framing of Kosovo as first and foremost a multiethnic state. The movement’s counter-narrative represents an additional internal legitimation challenge to the new state. This paper thus finds that internationally endorsed “diversity management” through minority rights did not deliver as a panacea for the legitimacy dilemmas of the post-conflict polity. On the contrary, the “state of communities” continues to be contested by both majority and minority groups in Kosovo.     

Unintended consequences of state-building and the management of diversity in post-conflict Kosovo

This paper examines the adoption of a multiethnic liberal-democratic model of governance in post-independence Kosovo and the dual task of state-building to secure unity and manage diversity. This article explains why in post-conflict and post-independence Kosovo, its domestic sovereignty and legitimization have become conditioned by the integration, accommodation, and protection of its minorities. While the existing literature has mainly focused on the shortcomings deriving from the exogenous character of state-building in Kosovo, this paper aims to challenge and complement this view by drawing on the “state-in-society” approach developed by Joel Migdal, which highlights that the actual states have less coherence than their theoretical counterparts. Analysis of post-independence Kosovo reveals the legislation-implementation gap and the unintended consequences arising under the impact of endogenous factors. Overall, this article shows that multiethnic state-building in Kosovo has been crucially transformed and “limited” by local idiosyncrasies.     

Historical aspirations and the domestic politics of Russia's pursuit of international status

What determined Russia's national interests and grand strategy in the first decade after the Cold War? This article uses aspirational constructivism, which combines social psychology with constructivism, to answer this question. Central to aspirational constructivism are the roles that the past self and in-groups, and their perceived effectiveness play in the selection of a national identity and the definition of national interests. This article explains why Russian political elites settled on a statist national identity that focused on retaining Russia's historical status as a Western great power and hegemon in the former Soviet Union and in engaging the country in bounded status competition with the United States.     

Russian hegemonies: historical snapshots, regional security and changing forms of Russia's role in the post-Soviet region

The broad purpose of this study is to exemplify changing forms of hierarchical rule manifested in post-Soviet Russia's varying provision of regional security related to military conflicts. Russia's regional role varies in form and in thickness. Although the endurance of Soviet legacy can be observed in four major areas (stabilising borders, economic interest, unification of fellow Slavs and fluctuating alliances), there is enough variance to suggest that over-deterministic theories about Russian regional foreign policy do not account for conjunctural factors that can contribute to change. Instead, we can view the Soviet and post-Soviet regional dynamic as one that is on a fluid anarchy–hierarchy spectrum.     

The frustrating partnership: Honor,status, and emotions in Russia's discourses of the West

This paper analyzes Russia's presidential discourses and emotions of the West from March 2008 to December 2012. By studying the languages of inclusiveness and exclusiveness in annual addresses to the Federation Council and public statements, I have identified several distinct stages in the Kremlin's emotional evolution from fear to hope to frustration: the initial fear (March 2008–June 2009), hope (September 2009–the late 2010), and frustration (since the early 2011). The Russia's emotional shifts are shaped by the country's historically established social relations with the West and are not to be reduced to the dynamics of power and prestige/status. Russia's deep emotional connection to the West as well as Russia's own concept of national honor are the two factors that drive the nation's leaders' complex actions, feelings, and rhetoric. Russia displays emotions of hope each time it feels that its honor is being respected and those of frustration, fear and anger when in the eyes of Kremlin its identity/honor as not recognized.     

Producing the ‘transit’ migration state: international security intervention in Niger

Abstract

Despite a growing interest in transit migration and border controls along migration routes, there is relatively little work on the production and operation of the category of ‘transit’ itself. This article investigates how Niger emerges as a country of migration ‘transit’ and what impacts this categorisation has had on security and development interventions targeting the country. Building from the literature on the governance of transit migration and on the ‘migration state’, this article theorises transit as a political label. It argues that Niger’s status as a transit country is constructed through a ‘polyvocal’ process involving the discourse and everyday assumptions of international and local actors. The article locates this shared understanding in official texts, everyday routines, and sub-state diplomatic practices. It goes on to argue that these framings, despite divergent rationales, have effects visible in the evolution of security intervention in Niger. These include shifts in the location of border security, the blurring of migration into other transnational threats, and the creation of new domestic institutional practices. The article contributes to theorising the political construction and specificity of transit-ness and provides a fresh case for the research agenda on inter-state relations around migration governance.     

Language,nation and citizenship: contrast,conflict and convergence in Estonia's debate with the international community

This paper investigates the clash of (language) ideologies in Estonia in the post-Communist period. In an analysis of changing Western recommendations and Estonian responses during the transition of Estonia from Soviet Socialist Republic to independent state, we trace the development of the discourses on language and citizenship rights. Different conceptions of the nation-state and of how citizenship is acquired, together with different approaches to human rights, led to disagreement between Estonian political elites and the political actors attached to international institutions. In particular, the Soviet demographic legacy posed problems.

We use a context-sensitive approach that takes account of human agency, political intervention, power, and authority in the formation of (national) language ideologies and policies. We find that the complexities of cultural and contextual differences were often ignored and misunderstood by both parties and that in their exchanges the two sides appeared to subscribe to ideal philosophical positions. In the following two decades both sides repositioned themselves and appeared to accommodate to the opposing view. In deconstructing the role of political intervention pressing for social and political inclusion and in documenting the profound feeling of victimhood that remained as a legacy from the Soviet period and the bargain that was struck, we hope to contribute to a deeper understanding of the language ideological debates surrounding the post-Communist nation-(re)building process.     

Tracking the gender politics of the Millennium Development Goals: struggles for interpretive power in the international development agenda

This article tracks the gender politics of the processes that led to the adoption of the Millennium Development Goals and that continued to feature in subsequent policy debates. It suggests that this politics is rooted in tensions between conceptualisations of rights and capabilities that characterised the preceding decade. While feminist organisations made major gains on women’s rights during 1990s, it was a narrow version of human capabilities that defined the MDGs. Feminist efforts since then have focused on defending sexual and reproductive rights in the face of the attacks mounted by an ‘unholy alliance’ led by the Vatican and supported by a shifting group of countries and religious groups. This has led to the relative neglect of the economic injustices associated with the dominant market-led model of development.     

Beyond crisis management? The role of Citizen Initiatives for Global Solidarity in humanitarian aid: the case of Lesvos

Abstract

In recent years, what has been called citizen initiatives for global solidarity (CIGS) have grown considerably in numbers across Europe and beyond. Lately, CIGS have also received attention as they are responding to humanitarian crisis across the world. In Europe during 2015, citizens were heavily involved in catering for incoming refugees, putting up loosely organised voluntary-based initiatives. CIGS popped up in places such as Lesvos, which is the focus of our research. Humanitarian CIGS are quick in their response to needs on the ground, are quickly governed by rules and regulations as well as overall ideas about crisis management, and come to work either with or in opposition to other actors. We examine two examples of CIGS positioned at the margins of the humanitarian aid machinery in Lesvos. Through a lens of power and resistance, we discuss how they resisted paradigmatic ideas of crisis management and instead called for a different interpretation of how to think about and do crisis management.