Critical Analysis of 2012 Local Elections in Bosnia-Herzegovina (original) (raw)
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Local Elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina: Change or more of the same?
The stakes were high. The local elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), held on 7 October 2012, came at one of the most critical moments for the country in recent times. The government has practically not been functioning since the last general elections of 2010: after it took more than 16 months for BiH politicians to reach an agreement and allocate the seats in the Council of Ministers, the coalition effectively broke down shortly afterwards. Disagreements over the state budget served as a trigger for the final clash between the Social Democratic Party (SDP) and Party of Democratic Action (SDA). The latter's ministers were later forced out and SDA found itself in the opposition, while SDP formed a new coalition with the party 'Alliance for a Better Future' (SBB).
The 2018 regional elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina demonstrate that the country as a whole continues to suffer from the results of the conflict in the 1990s, as well as the impact of power-sharing, electoral rules and ethnic selfgovernance in homogeneous territories. Bosnia's politics reflects a stalemate dominated by ethnic parties who are mainly focused on their own patronage networks. This paper focuses on political competition at the regional level and shows that regional elections are characterized primarily by competition between ethnically exclusive parties with little competition for voters across ethnic groups. While civic parties have emerged and had success in some regions, they have not succeeded in building support across ethnically defined regions. As a result, the volatility and competition in the country reflects the legacy of the war and does not show signs of transformation, despite widespread dissatisfaction with the system.
BOSNIAN GENERAL ELECTIONS OF 2010 AND THE POST-ELECTION CRISIS
This paper examines the 2010 general elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) and the post-election crisis. Currently, Bosnia"s political system is the result of the Dayton Accord that stopped the Bosnian war in 1995. Bosnia is described as a country with a multi-party system that regularly holds free, fair, and competitive elections. The 2010 elections brought significant changes to the composition of legislative assemblies at the cantonal, entity, and state levels. SNSD 1 continued to dominate among the Bosnian Serbs, while HDZ 2 and HDZ 1990 3 received the highest votes in the Croat majority areas. SDP, 4 as only selfdeclared multi-ethnic party, won the majority of votes among Bosniaks. SDA 5 secured almost the same number of seats while the Party for Bosnia and Herzegovina 6 suffered the biggest loss. The phenomenon of each constituent people voting for their respective ethnic parties continues to characterize Bosnia"s elections. Election results showed that there must be a wide range of political parties creating a parliamentary majority due to a rather complicated way of decision-making and lawpassing procedures in Bosnia"s political system. It triggered several waves of political crises since the leaders of political parties were not able to agree on a Prime Minister and other ministerial posts.
Elections in Bosnia and Herzegovina: the Wind of Change between War and Peace?
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is a PhD candidate at the University of Graz. His research focuses on post-conflict power-sharing arrangements, foreign policy analysis and domestic policy analysis. Recently, he coauthored his second book published by Palgrave Macmillan under the title The Foreign Policies of