Survival as a Way of Life

Bozidar Jaksic

Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory
Belgrade, Yugoslavia

I came from one of the states that came into being in the process of disintegration of Yugoslavia. It does not even matter which one. I really liked the dedication Maria Todorova wrote to her parents on her newest book Imagining the Balkans. „To my parents, from whom I learned to love the Balkans without the need to be proud or ashamed of them." So, I will try to say something from a Balkan perspective on the „Pluralism of Cultures and Life Styles in the Face of Global Changes."

The end of twentieth century from the Balkan perspective looks as dark and gloomy as its beginning. As if two world wars in one century were not enough for the inhabitants of the Balkans. They started this century with two Balkan wars, and the end of it they are welcoming with just finishing the third one, one in Croatia and Bosnia. The fourth one, in Kosovo, is festering, and the international community is trying to extinguish, or at least control it.

The Balkan perspective is still rather different at the beginning and at the end of this century. At the beginning of the century, „the Balkan powder keg" exploded taking from the historical scene two great traditional empires, the Habsburg and the Ottoman. On the frontier of those empires a country of South Slavs, excluding the Bulgarians, was created, including strong Albanian, Hungarian and German minorities. The new state was made up of ethnically related South Slavs who never in their history lived together. For centuries they lived on the border of two empires. They belonged to two great world religions (Christianity and Islam) and three denominations (Catholicism, Eastern Ortodox Christianity and Islam). They spoke different but very similar languages, and they belonged to five different cultural circles. In great measure poor and industrially underdeveloped, they also differed in the way of economic organization. Those ethnically related people had an opportunity to create a pluralistic culture and a particular lifestyle on the basis of their differences. They missed their chance, not only because of the incompetence of the autocratic government, but also because of some primary immaturity for life together. They did not succeed in turning their ethnic communities into modern, democratic, political ones. It seems they paid the price of centuries of cultivating frontier mentality.

If the beginning of this century opened some opportunities for South Slavs, the end does look dark. „The Balkan Powder keg" exploded again, but the history did not repeat itself. The new explosion turned the Slavic part of Balkans in the gutter of Europe. The Balkans is the only region of war in Europe at the end of the twentieth century. United Nations, NATO, USA, members of the European Union and Russia are attempting to stop the tragic destiny of the population of former Yugoslavia for years now.

However it may seem that Yugoslavia was close to European integration processes, closer than any other country of real socialism, it was shown not to be true. The fall of the Berlin wall, which symbolically denoted the historical crash of political systems of „real socialism" made an impact on Yugoslavia also. Not one of the three federal „socialist" states survived that historical crash of European order made after the Second World War. Checs and Slovaks parted relatively peacefully, it s difficult to say whether to mutual benefit or mutual damage. The great Soviet Union disintegrated and transformed into the Association of Independent States, with a string of local conflicts among which the Chechen one had the most impact internationally. So the dance of communist ideologues with the „devil’s tail" of ethno-nationalism put a horrible end to the „real socialism" in some of its segments. And to the people who are the victims of that tragedy, if they survive, it remains to think about whether the endless horro

r was better then the horrible end. It seems that the political elites of South Slavic peoples showed colossal incompetence in the face of new challenges. They led their ethnic communities on the road of war, conflict and suffering, and not one of cooperation and understanding.

The results of such policy of the national elites of the Balkan peoples were catastrophic. I am afraid that, coming from the Balkans, or at least from one of its parts as a gutter of Europe, I will bring some gloomy tones into our discussion of pluralism of cultures and lifestyles. Simply, after I sent some E-mail massages and started to work at my computer with some thoughts for this meeting, I looked out the window. I have seen a man rummaging through garbage, looking for discarded bread to ward off starvation. The gap between the culture of Internet and that unfortunate man, who is looking for bread in the garbage, obliges me to intone my contribution differently.

Highly developed European countries are, with reason, proud of the breadth of cultural diversity and formation of the „global lifestyle". Their efforts to adjust the process of globalization and regionalization of cultural, political and economic life deserve respect. The world of TV of Berlusconi that a young Albanian or a young Serb is watching, for example, seems like the worldly paradise to them. It is similar with the impressions of a young Rumanian or a young Bulgarian if, by luck, they find each other on the streets of a European metropolis like Geneva. They are not blinded by the, often illusory, splendor of that life as by its being so out of reach. They do not need to know anything about the millions of unemployed in Western European countries. They need not to know anything about the dark side of life in affluent societies. They are faced with the xenophobic policies of those countries towards their eastern and southeastern poor neighbors who sometimes even slaughter each other. Crossing European borders seems to them as crossing the classic Chinese wall. Is it any wonder that sometimes they cross it in an improper, or even a criminal manner?

Their everyday life does not give them any opportunity to dream, to hope, even to work hard in order to live well. The historical crash of real socialism destroyed middle class in most countries. Masses of impoverished people with no rights make in some countries, Serbia for example, over 95 % of the population. Former middle class people often live below the existential minimum. The narrow class of nouveau riche, and in the Balkans many of them are war profiteers, are in charge of enormous capital over which they feel no responsibility -- neither of the inheritors, nor of the managers. The impoverished citizens of those countries are helpless and hopeless. The black market becomes an important economic factor, which allows masses of population to survive by miserly transactions. So in pronouncing reasonable economical, political and moral sentences on the black market, we should keep in mind that masses of people in Bosnia, Serbia, Croatia, Bulgaria, Albania survived thanks to its existence. The other surviv al strategy was the revival of the country life and help that people in cities received from relatives and friends from the country as well as mailings from gastarbeiters from abroad. Also, young people decided on permanent emigration from the postcommu-nist countries of Southeastern Europe, not only to avoid participating in the war. It was most difficult for those parts of city populations who were permanently unemployed or lived on factory wages. Even today the monthly salaries in Serbia are somewhat over 150 DM. It is obviously not enough for decent existence if indeed it is enough for any kid of existence.

Everyday survival struggle is hardly a pleasant way of life. But still, people live. They do not live well, they suffer, but they survive. Hundreds of thousands of refugees and displaced persons are looking for a corner to fit in. Life of minority members in postcommunist ethno-nationalist countries is a hardship. Living in that environment and talking about a „lifestyle" would be cynical. Not only is any kind of „style" absent in this survival struggle, but so is any kind of value or moral system. Those societies are falling apart. Their catastrophe is not only political or economical; it is much broader and goes into every facet of cultural and spiritual life. The centers of power in those societies are most often a combination of organized crime and political leadership. The Serbia of Milosevic, Croatia of Tudjman, Belorussia of Lukashenko are some more prominent examples of this affliction.

I felt an obligation to speak of this predicament from personal experience. We are conversing today on the pluralism of cultures, interculturality and global life style on the threshold of the third millenium. It is certain that Europe is by processes of globalization gradually becoming less racist and xenophobic and more open to values of other cultures. The question is, however, what to do with the Balkan gutter and millions of poor Eastern, mostly Slavic, neighbors. How will they become a part of European integration processes and other global cultural trends. Of course, the first question is what those poor relatives of rich Europeans can do for themselves! Only then can we ask what developed European nations can do for them. I am afraid that arrogant attitudes and offers of the kind of „Partnership for Peace", NATO membership, etc., are not on the right track, because it is not the way towards, in the phrase of Jean Perre Faye, „one Europe", Europe of citizens. Different modes of assistance, however wort hy, do not solve this problem. It seems that the vital interest of Europe is the democratic stabilization in postcommunist countries. So, if Europe on the threshold of the third millenium wants to do more for itself, it will have to take more care of its gutter, the Balkans. Until the European lifestyle becomes the way of life in postcommunist countries, developed European countries will remain imprisoned by xenophobia and racism. And it will put into question not only the future of its own cultural development, but also some traditional values it nurtured for centuries.