1996 – 2000
A global research project was conceived as an interdisciplinary study of external and internal preconditions for realistically feasible transition strategy. The project builds on previous results of the global project “Europe in Transformation: nature, trends and perspectives”. In previous research period the emphasis was placed primarily on the causes of the Yugoslav disintegration and the role of Europe in the crisis. The center of the current research is to find strategies to fit the FR of Yugoslavia into the European, regional and global processes. This requires taking into account not only the internal processes in Yugoslavia but also the nature and shortcomings of European integration, especially in post-Maastricht period.
The aim of the research
The project has three objectives which correspond to three levels of analysis:
a) Gaining insight into the nature of the current West European reconstruction, which involves the simultaneous processes of transnationalization, integration and regionalization. This means the study of normative, political and economic aspects of the current European evolution, identifying and finding its antinomy and modes of their resolution. This study will, among other things, include the assessment of the need for new democratic agenda as a response to the emergence of tensions between nation states and transnational communities.
b) Comprehensive analysis of the possibilities of social development of FR of Yugoslavia in the post war-and-sanctions period. The project will attempt to answer the questions of the possible overcoming of the crisis of modernization, the bypass of disintegrative tendencies and severe social conflicts to establish the basis for irreversible structural political and economic reforms. Amongst others, the research will include Yugoslav role in the integration of the Balkan region.
c) Identifying the initial stages of transition in East European countries and the generalization of their experiences. The project will particularly focus on two questions: What are the consequences of the efforts of these countries to be closer to the EU when the time their mutual interest in cooperation is limited, and what are the geopolitical security consequences of EU enlargement and NATO in Eastern Europe?
Subprojects
Global project is divided into four sub-projects. Each sub-project will be carried out by the research team which is composed, though not exclusively, of the institutes’ researchers.
1. European Integration after Maastricht – compliance and antinomies;
– The transformation of the normative concept of European integration;
– The nation-state and transnational communities;
– The European Union as a model of European integration;
– The role of Germany in the shaping of Europe in the 21 century;
– Constitutional economy of the European Union;
– Monetary Union in the EU;
– Conceptual and institutional difficulties of European collective security;
– The status of citizenship and nationality in the EU;
– Cultural Policy of the European Union and the Council of Europe;
– Media policy and public opinion in the EU.
2. Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in contemporary Europe: preconditions and obstacles to modernization
– Yugoslavia in the light of philosophical and political paradigms of Europe;
– Adjustment of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia to the European integration process;
– Legal and political status of Yugoslavia today;
– European standards of human and minority rights and their implementation in Western Europe and Yugoslavia;
– The strategy of solving internal conflicts in former Yugoslavia;
– Interventionism as a mode of conflict resolution in the world after the Cold War;
– Sanctions and the new world order: Yugoslavia, Iraq, Libya, Haiti;
– Status of Yugoslavia in the regional and European system of collective security;
– Chronology of the Yugoslav crisis.
3. Comparative studies on the transition in Eastern European countries
– Post-communist modernization: comparative aspects of economic and political transformation;
– Liberalism, socialism and the transformation of Eastern and Central Europe;
– Parties and party systems in emerging democracies – parliamentary and presidential systems;
– The ethnic conflicts in post-communism.
4. Balkans as a European region: status and prospects
– Regions as elements of European integration: the evolution and institutionalization of regional autonomy;
– Status of the Balkans in the post-Cold War era and its prospects in the West European integration processes;
– The nation-state, self-determination and minorities in the Balkans – between the principles and practices;
– Opportunities and obstacles to economic and political cooperation in the Balkans.