Suchergebnisse

NATO's political and - above all - military participation in secession-motivated conflicts in former Yugoslavia (1990-1995), will be remembered as a clear example of demonstration of power, intentions and (in)capability of the Victor in a decades-long global "cold war" between the "freedom-loving" West and "totalitarian East". Regardless of the expectations of liberal theoreticians and the majority of public opinion, it was soon revealed that the victory was no "triumph of freedom" and even less "the end of history". On the contrary, as historically typical, it was only an unstable resultant of relations between major actors in the modern global theater, who strive to legitimize their need for domination with varying success and vocabulary. Hence the lessons to be learned from the final act of destruction of Yugoslavia (several months of NATO bombing of Serbia in 1999) have the expected tone of banality: absolute might strives for absolute power (which remains unattainable in principle); "the mighty oppress" is true always and in any place (but with a time limit); and, finally, what everyone knows but does not (or is unable or refuses) to say aloud: the only true alternative to military threat and/or aggression of a single political actor is an equally valid (military) threat/aggression by another one. We are tempted to conclude that, despite the ideological ardor of NGO activists, the political correctness of theoreticians and the rhetorical figures of speech of politicians, the "banalities" remain valid as the only certainties, i.e., regularities in the unpredictable currents of relations between states.

In this paper, we tried to analyze the consequences of the transitional process in the societies of the South-West Balkan, primarily on the example of Serbia. The indicators that we have found by the research clearly speak in favor of the fact that the transition is the cause of peripheralization of these societies. Citizens who entered the transitional processes with hope - imagining them as the accomplishment of the best European values - soon were convinced that the transition is only another manner to place these countries in the position to be exploited by multinational capital and developed, 'old' member of the EU, as well as to serve for squaring accounts in geopolitical games of the creators of the 'new world order'. In the case of the countries of the Western Balkan, the transition had the characteristic that, among other things, it was performed in conditions of political violence: destruction of the joint state of Yugoslavia, civil and religious war in Croatia and Bosnia and Herzegovina, aggression of NATO to the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, destabilization of Serbia through the attempt of Kosovo secession, etc., therefore, in the conditions that were extremely antihistorical. While the Europe was uniting, the Balkan was disintegrating. At least two out of the three 'ideas that conquered the world' (Mandelbaum) have been violated: the peace and the democracy. Free market in the conditions when there was no peace and regarding democratically insufficiently consolidated societies could not bring their progress, but on the contrary, as we established, only regression. That is the reason why the destroyed and collided South-Balkan societies, contrary to the European vow of their political elites, are today de facto much further from the European aspirations than they were quarter of the century ago. With their policy, the countries of the West have contributed to De- Europeanization of the South-West Balkan and strengthening of the Euroscepticism with citizens of those countries that still have not joined the EU, like Serbia. In fact, the citizens of Serbia can hardly recognize in the policy of the EU those values that have been usually considered European and which we mentioned at the beginning of this paper.

In the last twenty years the world has undergone serious changes, unfortunately not in positive direction. The collapse of the bipolar system and the establishment of one bloc hegemony - NATO headed by the USA, has not only failed to establish more stable and secure international relations, but, on the contrary, it has corresponded with the greatest insecurity and uncertainty of the mankind ever since World War II till the present day. After the 'counter-balance' disappeared, there has been open political, economic, even direct military, interference by the Alliance states in the sovereignty of many countries. Consequently, the world's conflicting potential has largely increased. Apart from the threats present from earlier, the contemporary world is faced with a series of new, formerly unknown or marginal, ones. The most notable among them are: uncontrolled escalation of armed conflicts; international terrorism; proliferation of nuclear and other weapons of mass destruction; expansion of drugs trafficking; illegal cross-border migrations; human trafficking and trafficking in human organs; piracy; criminalization of different areas of living; etc. The economic and financial crises have additionally warned the world of the limitedness of natural resources and, in the most serious form, posed the issue of the fight for preservation, or conquest of areas rich in raw minerals. Apart from the current courses of action in the fight for control over the natural resources, both new methods of action and new areas of contest are emerging (Arctic, Antarctic .; above and under the Earth's surface; on the sea, and under the sea bottom), over which the interests of great powers will be increasingly conflicting. Michael Klare, the author of well-known books 'Blood and Oil' and 'Resource Wars', convincingly evokes a growing hunger for resources by the picturesque title of his latest book 'Race for What's Left: Global Scramble for the World's Last Resources'. For success in this new competition in strength and skills, new strategic concepts are required. Some have already been created and preliminarily tested; others are being prepared for implementation and corrected 'on the go' based on the performance of already proved solutions; still others are being hurriedly shaped. Understandably, along with this, what actual and potential rivals do related to this, or what their activities suggest, is watched closely.