Survival as a Way of Life

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 horror 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 survival 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 worthy, 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.

(This was the paper prepared for the Conference about styles of life,
organized by Gorgachev Foundation in Germany, september 1998)

 Bozidar Jaksic
Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory
University of Belgrade
Belgrade