by Georgi Medarov The Bulgarian 2013 was marked by the largest protests since the 1990s. In February they were against austerity and high-electricity bills, toppling the center-right government praised by the EU for outstanding “stability”. It was a movement of hopelessness, triggered by the sheer impossibility to cover basic living costs. Initially protesters called for […]
A note from the editors of LeftEast: This is the third article on Turkey we have published over the last two weeks. With this series, we wish to introduce our readers to the dynamics of Turkish society beyond the Gezi protests and to expand our traditional geographical coverage to other zones of peripheral capitalism. To […]
An open letter to the international community in Bosnia and Herzegovina, signed by 130 academics and scholars from around the world. A shorter version of the letter appeared on The Guardian. For more than two decades, the international political community has viewed, interpreted, and acted upon the political landscape in Bosnia and Herzegovina almost […]
We, the undersigned, express our full support for the legitimate demands and justified outrage of citizens of Bosnia-Herzegovina. Their cry for a decent life, true democracy, solidarity that knows no borders—be them ethnic, national or religious, social equality and justice—resonates throughout the world. In a similar fashion to the citizens of Tahrir, Zuccotti Park, Taksim […]
Political analysis from Ilya Budraitskis written as he visited Kiev in the midst of revolution. Back in mid-December, our estimate of Ukraine’s political crisis as a “revolutionary situation” resulted in a lot of critical reviews. Further, the use of the word “revolution” in the context of Ukraine was condemned as a kind of sacrilege, because […]
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The revolt rocking Bosnia
by James Robertson BOSNIA IS burning. Over the past several days, tens of thousands of workers, students and citizens have taken to the streets across Bosnia and Herzegovina to call for the resignations of local and federal governments. In one of the largest and most confident displays of civil resistance since the civil war of […]
(source: Jasmin Mujanovic) The situation in BiH is changing rapidly. Numerous cantonal governments have already resigned and we can expect further protests in the coming days. The authorities in BiH have already begun a concerted campaign of disinformation about the causes of these protests and their aims. In an effort to support the struggle of […]
War has returned to the cities of Bosnia and Herzegovina. Not the nationalist wars of partition of the 1990s, or the cold war of nationalist politicians within an ethnically divided federation presided over by a colonial style High Representative of the Great Powers, but a social war, an uprising of the people. Beginning with the […]
An anti-privatisation protest in the city of Tuzla has exploded into general social insurrection. by Jasmin Mujanovic, Al Jazeera, Feb. 9, 2014 Whatever little semblance of legitimacy the constitutional order in Bosnia-Herzegovina (BiH) may have enjoyed at the beginning of this week went up in flames on Friday night. BiH’s three Presidents, two entities, […]
by Eric Gordy http://eastethnia.wordpress.com, Feb. 8, 2014 Two vignettes Conversation 1 was with the waiter in a large Sarajevo hotel, where we were generally a bit sheepish to be attending our conference (the deciding factor was that it was big enough for all of the participants, the down side was its odd business history and […]