AU in conversation with: Valery Perry
Read time: 20 mins
Our interview with Dr Valery Perry is the first of a series of in-depth interviews with key international changemakers.
Valery Perry worked in the Western Balkans since the late 1990s, conducting research and working for organizations including the Democratization Policy Council (DPC), the European Center for Minority Issues (ECMI), the Public International Law and Policy Group (PILPG), the NATO Stabilization Force (SFOR), several NGOs and the OSCE Mission to Bosnia and Herzegovina in Sarajevo as Deputy Director of the Education Department and Deputy Director of the Human Dimension Department. She has consulted for the UN Office on Drugs and Crime, the UN Development Program, the Regional Cooperation Council, USAID, IMPAQ International and other organizations. She received a BA from the University of Rochester, an MA from Indiana University’s Russian and East European Institute, and a PhD from George Mason University’s Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution. Valery has published numerous articles and book chapters, has spoken at conferences and policy events in the United States and throughout Europe, and has testified at the U.S. Congress.
In Conversation with AU, Valery discussed the following issues:
1. Why did you decide to go into policy work and more specifically to work on issues related to Bosnia and Herzegovina?
2. Can you tell us a bit about your work at OSCE?
3. What do you think are the current challenges for the Western Balkans?
4. Is accession to the European Union a possibility for the Western Balkans and could that play a role in peacekeeping in the region?
5. What do you think the world can learn about the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the conflict of 1992-1995?
6. What do you think might be important for greater gender equality in Bosnia and Herzegovina?
7. You recently made a movie about Bosnia and Herzegovina called “Looking for Dayton” (2020). Can you tell us a bit about it and why you think this movie is important?
8. What kind of managerial or leadership advice would you have for young professionals interested in human rights and international relations?
9. What brings you fulfillment in doing your job in policy work?
10. Valery’s book recommendations.
[Note to Readers: Dr Valery Perry has no affiliation to AU or relevant declarations to make. Views and opinions expressed below are not necessarily those of the organization and vice versa.]
Why did you decide to go into policy work and more specifically to work on issues related to Bosnia and Herzegovina?
“My educational and career path both mirror the arc of post-cold war political human rights and democratic development. I was an undergraduate when the Berlin wall came down, when we had what people thought was the advent of more democratic participation and accountability, human rights, freedom of expression, protection of national minorities, women’s rights, empowerment, and so on. It was a great time to be studying political science and international relations – it was an opportunity for the world to move forward and to expand the number of people who were able to enjoy the rights articulated in so many conventions but so often unrealized. I became interested in these issues then, because it seemed like an opportunity to spread the liberal values that all human beings deserve and require to live a life of dignity.
The way I started working in Bosnia and Herzegovina (“BiH”) was also related to these unfolding dynamics. When the war ended in the Balkans, there was a sense that the Dayton agreement could be an example for the world, that wars could be ended through negotiations and dialogue rather than through escalating and unending violence. Back then Dayton was seen as a positive.
I had the opportunity to come to BiH in the autumn of 1997 to work as an observer in the first post-war municipal elections, and then in extraordinary elections in the Republika Srpska. 1997 was particularly interesting and inspiring because there was a sense that, for all the challenges ahead, there was a place in Europe for BiH to join, that there was forward momentum. In 1999, when I was starting my dissertation research for my PhD, there was a regional stability pact meeting in Sarajevo where diplomats and various international actors came together to discuss how the Balkans could be a place that is not only stable, but also thriving. For some time, we witnessed positive changes, including the expansion of the EU in 2004, and things getting better in BiH. For example, in 1996, it was unthinkable to even think that a few years down the road the country would have a single ministry of defense and a unified armed force, and yet with dedicated effort and commitment to positive visions, that reform was made. There were reforms in other sectors too – the tax system, judiciary, etc.
We saw a lot of progress up until 2007, and then for a number of different reasons the progress in BiH and the whole region started to backslide. It is very frustrating for me to see the number of missed opportunities in BiH to consolidate a positive peace, and to see that the expectations and standards and hopes have been watered down to such a minimal level. And the irony is that the farther it seems that BiH is to joining the EU as a country, the more citizens of BiH decide to vote with their feet, and just emigrate to the EU for a better future.”
Can you tell us a bit about your work at OSCE?
“I started working at the OSCE Mission to BiH in 2003. I was hired to set up a policy, reporting and evaluation unit that would feed into lessons learnt within the OSCE mission. That was an interesting way to get an understanding of what the OSCE in BiH was doing, as I was looking across all of the different units within the mission from a fairly high level. After about a year and a half, I moved over to become Deputy Head of the Education Programme, to work on education reform.
The issue of education has been at the core of the identity conflicts that have been fostered and manipulated by ethnic entrepreneurs and elites in BiH, who have tried to convey and institutionalize the notion that the various different people of BiH not only cannot live together, but also should not study together. We worked with schools, teachers, policy makers, textbook writers and others to try to reduce the amount of blatant hate speech in textbooks – particularly in history but also in other subjects – and to promote activities that would fill the gap that we have seen in the country since the war, by making opportunities for children to come together and learn about the long history of BiH as a multiethnic and diverse place. Supporting and providing such opportunities was completely contrary to what the divisive curricula have been intended to do.
I then moved to the position of Deputy Director of the Human Dimension department at the Mission. The OSCE – based in Vienna – is organized according to three main dimensions: one focuses on political and military security, one on economics and the environment, and the third on the human dimension, which includes democratization, good governance, human rights, and the rule of law. All these concepts are often considered to be the “soft” elements of comprehensive security, but they are the necessary human elements of security without which any sort of comprehensive security is impossible.
In my position as Deputy Director, I supported efforts to strengthen and reform the legal, legislative and policy institutional frameworks in the country to maximize the opportunity for more accountable and responsive government (particularly at the local/municipal level), a more effective and independent judiciary, human rights promotion and protection, and, again, education. All of this was aimed at minimizing the role that spoilers – whether institutions, parties, or individuals – can play in dividing people and preventing a successful transition from conflict to peace. After I left the OSCE, I worked on different consulting projects related to corruption, extremism, accountable governance and related topics.
In 2017, I went back to work for the OSCE, but this time for the Mission in Serbia. I worked there for about a year and a half as Project Coordinator for a programme that was aimed at trying to reduce and prevent the factors and drivers of extremisms in Serbia. In terms of extremism, we were looking at all types, in particular, violent ultra-right nationalist extremism, as well as violent Islamist/jihadist extremism. We worked mostly with civil society organizations and local communities to address the various factors that could help reduce the threat and rise of such extremism dynamics. I’ve felt for some time that the same tools that were being used to prevent and counter violent extremism were very similar – if not almost identical – to efforts in support of the broader aim of ensuring a rights-based accountable society based on effective governance, reducing hate speech, reducing corruption and state/party capture, and creating conditions in which individuals feel they live in a secure environment, where there are fewer drivers to push people towards violent extremist alternatives.
I left the OSCE in March 2019 and came back to Sarajevo, where I have been doing research and policy advocacy, as well as consulting for different organizations.”
What do you think are the current challenges for the Western Balkans?
“While the international community – by which I mean the pro-EU, pro-NATO/trans-Atlantic integration Western international community – has recognized that the conflict in BiH not only has not been satisfactorily resolved, but that after about a decade of post-war progress the country’s reform processes have stalled and, in some cases, regressed over the past several years, it has not developed a new strategic policy or approach for BiH.
For years the EU has wanted to believe that the promise of future membership would make Brussels a magnet for reform. Instead, it has continued and doubled down on a highly transactional and cynical approach to dealing with political elites, to appease their predatorial agendas to divide the country further.
The three representatives of the nationalist political parties in the country – who purport to represent the three main “constituent peoples” of BiH (Bosniaks (Muslims), the Bosnian Croats (Catholics) and the Bosnian Serbs (Orthodox Christians)) – have profited quite well from the frozen conflict in the country. Each have maximized the different structural weaknesses created by Dayton to create their own patronage networks to profit politically and economically, with minimal accountability.
A lot of the time you hear diplomats coming to BiH saying: “if these same political parties are being voted in every year, then they must be what the people, the voters, want.” But this is a fundamental misunderstanding of how non-consolidated democracies work, as in BiH there is not a real accountability-responsiveness link between elected officials and voters. Elections have been an opportunity to affiliate with a tribe – because of fear that the other is going to vote for their own tribe – or to vote based on incentives of patronage.
For example, if a person in BiH works or has family members who work for the government or some private company that has close political ties, there can be inordinate pressure to vote for the political party that has secured them those jobs. Fear and patronage are the driving factors in elections, as opposed to a considerate thought of the merits of some political party. (For the record, I am worried that in the US, as national politics are localized and local politics are nationalized, we are also seeing elections becoming less about issues and more about “tribal identity,” of blue (Democratic) vs. red (Republican) – but that’s another story…)
Currently, if the aim is to prepare BiH for future EU membership, and to enable BiH to be a more accountable and a European values-based society, then the ethno-national structure and segregation that was built into the Dayton agreement needs to be weakened, rather than strengthened. More opportunities for voting outside of ones’ presumed block, more opportunities to vote out political parties and individuals because they have failed to deliver, and more opportunities for meaningful citizen engagement must be supported. Unfortunately, because the international elites by and large shape all their interactions with BiH on the political elites of BiH, they paradoxically support more division and segregation, not less.
However, rather than seeing efforts to reduce the over-powering role of institutionalized segregation in BiH’s political system, we are now seeing efforts – with international support – to even further entrench and formalize them. This trend started a little over a year ago in Mostar, where the UK, EU and US helped to broker a deal related to that city’s election law that ensured a preference to ethno-national political units, and essentially represented a reversal of a commitment to the long-term goal of reducing rather than increasing ethno-national election engineering. This had the anticipated election results. Most frustrating, however, is that it was declared to be a success story. The model of transactionalism with the leading political elites – “you give us the illusion of reform and we’ll give you the illusion of democratic process” – and the participants started to upscale it to the level of BiH.
So, for the past year there has been a series of talks aimed at “fixing” some lingering political problems in BiH. Much of this has been predicated on the need to make constitutional amendments to implement a series of rulings by the European Court of Human Rights in Strasbourg. Several plaintiffs successfully argued that the BiH constitution is discriminatory, for not allowing national minorities to run for election to the BiH Presidency or the BiH House of Peoples (e.g., the case brought by Sejdić and Finci), or the inability to run for office as simply a “citizen” of the country, rather than as a member of a constituent peoples (e.g., the case brough by Azra Zornić). For over a decade these cases have remained unaddressed as the parties in power have resisted changing the discriminatory and segregation-based status quo.
However, we are now seeing two interests converge: the interest in the international community in making it look like reform is happening, and the interest of some nationalist leaders to use this “crisis” to secure long sought-after agendas. This has been framed as being about election law reform and “minimal” constitutional reform. A lot has been written about this, and a few themes have become clear. And in the best traditional of internationally brokered transactionalism, there is a narrative that the three main nationalist blocs must each “get” something to keep them at the table.
Dragan Čović wants election reform that ensures that he moves closer towards a de facto or de jure Croat “third entity,” so that “only Croats vote for Croats,” either through careful gerrymandering, unaccountable fixes like “floating electoral units,” indirect electoral appointments, or other engineering. Milorad Dodik supports Čović in his bid to cripple the country, but he too sees his own long-held opportunity. A large chunk of the country’s physical land is considered to be state property – rivers, forests, agricultural land, etc. – and despite court decisions to the contrary, he continues to insist that the state does not have the right to property; it should be devolved to the entities. This would, of course, be a windfall the likes of which haven’t been seen since privatization provided a model on asset stripping and wealth transfer to private pockets. Bakir Izetbegović – well he might “get” some version of the law against genocide denial, or perhaps a promise he won’t end up on some sanctions list.
This has been an extremely cynical exercise. We constantly hear people talking about Switzerland, or South Tyrol…. When really the progressive state dismemberment would end up with a country that looks more like Lebanon. And what’s been missing from all these conversations is simply how to make the country function better. None of the discussed deals would improve the way the country works, ensure the accountability of officials, improve the quality of schools, slow down emigration among the young. These deals would make the structure of BiH from Dayton even worse, rather than recognizing Dayton as a floor from which the country could be improved and move forward.
Unfortunately, the time that has passed has led a lot of international community actors to forget some of the dynamics of corruption and human rights violations in the country. This has led them to believe that, for some reason, people in this country do not deserve the standard of democracy that is possible in other European countries, and that they need to be separated into different boxes. That it is impossible to have a layered or complex identity. That the only thing that matters is one’s presumed identity or affiliation. That sovereignty can only be held by the constituent groups, not by citizens, not by individuals... such lingering stereotypes and narratives have allowed diplomats to continue to think less of the people of BiH.”
Is accession to the European Union a possibility for the Western Balkans and could that play a role in peacekeeping in the region?
“Citizens in the region do want to join the European Union, as they see it as a path towards more economic, trade and educational opportunities. Unfortunately, one of the problems with the European Union enlargement process is that it was never aimed at being a conflict resolution mechanism, but it was rather aimed at preparing countries which were already normal functioning democracies into meeting the terms to join the EU.
Since the first big bang wave of expansion in 2004, we have seen that the technocratic approach to the EU in its requirements has at times ignored some of the human infrastructure of the broader political structure that is required to be a constructive a member of the Union. This is not limited to the former Yugoslav states; it is easy to forget that when Hungary joined the EU, everyone thought it was going to be a model of a liberal democracy, but what we are seeing now is a model of an increasingly illiberal and autocratic state.
Croatia managed to get in just at the right time, as now there is less stomach for enlargement among many countries in the EU, and progress towards making reforms to join the EU has stalled within the Balkans as well. All the leaders of the Western Balkans claim they want an EU future, but while they say this rhetorically, what they are doing in practice shows the opposite. They want EU membership and access of funds etc., but without having to do any of the hard work to get in; they want membership on their own terms.
This enlargement fatigue has had a bad impact on the region in several ways. One of the most frustrating is North Macedonia and Albania have been stalled in terms of their moving forward in the EU accession process. This has sent a really bad signal, as the failure of North Macedonia in particular to move forward after making certain reforms – including changing the name of the country – has frustrated people in the region and made them wonder how they can trust the EU if they do what they are asked and suddenly the door is shut on them. The EU needs to support them and agree to begin accession negotiations to restore its credibility.
At the same time, we also see a lot of unfounded wishful thinking with regards to Serbia being the regional country through which enlargement in the region should or could move more quickly. Yet we’ve seen in the last couple of years how Serbia is moving farther and farther away, domestically, and internationally, from EU values. Domestic politics in Serbia is becoming increasingly authoritarian, and in terms of international and public relations Serbia is showing its readiness to align more with illiberal actors such as China or Russia, as opposed to aligning more solidly with the West. These are just some of the bigger concerns that we see emerging, especially with the rise of authoritarianism and the drop of confidence in the West, marked by events including the financial crisis, Brexit, the election of Trump in the US and the general crisis of democratic confidence.”
What do you think the world can learn about the history of Bosnia and Herzegovina and the conflict of 1992-1995?
“I think the main thing is that in 1990, 1991 and 1992 we saw global politics changing, as the cold war ended, and nationalist politics took hold in former Yugoslavia. There was a very strong tendency to explain everything on the basis of “ancient ethnic hatreds”; this made it easier to throw up one’s hands and say there was nothing anyone could do in the former Yugoslavia to avoid the violent disintegration.
I touch on this a bit in the “Looking for Dayton” movie: there were opportunities to intercede in what was a very thoughtful effort to disentangle and destroy the country. It was not natural or inevitable, and it was not something most people wanted. Most people don’t want war, they don’t want to see their sons and daughters and parents and friends die, but if political elites feel they can prosper more through division and conflict, that is very often the path they will take. Ethnic entrepreneurs played a huge role in the unfolding of the violence in former Yugoslavia.
When I look at the divisions that are growing right now in the US – often geographic, often racially based, positioning people into polarized tribes of urban or rural, liberal or illiberal, exacerbating and operating on social cleavages – I often think of what happened here in BiH, in the former Yugoslavia, and how there are many similarities in terms of how a state can be divided and then fragment and create the conditions in which a civil war can emerge, or, if not war, a state can begin to functionally collapse, losing the faith and trust of its citizens.
Understanding these interlinked dynamics and how political entrepreneurs can manipulate them is critical. And we see that in the US there has been an increase in attention in the press about what can be learned by looking at other failed states. For example, it has been noted that the various components of the recipe of disintegration often include the stoking of grievance and resentment of one group against another, and I’ve heard mainstream commentators mention as a comparative case how Milošević was able to appeal to the fear and grievance of many Serbs against losing Kosovo, nurturing a feeling of victimization, and manipulating historical narratives. This helped to radicalize the population in the late 80s, in preparation for violence, and war.
When I look at these issues of grievance, resentment, loss of status and anxiety, I see a lot of similarities in terms of the dynamics in the US now. And now we have the extra challenge of fully polarized social media and angry twitter hordes. But really, since the financial crisis and now the pandemic, there has been a huge rise of illiberalism and anger and inequality that have provided an opportunity for politicians to pursue illiberal goals; we saw this happened in the 80s in Yugoslavia.”
What do you think might be important for greater gender equality in Bosnia and Herzegovina?
“BiH can never make progress towards gender equality and more equalized opportunities for full and equal participation in political, social and economic life with the current structure it has.
The entire post-war experience has been based on what is, by its very nature, a peace agreement which is inherently regressive, essentialist, reactionary, and masculine. With a constitution based on discrimination rather than inclusion, on the notion of tribe rather than on the notion of citizen, it is very difficult to find a way in BiH to have a meaningful, feminist forward-looking domestic policy or outlook. We see this throughout the region in terms of the very dominant role of men in politics and the pursuit of mostly masculine interests in policies.
And mirroring the broader illiberal turns, in countries like Turkey and Poland, beyond the Balkan region, we are seeing a re-traditionalization of society, where suddenly women’s rights which we thought had been secured are now at threat. Women who are middle aged today may see that their daughters may grow up in a society where they have fewer rights that they can take for granted than their mothers did. That is unfortunately the result of a society that has been radicalized towards more traditional, right wing, illiberal ideologies, rather than towards more inclusive, open and tolerant options.”
You recently made a movie about Bosnia and Herzegovina called “Looking for Dayton” (2020). Can you tell us a bit about it and why you think this movie is important?
“In a nutshell, at the beginning of 2015 I was speaking with some friends in Sarajevo about the fact that 2015 would be the 20-year anniversary of the Dayton Agreement that ended the war in BiH. I had already been hearing from friends, colleagues and academics about all of these various plans for conferences and workshops to commemorate these 20 years.
One of my friends in Sarajevo – who had fought in the war for 3.5 years – asked me: “why are you going to these events? It should be me going there. It should be people who went through the war, fought for this country, are citizens of BiH and have had to live with the terrible structural situation that Dayton has locked the country into this situation, that go to these events.” I thought that was an interesting comment; and what started as a joke about sending a couple of “regular guys” from Sarajevo there – instead of academics or diplomats or policy makers – to the Dayton conference to talk to policy makers, turned into the concrete idea of sending three friends to the US to participate in the Dayton 20 events and to film the experience.
If you speak to any filmmaker, you will find out it always takes two to three times longer than anticipated to make a movie. Our project had many delays, so we didn’t finish the film as quickly as we wanted to. However, in the end it became useful that the film was finally completed in the spring of 2020, as that year marked 25 years since Dayton, and it provided more time for reflection and the opportunity to reflect on what had changed since we all went to the US. Film provides a different way of presenting what the peace agreement was about and what it did for this country, for better or for worse, and it can begin to reach a different audience than policy papers or academic documents.
I always joke that I’ve been writing policy papers, book chapters and essays for 25 years that no one is reading, and so it was time for me to produce a movie that no one would watch – but I say that only half-jokingly. My real overpowering aim with the film is to show people that wars don’t end when a peace agreement is signed. That’s when the hard works starts. And if not carefully thought through, supported and nurtured, peace agreements will never work.”
What kind of managerial or leadership advice would you have for young professionals interested in human rights and international relations?
1. “Always spend some time in another country: get out of your comfort zone, no matter where you’re from, see what it’s like to live somewhere else, see what’s similar and different to the country where you’re from. This is how you gain an appreciation of the similarities, differences, and types of people that are on the ground. Only then can you remember that people are very different from those described in political science textbooks. The human element is critical in this. When travelling try to get outside the capital cities because you are only scratching the surface if you only see the big cities. Visiting the outskirts is a reminder that we should develop policies and grow support for citizen initiatives which go beyond the capitals. This is key to get a better sense of a country and to make “partners”; I use that word intentionally but with a caveat, as we often hear from diplomats that they look at the political elites as their partners, but it should actually be the people who are their partners.
2. Research, theory and practice are an important triangle – try to learn and practice them all. When I did my PhD at the Institute for Conflict Analysis and Resolution at George Mason University in Virginia, just outside Washington DC, these three elements where embedded throughout the program. The research component is in every thesis and policy paper you do as a student or a professional. The theory component is useful in trying to see what we can learn from sociological, political, international relations and other theories, so that we can understand past dynamics and consequences and frame the present in terms of some larger picture. This can begin to help us avoid mistakes, better understand possible outcomes, and look forward for different opportunities in support of better policies, engagement and support for lasting and positive peace. The practice component is mostly working with NGOs, academic bodies, international organizations and other organizations to see how they shape and structure their engagement. Ideally this includes working for better engagement with citizens in any place in a meaningful way, by not treating them just as recipient of grants, as service providers, but as actors who share the same values that the organizations/donors purport to have. For young people who want to get involved in this kind of work, understanding these different roles – whether research, on-the-ground implementation or advocacy work – is really important.
3. Stay optimistic. It is very easy to get frustrated and discouraged. Change in any society and in the world is never quick or easy or linear – there are structural sources of stagnation and within the status quo that have an interest in surviving, so social change is never easy. While it has been extremely frustrating to see the way the US has been in my view declining over the past years, in terms of division and disintegrative political dialogue, it is a useful reminder that no country is immune to instability, and that social change and the expansion of rights is a process in the making that is never “done”.”
What brings you fulfillment in doing your job in policy work?
“One of the things that inspires me is the fact that I know so many great people who want the same thing that anyone wants – they want the opportunity for a good life, good job, good education, community…. To live in a society that offers opportunity and dignity. Remembering that it is people, and not politics, that should motivate us, keeps me motivated.
Some people ask me how I manage to continue to work on such issues for so long, and I often say that the fact that I don’t deal with high level politicians gives me an opportunity to meet more regular people in regular places. You don’t need to meet Barack Obama to know what people in the US think, and I feel it’s the same here in BiH; because I don’t have to be clouded by some of those high level political and diplomatic gains, it’s easier to avoid the transactional lens. I think it’s better to be a frustrated optimist than a lowest common denominator pessimist.”
Valery’s book recommendations:
1. ‘Thieves of State: Why Corruption Threatens Global Security’ by Sarah Chayes
2. ‘Jihad vs. McWorld: Terrorism’s Challenge to Democracy’ by Benjamin Barber (Note to readers: don’t let the overly sexy title fool you; this book from 1995 predicted many of the extremisms and dynamics we are witnessing today)
3. ‘Democracy in Chains: The Deep History of the Radical Right’s Stealth Plan for America’ by Nancy MacLean
