Postmortem on a Stillborn Census: Bosnia–Herzegovina, 2013–16

From Dayton to Bernese Jura: The Election of the Croat Member of the Presidency of Bosnia and Herzegovina

“…Indeed, the international community, especially the United States (U.S.), “coerced the Bosnian Serbs, Muslims, and Croats into accepting the Dayton Peace Agreement” in 1995 (Downes, 2006: 55). According to the Annex 4 of the DPA (the country's constitution) BiH is composed of state‐level institutions and two asymmetrical territorial‐administrative entities: the unitary and centralized RS, populated by a Serb majority, and the Bosniak‐Croat FBiH, composed of 10 cantons, of which five have Bosniak, three Croat majority, and two are mixed (Hayden, 2020: 16).…”

“…In addition, the Hodžić and Stojanović model is outdated since they presented their model before the 2013 population census. According to the latest population census, one of the five cantons from which the election of the Croat member should occur according to Hodžić and Stojanović, does not actually have a Croat majority (Central Bosnia), or is officiously defined as “mixed” (Herzegovina Neretva) (Hayden, 2020: 16). Like Hodžić and Stojanović, we are aware that the model confirms Croats are more present in a specific area, but this “solution would not lead to the formation of the ‘third entity’ advocated by many Croat politicians” (Hodžić & Stojanović, 2011: 100) since it would be used only during the election day, as in the case of Bernese Jura.…”

“…It should be noted that the 2013 population census was disputed, especially its methodology and data on "non-permanent residents"(Cooley, 2020;Hayden, 2020). Regardless, the census is used for official purposes in the FBiH.…”