Original scientific paper
The prewar, war and post-war Croatian-Serbian neighbourhood in local communities
dragutin Babić
; Institute for Migration and Ethnic Studies
Abstract
Neighbourly relations are the basis of local communities and they represent the vital links
of society as a whole. For a modern version of social relationships it is particularly important
to include different ethnic/national groups in the communities network. Prewar neighbourhood
in Croatia included different such groups, and in terms of social relationships of
the Croats and Serbs, neighbourly relations, as the respondents of this research point out,
have been an important component and were judged favourably by the most of our respondents.
The prewar ethno-national propaganda has already affected neighbourhood as
a basic segment of the communities network, to be even more destroyed by the clashes in
the Croatian War of Independence. However, as the research results show, it also happened
that in these turbulent times there were cases when a neighbour protected his
neighbour of a different nationality, Croat/Serb in our case. Reminiscence of such situations
makes a social capital in the post-war period around which a new network of primary
social relations can be built and which would include the members of the
majoritarian nation and the biggest national minority in Croatia. In the post-war period,
there are some signs of the rudimentary forms of regeneration of the network of primary
social relationships. Croatian-Serbian neighbourhood is being restored, although with
many problems, defiance and conflicts. In various regions of Croatia (Eastern and Western
Slavonia, Bania and Dalmatia - where our research has been carried out) neighbourly relations
are differently perceived and built and Eastern Slavonia is the Croatian region with
the heaviest segregation between the Croats and Serbs and this territory is undergoing
more conflicts than other ex-war zones.
Keywords
neighbourhood; Croats; Serbs; coexistence; local community
Hrčak ID:
93833
URI
Publication date:
17.2.2007.
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