When the Irish vote today (again) on the fate of the Treaty of Lisbon, spare a thought for the people of Bosnia. That’s the message here. The idea is that EU reform will help usher Balkan states into the Union by improving administrative efficiency within the block. Apparently Brussels is a failed state unto itself. Says Paddy Ashdown, ex Western proconsul for Bosnia: “Bosnia is dysfunctional, but not as dysfunctional as Brussels.” Ouch.
Well, maybe. Brussels is a sketchy place, and Belgium, well, don’t get me started. Recall that this is the country that went nine post election months without forming a government. That said, I’m gonna question one of the premises here. Just how impending is a return to violence in Bosnia? I mean really, the war has been over for almost 15 years. There are people approaching adulthood there who don’t even remember it. A great place to live, no–the economy sucks and the government is on par with, well, Belgium. Oh, and the weather sucks.
I don’t buy it in part because there’s little incentive for anyone to return to violence (there’s too much money to be embezzeled from foreign aid and too little to be gained from another generation of slaughter) and in part because the region is beginning to move along with something like a tollerable pace. Rising waters and all that. The Economist has a sunnier, if rather Friedmanesque, assessment here.
As for the Irish, well, presumably they’ll vote the right way eventually, and the EU has a pretty good record of rerunning these things ’til it likes the outcome. Just sit tight, folks.