What do I mean by fear of the outsider? While I think that Serbia is moving towards Europe (see below entries), there are plenty here who would disagree. The picture to the left is the name of a hooligan firm in BG, associated with Partizan Football Klub. Their name, Anti-Romi (anti Roma people) suggests their politics is Serbia for Serbs. This part of society is not interested in having anyone from the outside (Roma, Croatians, Bosnians, Muslims, Albanians, and Westeners fall into that category) tell them how to live, which laws to adapt and which of their heros to arrest.Well, this is nothing new, any country that has been occupied and re-occupied for huge swaths of its existence would feel the same. But for Serbia (and possibly for the rest of the Balkans), the other factor contributing to its split personality is fear of change. This is a fascinating time to be here for that very reason. The country, thanks to the forcefulness of its political system, is currently inching towards EU integration, towards Westernism, towards Ipods, Nescafe and BMWs. It is moving away from socialism, Kafa Domacha and Yugos. Cost of living in places like BG is already very high for such a low income country, tourists are coming with higher frequency, and Kosovo is slowly slipping away.
What isn't changing is the fact that change is being produced by totalitarian means. What's new right? Well, it's an interesting picture here though. I get the sense that if the country were to hold a popular referendum on whether to join the EU, the vote would be split 50-50, or the 'no' vote would just barely win out. In the the face of this indecision, the government is able to maneuver fairly easily. The voting population is uninformed and confused: 8 years ago NATO was destroying buildings in BG, today they are being labeled as friends. 20 years ago Serbs were once again standing up for their own unique identity, but today they are being told to exchange it for a European one (which comes standard with an ipod...).
The government is also fortunate to have a fairly significant concentration of power at its command (despite my current efforts at decentralization) and a disregard for transparency. As a result, legislation, when necessary, passes quietly and without public scrutiny (not unlike the UK in many regards). The saving grace at the moment is, ironically, the radical opposition in Parliament. Only they have the power to stop the current government from doing what ever it wants. This opposition has been able to shut parliament down for all of the last 4 weeks, and it will remain so until early September.
Anyway, whatever the mechanism, Serbians are recognizing they lack control in there own affairs. They (or at least part of 'they') are directing that fear at the most obvious target (Europe, the West, etc) without realizing they have never really controlled their fate (who has?). The result is polarization and anxiety, taken out on foreigners. The most obvious foreigners are the Roma.
I went to a Roma school the other day and celebrated the last day of class with young Roma kids, who wanted to do what all young kids want to do on the last day of class: sing, dance and have fun. But the Church, which occupies the neighboring lot, is so xenophobic towards this Roma school (god forbid they get an education...) that it is building an extension of the already existing wall, so they never have to look upon these kids. Its amazing, and perfectly illustrates how Serbian society is reacting to change. On the one hand you have the Serbs who work with me to help such marginalized groups find a voice, while other Serbs to to great lengths to pretend these margins don't exist.
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