Europeanization Hasn’t Failed in Balkans – it Just Needs Time

The states that once formed part of the former Yugoslavia in the 1990s experienced war, mass murder, ethnic cleansing, and humanitarian disaster. Economic growth was slow or negative and corruption was the rule, not the exception. The outflow of refugees was much greater than the migration of young people out of the Balkans today. It was dangerous until 2000 even for an American to drive any route that stopped in Zagreb, Sarajevo, Podgorica, Skopje, Pristina, and Belgrade. I did them all but Belgrade for the first time in 2001, when it was still regarded as daring, especially for my Bosnian Serb driver.

Today, many tourists and people of all ethnic groups go almost wherever and whenever they want in the region, with minimal inconvenience, meeting little hostility, and mostly professional behavior on the part of officials at the borders.

Airports meet international standards. Drinking water and food, once serious hazards, are now safe, even if air pollution is at deplorable levels due to revival of at least some industries and much wider use of air conditioning and electric heating.

Standards of living have risen everywhere. Schools and universities lag behind their Western European counterparts but operate at a level that enables their best graduates to find their ways into Oxford or Princeton for undergraduate and graduate degrees. Rudimentary health care is available everywhere, although more advanced care often requires a trip into the European Union.

Governance and rule of law fall short. Parliaments are elected and coalitions form from majority governments in accordance with now well-worn constitutions, but the process is often less than free and fair, even if election fraud at the polling places is less common than once it was.