Thread by @dbchslr

Judicial-political earthquake for Bosnia-Herzegovina: the press leaked a supposed new #ECHR trial. A thread.

Supposedly:
1. The ethno-territorial district for the presidential elections needs to be abolished.

istraga.ba/nova-presuda-s…

2. The ethno-territorial districts for the elections of the House of the People (2nd chamber) need to be abolished.
Jointly with earlier decisions, such a court ruling sets a challenging framework for institutional reforms, and little space of manoeuvre. A few thoughts....

The election in ethno-territorial districts was reviewed critically also in earlier ECHR judgements.
1. It divides non-majority groups into two classes of citizens. Those living dispersed (e.g. Croats or Serbs in Sarajevo) don't have the same rights to elect group representatives

2. Thus, it solidifies the power of ethnonationalist parties that are dominant in the minority-majority regions. This leads to a wrong picture that they are the sole legitimate representatives of Serbs/Croats.
3. It segments elections along ethnic lines, undermining programmatic

competition.
Recently, the Croat nationalist parties have pushed into this direction.
@DamirKapidzic and myself have just published these comments in more detail here: @Ethnopoliticstandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…

@DamirKapidzic @Ethnopolitics Will the ECHR ruling (if the sources are correct) lead to quick change? Probably not, the institutions have also ignored earlier ECHR rulings.

What could be reforms?
1. Anti-nationalists will immediately want to abolish ethnic divisions. Serbs & Croats will block.

@DamirKapidzic @Ethnopolitics 2. An option is to move to an indirect election (election of the presidency via parliaments). This might be more difficult, if the election mode for the House of the People would be altered.

3. House of People could make place to a true Federal 2nd chamber

@DamirKapidzic @Ethnopolitics ... with cantonal/entity representatives, plus some guaranteed seats for minorities. This would de-facto maintain the representation of all groups, but de-couple the ethnic from the territorial principle.

4. I've made a suggestion for the presidency earlier:

@DamirKapidzic @Ethnopolitics it seems conform. Moving from 3 to 5 seats. This opens up the elections would allow for true national competition. Cross-ethnic voting would no longer allow larger groups determine seats of minorities.
@Ethnopolitics published it.
tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.108…
zora.uzh.ch/id/eprint/6130…