Mostar as a ''Hopeless Case City '' - The Absurd Hopelessness of Objective Circumstances

Abstract

The goal of this paper is to emphasize many objective weak points of the organization of the city of Mostar, which, however, were the reason for marking Mostar as a ''hopless case city. ''In order to prove his hypothesis, the author bases his research on the Dayton Peace Agreement, as well as on the fact that the two cantons: the Herzegovina-Neretva canton, in which Mostar is situated, and the Middle-Bosnia canton, in which Travnik is situated, were called mixed cantons, and that those two cities should have been organized in the same way. Nevertheless, the international community focused only on Mostar. Additional difficulties were caused by enforced transitional Statute of the High Representative Paddy Ashdown, with which six municipalites (three Bosnian and three Croatian) were abolished, which resulted in aproximatelly 1000 people losing their jobs. Based on these facts and their consequences, the author proves his hypothesis using research methods of deep interview. Additionally, the author researches the time passed in Mostar in mutual conflicts between the Croats, who consider Mostar as their only big city due to the fact that all important institutions are situated there (the only University in Croatian language, the theatre, archives, the hospital, etc.) and the Bosnians, who consider Mostar as the basis for the existence of Bosnia and Herzegovina. During that time of mutual conflicts and fresh war wounds, the Mayor could not be elected for the twelve years. Not only did the author witness the war, but he also witnessed the post-war events in the city of Mostar. The elections for the Mayor were held in 2020, but there were many irregularities seen during the elections. Accordingly, if everything is taken into consideration, there is no justified reason for marking Mostar as a ''hopless case city.''