Conflicts and Co-Operation Between Returnees and Immigrants in the Period After the War: the Brod-Posavina County

The paper examines conjunctive and disjunctive social integrational processes (cooperation and conflict) in the western part of the Brod-Posavina county. The actors involved in the mentioned processes – queried in a questionnaire survey – included refugees-immigrants, returnee Croats, returnee Serbs and representatives of the institutions of the groups. In total, 180 war victims were surveyed. With the end of the war, the primary network of social relations in the liberated area is beginning to be renewed. At first after the return especially of Serbs there were conflicts and settlings of accounts between the members of the three groups of war victims. However, although the conflicts were present on the level of nationality (which is not surprising in view of the Serb aggression on Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia and the marked stigmatisation of this national group), a shift can be noted from the psycho-emotional to the socio-economical levels. Although there is enmity in Croat–Serb relations, nevertheless the conflict is more pronounced between refugees-immigrants and returnee Serbs, despite what might be expected on the basis of the war events. Yet as opposed to returnee Croats, refugees-immigrants were not actors of the war events in this area, which may be (on the psychological level) a slight advantage in communicating with returnee Serbs. However, among them as well it is evident that conflicts occur mainly in the area of property, which is precisely the unresolved question between refugees-immigrants and returnee Serbs. Immigrants from Bosnia and Herzegovina have been settled mainly in houses of persons of Serb nationality, which is the source of intolerance, distrust as well as conflict between them. On the other hand, returnee Croats are relatively secure in this regard and do not have direct property relations with the Serb population. Memories of the war and the role of the Serbs is not negligible, but it is also noted that the people now in question are mainly elderly and did not actively participate in the war events. Coexistence is evolving on the level of primary social relations in a continuum from cooperation to conflict. In the present situation, after the end of the war, conflicts are being reduced, but cooperation is still burdened by traumas and reminiscences of the war. In the local community examined, even if slowly, the perspective of coexistence and regenerated networks of primary relationships is nevertheless becoming a part of the consciousness and behaviour of the people.