Paper short abstract:

The paper examines the long-term impacts of violence during the Bosnian war on today’s inter-ethnic relationships on the local level. On the basis of a social network analysis and from the perspective of local women, it will discuss the scope and the limits of societal reintegration processes.

Paper long abstract:

This paper discusses everyday networking and coping strategies of women, and their role for the societal reintegration process and it's boundaries in the Bosnian post-war community of Prijedor.

The war in Bosnia and Herzegovina heavily affected the inter-ethnic relationships, and destroyed networks of trust, exchange and mutual support within neighbourhoods, networks of friends and even among relatives. These relationships had been vital in pre-war social life. At that time, women were at the heart of inter-ethnic and informal exchange in these neighbourhoods and within families. But these relations and the women's roles in the neighbourhoods have been heavily affected by the war, especially in a region where high rates of violence or even genocide took place. Therefore the process of rebuilding the society as well as the coping with the suffering of intimate violence between and among neighbours has become a crucial challenge for the building of sustainable peace.

On the basis of a social network analysis and from the perspectives of local women, this paper examines the reintegration (and reconciliation) process and it's boundaries between two different groups: the so called Bosnian-Serb women and the Bosnjak (Muslim) women. The focus on social networks in specific localities such as villages and neighbourhoods sheds light on both amicable and hostile relations, and the re-formation or persistence of ethnic boundaries. This helps to explain at what times and under what circumstances such and other boundaries are weakened and processes of ethnicization softened.