Transformation Processes and Democracy

When the recent past in former Yugoslavia can be described as a sequence of violent experiences (series of wars since 1991), then the question that arises concerns the future and the hopes, wishes and expectations associated with it in the context of the nationalistically induced disintegration of the formerly multi-ethnic state of Yugoslavia. Proceeding on the basis of the results of transformation research, we will attempt to establish the historically developed connection between individual and collective memory, between memory and identity as well as between the past and future expectations. The theoretical context of this investigation, in which the gender-specific dimension of this process assumes central significance, is a psychoanalytically oriented trauma theory as formulated by Masud Khan and Hans Keilson. On one hand, this ought to be compatible with the historicity of these processes; on the other hand, this constitutes, in our opinion, an important building block in the understanding of the subconscious interweaving of the individual and the collective. In going about this task, a trauma theory understood in this way does not fail to take the respective social-political processes into account in its analytical and explanatory context. Furthermore, this project will focus considerable attention on the question of gender perspective-particularly in the origination and formation of nations-as this is described in terms like `genderized ethnicities` and `gendered nations. These mentioned processes of social transformation and/or political transition and disintegration in former Yugoslavia can be interpreted as collectively experienced historical trauma. If the past and the trauma are not focused on a key event, the question of the collective memory and collective recollection must be embedded in this temporal dimension. This permits to describe following hypothesis: the extent of the possible preoccupation with the past and remembrance of what transpired is determinative for a democratic development of postwar societies. If most of the history of the past has to be repressed and detached from the collective consciousness, then this will result in not only restoring the `old balance of power` but also in passing on that which is repressed from one generation to the next. The extent to which this can have consequences that endager democracy is shown by studies in the field of transformation research, as well as by some election results in former Communist Countries.