Long time ago the German philosopher Hegel once said “History repeats itself just like irony and farse”. Many things that happen today, happened before. It is just the ability to recognize them and draw parallels so we could know how to act and reacts. Many believe that the European Union is something unique since it started. However, this belief is false: In ancient Greece existed the Fund of Delos, almost working the same as the EU. Just as the EU, it evolved after a great war, namely the Persian Wars. But it disapeared with the Peloponesian Wars. And the Greek identity, as the European identity had to wait for a totalitarian system in order to evolve.
The point of this story is to draw parellel between Serbia in 1858 and 2000. In 1858 Serbia was at the end of unpopular beaurocratic regime lead by Prince Aleksandar Karadjordjevic, something that resembled to the rule of Milosevic, full of supression and terror towards its own people. The National Assembly in December 1858 decided to overthrow Prince Aleksandar and return the Obrenovic dynasty, with Prince Milos as the ruler of Serbia, again. His son, the succesor to the thrown, Prince Mihajlo returning from exile himself made a visit in Vienna where he met, at that time the most powerful personality in Europe and former Austrian ruler, Prince Metternich . At the audience, Prince Metternich gave in four eyes an advice to Prince Mihajlo. This advice is in the text of a book written by Svetlana Velmar- Jankovic:
“My dear Prince, your Father is old, as I am. For a year or two, you will become the ruler. Memorize these words of mine: The people is as a child, all the time it requests a toy for itself. As it grows, the more toys it requests. To please it, please don’t take as model the great European nations and their thousand year histories as a model. Your people is small and backward and, if you wish its progress, don’t go through the row (in the Serbian text – ред), but lead it under a specific order. In raising your people beware of jumping through numbers: don’t count 1, 3, 5, 8, 12, 20, but show patience counting 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6, 7 – as the order requests it. I’m talking you of patience, because you will have to develop it. Don’t get into dispair when you realize how much you little country is behind of great European countries and how much different it has to be.”
Even though Metternich in his time of rule was much anti-Serbian oriented, however, in this text he says one truth: Serbia is different from other European countries and realizing that can give us the incentive to go forward. Otherwise, getting into dispair will lead us to an even greater dispair. Every country has its pace and it has to follow it in a perfect order. Thus, I believe that every politician of Serbia has to learn from this text in order to know how to act. Because, the desires of the people can be manufactured and presented by a politician in a way that the people gets the illusion it is originally their desire. Besides, among all, politics are also an art. The politician that can create a state of equilibrium in a society, in which all the needs no matter how diverse they are are satisfied, this politician is an artist. And with such an equilibrium the society can go forwards in all domains. The question is however, which politician of the Serbian society is the needed artist?
As for the position of Serbian in Europe, St. Sava once said:
“At first we were confused. The East thought that we were West, while the West considered us to be East. Some of us misunderstood our place in the clash of currents, so they cried that we belong to neither side, and others that we belong exclusively to one side or the other. But I tell you, Ireneus, we are doomed by fate to be the East in the West and the West in the East”
For me, this can only be beneficial for us. What do you think?
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{ 6 comments… read them below or add one }
Cvijus,
As I was reading through your article I was thinking of your final conclusion. I fully agree with St. Sava, we are neither West or East, but we are the bridge. And going forward we have to recognize this uniqueness and really build that bridge.
As to your question as to which politician is an artist, I see two candidates in my head. One of them is Tadic, who in fact is striving to Europe but is more concerned of the “toys” Serbian people will have. Another one is Dinkic, and the reason for that is I remember him saying in one of his interviews that Serbias goal is not the EU, but the EU standards. Its like we now know what we have to become internally, but whether we become an EU member thats not important at all, just as lnog as we catch up in those standards.
Kostunica unfortinatelly to me can not be that brisge, because he internally does not know how to develop us inot becoming that “bridge”. While on the other extreme you have Jovanovic who in fact wants to abandon the East in us at any price , and try to make us identical to West.
The radicals i dont consider as politicians, because i see them having no capactiy in leading the country.
Greetings,
Ivan
The problem (if you can call it a problem) is that there is not a clear distinction anymore about what west represents, nor what east represents. Where do you draw the border, if not in the world, than in Europe alone? What’s the distinction? Or better yet, what’s the unifying factor that all the countries of ‘the west’ have? What’s common for the countries represented as ‘the east’? I can’t find it.
All the countries in Europe have their own distinctions, no matter where they are located.
These days some people might consider Bulgaria and Romania for ‘west’ now that they’re in EU, while others consider Portugal and Sicily to be ‘third world countries’ (and i heard this from lots of Portuguese and Sicilians too). But, i think they are all wrong.
It’s good to have these messages from the past, but not all of them can be applied to every situation.
We can no longer pretend to be West in the East nor East in the West, because there are no West and East anymore – there is only Europe.
Poppycock. To everyone but yourself, you ARE how you are perceived and treated. If those in the west think Serbia is in the east then to them it is and vice versa. The west has labelled Serbia and they are not in a big hurry to change the label, no matter how much some (both in the west and in Serbia!) would like to see Serbia grovel for that new label.
From what you have written, Metternich did not consider Serbia to be special, which is what you imply with you reference to diffent but just so backward that it will need a lot of time to catch up. This remains so, but it is also true for a number of other European countries, and even more so for many countries around the world. Viktor makes a great point, to which I would add that stories and myths about Serbia’s distinctiveness are what got it into the position it is in. It is important to realize that Serbia is just a small European state, not more not less. To the extent that all countries are distinctive, so is Serbia. Again, no more and no less…
Viktore,
Many people, me too, consider Europe to be a ideological construct based on common values such as Christianity. What makes the difference in Europe between East and West are the cultural values, traditions, historical backgrounds, experiences and developement. Yes, Bulgaria, Romania, Greece and Cyprus are EU members, but they are what St Sava said the East in the West and the West in the East. Believe me, visiting a Greek village is much different than visiting a Dutch village, in all aspects. And this differentiation is not only because of the Ottoman Occupation, but much longer. The book of Steven Runcimann “The last Byzantine Renaisance” makes the difference even more clearer. However, the EU stands for the principle of unity in diversity, so that differentiations are not necessarily negative, quite the contrary.
IZ,
The Serbian society is divided in this aspect into two extremes: Thos that believe that we are completely different (SRS) and those that believe that we are in our essence the same as any other european society (LDP). Both are wrong. We are different from the others, but we share some essential values with the others, and that goes for any other nation, more or less. It is important to recognize the differences, respect them and act according to them.
Metternich reffered to practical developement such as institutions, infrastructure, economy and societal systems, which people call it today civil society. But by this he also meant the liberation from the Ottomanlike feudal system. He reffered to our practical backwardness, not to cultural differences.
Cvijus,
my point was that a village in Netherlands is, besides that is different than a village in Greece, also much different than a village in Spain or a village in France or a village in England, or sometimes even much different than a neighbor village in Netherlands.
Also, because of the globalization, some things are very alike, if not the same in a Dutch and Greek village.
My bottom line is – artists formerly known as ‘West’ and ‘East’ are today broken into little pieces, and, like you, i consider the differences to be a good thing, but i also favor some globalization-caused-similarities.