Change or Defeat

By: Saša Janković

Dear Iljir,

In your previous letter you took our correspondence, for a change, beyond the Balkan courtyard. Thank you. For decades we have been going in circles, unable to find a way out, and little genuinely new can be said. Even if a brilliant solution were to occur to us, words today are a weak currency: everyone writes, few read. We are closing ourselves not only within ever smaller states, but also within the limits of our own knowledge – or ignorance.

Mass psychology teaches us that when we become part of a crowd, the current almost always pulls downward, not upward. I know it would be more popular to write about daily political statements, trivial symbols and personalities, or endless combinations of electoral lists. But I cannot and will not dull either myself or others.

So let me ask you this: on the recent International Human Rights Day, 10 December, did you think about what is actually happening to human rights today – not only here, but globally?

Human rights are not merely being widely and systematically violated; the very civilizational idea that every human being possesses inherent dignity, and that every state must guarantee and respect it, is hanging by a thread – a state that does not do so ceases to be a state and becomes a prison. Will human rights become, for future generations, nothing more than a legend from the past?

And more practically: will those of us who work in human rights continue to do everything as before, blaming everyone else for a grim reality and demanding that they change, or will we finally look into our own backyard, acknowledge our illusions and mistakes, and change something about ourselves?

At the core of the human rights crisis – alongside external factors – lies a simple truth: the system has become too large, too complex, and increasingly detached from reality. It now largely serves itself.

On paper, new “rights” constantly emerge, often through interpretations by expert bodies, without genuine political consensus and with even less consideration of how they will be implemented in practice. At times it seems that academic constructions and personal fixations are presented as international law, “best practices” (that have never taken root anywhere), and binding state obligations. The inflation of such fantasies across various international documents and parts of institutions and civil society dilutes focus and relativizes even the most basic human rights norms – those that every person intuitively understands, feels as their own, and has an elemental need to defend.

At the same time, the institutional architecture for protecting human rights has swollen to the point of absurdity. Instead of defending and strengthening bodies whose longevity and reach have proven their value, such as independent courts and ombudsman institutions, new bodies and mechanisms are endlessly created. They generate more procedures, reports, and self-referential narratives than tangible results for the citizens they are meant to protect. And costly they are. The larger and more expensive the system becomes, the less people remain at its center.

This pattern is clearly visible in the so-called “normalization process” between Belgrade and Pristina. In one of the most closely watched political issues in Europe, human rights are largely a secondary matter or a tool of political pressure. People caught in these scisors have for decades been hostages of an endless “process.”

Their rights are relativized or suspended according to daily political needs. And if human rights guarantees do not apply precisely where they are most needed, what is the point of all the conferences, statements, and ritual expressions of concern?

All of this leads to the same conclusion: those of us who believe in human dignity, democracy, and freedom – on the Balkans and beyond – must either change something fundamentally, or disappear as a relevant factor.

We need to return the focus to a limited but essential set of fundamental rights around which there is broad political and social consensus – rights that people instantly recognize as their own, without having to undergo a brainwashing first.

We also need to return to institutions with tradition and authority, and breathe real power and responsibility back into them, instead of endlessly multiplying new bodies and repeatedly reliving their childhood illnesses.

Above all, we need the courage of the expert community to step out of its comfort zone, acknowledge that the current system is unsustainable, stop seeking help from those who in fact create the problems, and turn to solutions we ourselves can provide. Only then might some conscientious politicians, unfairly trapped in the understandable public contempt for their profession, find ideas in expert solutions and gain the support needed to make real change possible.

Yours,

Saša

Ukraine and lessons from the Western Balkans