Individual
Choice and Community Entrepreneurship
It is fitting that the opinions most emphasized in
this work are those of individuals; the central question that this
research seeks to answer focuses on the factors influencing choices
of individuals to participate (or not) in community activities in
their local village or city. The Mozaik Community Development Foundation
seeks to encourage broadbased community involvement in the projects
that it supports in local communities, with a particular focus on
local volunteer involvement. This work extends beyond Mozaik projects
to include other aspects of citizen participation in formal and
informal community activities, seeking to answer the central question,
''What are the barriers to and motivations for participation in
community life in B&H?'' This question led to consideration
of the additional, related question regarding the very existence
of community activities, ''What are the sources of community enterpreneurship
in rural BH communities?''
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‘That we Might Live:’
The Story of Tegare - December 2004
This paper represents the first part of Laurie's wider
research project, “Building Social Cohesion in Bosnia and
Herzegovina.” Tegare is the first community in a three-community
case-study that includes two other remote, returnee villages in
different geographic areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina. This research
is part of an effort by the Mozaik Community Development Foundation,
Laurie's host organization, to understand the motivations for and
barriers to community engagement in Bosnia and Herzegovina.
While it is clear that relationships between Bosniaks and Serbs
living in Tegare are far better than an outsider may expect knowing
the local history, it seems equally apparent that relationships
between residents of different ethnicities are vastly different
from the way that they were before the war. Stories from before
the war highlight close friendships across ethnic differences and
a sense of the irrelevancy of ethnicity. In post-war Tegare, informal
gatherings of community members for coffee are never mixed groups.
When residents are in need of sugar or another form of non-urgent
assistance, they approach community members of their own ethnicity.
Despite efforts to preserve a vision of community life that is in
concert with pre-war Tegare, it is clear that things have changed.
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‘That it will be Better:’
The Story of Kamenica- March 2005
This paper represents the second part of Laurie's wider
research project, “Building Social Cohesion in Bosnia and
Herzegovina.” Kamenica is the second community in a three-community
case-study that includes two other remote, returnee villages in
different geographic areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
In many ways, Kamenica is an example of the type of productive
community life that many organizations and people have hoped and
worked to support throughout Bosnia and Herzegovina in the post-war
period. In addition to community members' ability to come together
for productive action, Kamenica is a place were inter-ethnic relations
remain positive and separate ethnic groups still manage to live
together in one community. On the other hand, Kamenica also faces
what might be the greatest challenge for communities in Bosnia and
Herzegovina as they advance from the post-war period into the next
phase of transition and development. The unemployment rate in Kamenica
remains approximately 90 percent. Read
more>>
'So that we can make something:'
The Story of Kupres- May 2005
This paper represents the third part of Laurie's wider research
project, “Building Social Cohesion in Bosnia and Herzegovina.”
Kupres is the third and final community in a three-community case-study
that includes two other remote, returnee villages in different geographic
areas of Bosnia and Herzegovina.
A conviction that Kupres can and must be better comes in part
from a strong sense of collective identity, from the belief that
being from Kupres somehow sets individuals apart and unites them.
Frequently, when discussing any significance or meaning associated
with being from Kupres, people replied that Kuprešaki are somehow
different from other Bosnian-Herzegovinians due to their ability
to survive difficult winters and life at such a high altitude. When
asked if there was any meaning to being from Kupres, Branimir articulated
a common sentiment when he replied, ''(Kupres) is in my heart. I
was born here. I think that there is nowhere better.''
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