Description
Book SynopsisThe 19921995 battle for Sarajevo was the longest siege in modern history. It was also the most internationalized, attracting a vast contingent of aid workers, UN soldiers, journalists, smugglers, and embargo-busters. The city took center stage under an intense global media spotlight, becoming the most visible face of post-Cold War conflict and humanitarian intervention. However, some critical activities took place backstage, away from the cameras, including extensive clandestine trading across the siege lines, theft and diversion of aid, and complicity in the black market by peacekeeping forces.
In Blue Helmets and Black Markets, Peter Andreas traces the interaction between these formal front-stage and informal backstage activities, arguing that this created and sustained a criminalized war economy and prolonged the conflict in a manner that served various interests on all sides. Although the vast majority of Sarajevans struggled for daily survival and lived in a state
Trade Review
Blue Helmets and Black Markets provides a template for analyzing international interventions, suggesting that looking beyond the standard actors and actions yields some significant insights.
* International Studies Review *
Andreas does not deny the suffering or the heroism of those caught in the siege of Sarajevo or the deadly earnestness of those who maintained it. But he wants to make this savage tale whole by exposing corruption's part in exploiting and sustaining the violence. Andreas, with prose as lean as his analysis is rich, avoids moral judgments and focuses instead on the two-sided aspects of this sort of war: the illicit commerce between the warring parties, the profiteering by politicians struggling to save a community, the indulgences of outside agencies sent to help the victims.
* Foreign Affairs *
In this provocative study, Andreas examines the unexpected consequences of humanitarian intervention.... Drawing on extensive interviews, diaries, and memoirs of participants, and newspaper accounts, among other sources, Andreas argues that the internationalization of the siege paradoxically prolonged the conflict. Humanitarian assistance the international community provided to the people of Sarajevo became incorporated into the criminalized war economy that flourished in the besieged city.... The study also reveals the much more complex social dynamics that emerged and flourished during the conflict. In particular, far from severing ties between ethnic groups, the war economy sustained informal contacts and cross-ethnic collaboration in the midst of conflict. Andreas argues that the example of Sarajevo strongly suggests that uncovering the hidden dynamics of war economies is important because their legacies outlast a conflict's end and continue to shape postconflict reconstruction. Highly recommended.
* Choice *
Table of ContentsPreface1. The Longest Siege
Sarajevo on Center Stage
The Cast of Characters
Front Stage and Backstage: Formal and Informal Roles
Conflict Narratives
Criminalized Conflict Narratives
Preview2. Imposing the Siege
The Road to Siege Warfare
The Start of the Siege and the Criminally Aided Defense
The International Response3. Sustaining the Siege
Diverting and Manipulating Humanitarian Aid
Exploiting the Privileges of Mobility and Access
The UN-Controlled Airport as Smuggling Hub
Tunneling under the Siege: Lifeline and Profit Center
Trading with the Enemy
The Media and Its Dependence on the Black Market
The Money Letter Smuggling System
The Smugglers' Markets and Cigarettes as Currency4. The Siege Within
Criminal Defenders as Predators
Political Corruption, Abuse, and Opportunism
Obstructing Access to Water5. Lifting the Siege
Front Stage:Triggering NATO Air Strikes
Backstage: Shifting the Military Balance by Evading the UN Arms Embargo6. Aftermath
The Criminalized Aftermath of War
The Criminalized New Elite
Sarajevo as Transit Point for Migrant Smuggling
Sex Trafficking and Peacekeeping
The Arizona Market: Peace through Illicit Trade?7. Extensions
Srebrenica
Leningrad
Grozny
FallujaConclusions
Revisiting Sarajevo
Lessons from SarajevoNotes
Index
