Thirty years after the signing of the Dayton Peace Agreement that ended the Bosnian War, Bosnia and Herzegovina faces its most profound political crisis since the end of hostilities.
Institutional stagnation, heightened nationalist politics and renewed pressure for greater territorial decentralization point to a system that is approaching its structural limits.
The Dayton Agreement was reached in Ohio on November 21, 1995. Although it brought an end to three-and-a-half years of fighting, it left Bosnia with a complex and fragmented framework for governance.
The post-war territorial arrangement divided the country into two entities, the Serb-majority Republika Srpska and the Bosniak-Croat Federation of Bosnia and Herzegovina, with the Brcko District serving as a neutral buffer to prevent territorial consolidation that could enable secession.
Richard Holbrooke’s warnings
During a visit to Banja Luka in Republika Srpska 20 years ago, the chief architect of the Dayton Agreement, US diplomat Richard Holbrooke, warned that political actors in Bosnia and Herzegovina continued to advocate for a third, Croat entity within Bosnia, the secession of Republika Srpska or the dismantling of the current configuration.
He cautioned that such aspirations could jeopardize the stability Dayton had created. His condition for progress — consensus between all sides — remains unmet to this day.
Indeed the 30-year absence of political consensus in Bosnia has brought the Dayton peace architecture close to breaking point.
Moreover, debates over the secession of Republika Srpska and the longstanding Croat demand for a third entity have resurfaced with renewed intensity in recent years, highlighting the unresolved structural disputes embedded in the constitutional order.
Presidential election on November 23
Against this backdrop, voters in Republika Srpska will go to the polls on Sunday to elect a new president.
Early presidential elections were called after Bosnia’s Central Election Commission revoked the mandate of long-term Republika Srpska President Milorad Dodik in August after the highest court in the country sentenced him to one year in prison and barred him from all political activity for six years for disregarding decisions by the High Representative Christian Schmidt, the international envoy tasked with enforcing the Dayton Agreement.
While he avoided a prison sentence by paying a fine, Dodik continues to operate as the dominant political figure in the entity.
‘The president of all presidents’
Although Dodik has named Sinisa Karan as his candidate for the November 23 election, he has also openly signaled that he intends to maintain de facto control — regardless of the formal distribution of power — proclaiming himself “the most important man” in Republika Srpska and “the president of all presidents.”
His position has been reinforced by the recent US decision to lift sanctions imposed on him seven years ago despite the fact that he spent months threatening Bosnia’s constitutional order and taking action aimed at establishing parallel institutions, following a final court ruling against him.
Who are the frontrunners in the election?
Sinisa Karan, a former minister of internal affairs of Republika Srpska, is Milorad Dodik’s right-hand man and seen as his puppet and pawn in the game against political opponents.
Six candidates are running in the election. Support for four of them is negligible, which means that Karan’s only real opponent in Sunday’s poll is Branko Blanusa.
Unlike Karan, Blanusa is a complete unknown in Republika Srpska’s political landscape. A professor at the University of Banja Luka and a member of the Serbian Democratic Party, Blanusa was nominated by the party because none of its senior political figures wanted to run for the presidency just a year ahead of Bosnia’s next parliamentary election.
Will it be a tight race?
Polls indicate that Karan and Blanusa are neck and neck and that a small number of votes will decide the winner.
If Karan wins, it is expected that he will serve Dodik by only signing acts under the president’s jurisdiction, while Dodik continues to perform all other functions.
If Blanusa wins, the political situation will certainly become more complicated. Dodik has already said that should Blanusa win, Dodik’s SNSD party, which holds the parliamentary majority, will prevent the winner from being sworn in and assuming his presidential duties.
This could lead to mass protests.
Impact on national politics
At national level, governance of Bosnia and Herzegovina relies on the sharing of power among Serbs, Bosniaks and Croats.
During the legal proceedings against Dodik over the past year, Republika Srpska stepped up its blockades of national Bosnian institutions such as the Council of Ministers and the parliament. The intention was obviously to exert pressure on the judiciary.
Bosniak representatives in the coalition government at national level responded to this by leaving the coalition it had formed with Dodik’s SNSD and the Croat party of Dragan Covic, which continued to align politically with Dodik.
Since then, the Bosnian government has existed only on paper.
The Serbo-Croat partnership is rooted in the two groups’ shared interest in the creation of autonomous ethno-national units for Serbs and Croats within Bosnia and Herzegovina, a move that would effectively dismantle the existing Dayton structure.
Little progress in 30 years
As a result, three decades after Dayton, Bosnia finds itself back in the negotiation positions of 1995.
Since Dayton, institutional reforms in Bosnia have been minimal, and European integration remains largely declarative, lacking substantive progress.
In short, Bosnia and Herzegovina is weaker, more polarized and further from institutional consolidation than at any point since the agreement was signed.
The crisis now unfolding underscores the fragility of a political system that has survived far longer than its original architects believed possible, yet remains fundamentally vulnerable to the same pressures that shaped its creation.
It is highly unlikely that the outcome of Sunday’s election will change that.
Edited by: Aingeal Flanagan
