Choosing Stigma Management Strategy in Foreign Policy: The Case from the Balkans

• In Event: Foreign Policy of Small States

Abstract

Stigmatization and stigma management in international relations have received heightened attention in the last decade. Relying on Goffman’s sociological concepts of stigma and stigma management, seminal pieces of Zarakol (2010, 2011, 2014) and Adler-Nissen (2014a, 2014b) explain why states decide to cope with their stigma in international society and which strategies they pursue. Classifications of different stigma-management strategies are further developed by Chwieroth (2015), Kurowska and Reshetnikov (2021) and Rogstad (2022). However, factors that influence the choice of a stigmatized state’s stigma management strategy remain undertheorized.

Using insights from the Poliheuristic theory of political decision-making (Mintz 2004, 2005; Mintz and DeRouen 2010) and analysis of two cases: stigma management in Serbia and Croatia, we provide a more nuanced insight into the stigma management choice. Namely, we examine how the interplay of the timing – or when the actor held the position of authority relative to the stigmatization event – and past activities related to the stigmatization event may shape stigma management choices. This is conducted through an in-depth analysis of the relations between Serbia and Croatia from 2001 to 2020 focused on the foreign policy decision-making process of key political actors. Data sources include interviews with decision-makers from both countries as well as other primary sources such as official statements, key institutional press bulletins, autobiographies, and relevant news articles.

Based on the preliminary analysis, we classify four types of actors according to their role at the inception of the stigmatization. First are the actors who held the position of authority at the time the stigmatization occurred and were perceived as responsible for the acts that triggered the stigma. We argue that they are the least likely to exhibit stigma acceptance behavior in the foreign policy of their state. Second are those actors who were publicly opposing stigmatization, but did not hold any position of authority when it occurred. We argue that they will be less likely to exhibit stigma-acceptance behavior. Rather, they will continue denying the norm-breaking behavior of their state. Third are those actors who did hold minor positions of authority at the time of the stigmatization and were thus perceived as less directly involved in the decision-making at the time of the event. We argue that they are more likely to accept the responsibility for wrongdoings in the name of the state. More precisely, they exhibit stigma-acceptance behavior, while simultaneously trying to minimize their personal responsibility for these events. Finally, the fourth type of actors are those that did not hold the position of authority at the time of stigmatization and who publicly recognized that there is at least a part of the responsibility on the side of their state. We argue that they will be the most likely to pursue direct forms of stigma acceptance, such as public apologies for past wrongdoings.

Our findings contribute to the Poliheuristic theory of political decision-making (Mintz 2004, 2005; Mintz and DeRouen 2010) by illustrating that even actors who did not hold the position of authority at the time of the stigmatization but were publicly opposing it will disregard stigma acceptance as a rational option for their state. On the other hand, actors with the position of authority at the time of the event, but who were not publicly opposing it or were not perceived as the main decision-makers will be more likely to perceive that stigma acceptance could be good for the state. The factor which makes a difference is a perception of personal political costs for each group – where for one group the personal costs of stigma acceptance are considerably higher than for the other.

This study bridges two pieces of literature - Foreign Policy Analysis literature about political decision-making and International Relations literature about stigmatization and stigma management. It presents a novel attempt to explain the choice of stigma management strategy through the individual level of analysis. Other studies which tackled this issue at least partially (Zarakol 2011; Adler-Nissen 2014; Chwieroth 2015; Smetana 2020; Rogstad 2022) focused on the ideational and material factors and conditions coming from the international system or state/society dynamics as the level of analysis. While it is empirically focused on the two cases from the Balkans (Serbia and Croatia), its findings seem to be relevant for other similar examples as well, which will be additionally emphasized through digest comparison with other similar cases in the “discussion” chapter of the paper.

Authors

• Milan Krstic, University of Belgrade - Faculty of Political Science

• Djordje Milosevic, Southern Illinois University, Carbondale