Macedonia and NATO: Overcoming Bucharest Summit legacy
Publisher: Lidija Georgieva
Volume: 13 pages, pdf
Description:
Republic of Macedonia and NATO were engaged into mutual relationship only after the country has entered the process of independence and democracy building in early 90’s. It was not “love on the first sight” but part of Macedonian politicians, than overburdened by collapsing of the former Yugoslavia and possible spread out of ethnic violence have come to a conclusion that Macedonia’s membership into NATO will facilitate the process of independence and kept it aside from nationalistic euphoria and ethnic violence. The Central European initiatives that facilitated relations among newly emerged democracies and NATO and have contributed to peaceful transition served as a guiding example. The proponents of NATO membership in Macedonia were using these arguments while justifying the goal of membership. In their opinion, institutionalization of the relations and full membership will beck up political transition and easy economic transformation. Even more, NATO membership was considered one of uncontested internal political issues until 2008 NATO Bucharest summit. Then the resolution of the name dispute with Republic of Greece was set up as precondition for issuing invitation and relations between Republic of Macedonia and NATO become definitely trapped within ontological security debate. This paper argues that even “small” states and “nations” while trapped into regional in/security dynamics are important security actors for prevention and resolution of acute conflicts. The case of Republic of Macedonia has been perceived as atypical from the point of ontological security theory also. This paper argue that in Macedonian case the claims for ontological security have been intensified whenever country name or national identity were questioned: as a consequence of external risks or as a consequence of internal political and inter-ethnic competition. I will argue that lack of sustainable ontological security declines the lineage between citizens and ontological security of the state. NATO as a security community should not overestimate the impact of ontological security issues both as a member or non- member state concern and their impact on security policy and reforms.