The two-day international scientific meeting organized by the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts and the University of Donja Gorica "State, Democracy, Citizen - Crisis and Challenges", which took place at the Montenegrin Academy on November 28 and 29, brought together some of the biggest names in the field of contemporary political philosophy , law, sociology, political science and other humanities with the aim of answering or at least posing critical questions to the key dilemmas of the contemporary political and social moment in Montenegro and the world.
In the invitation of the organizing committee of the meeting, consisting of prof. Dr. Žarko Puhovski, prof. Dr. Milan Podunavac and Prof. Ilija Vujačić, Ph.D., the thematic-problematic framework of this scientific meeting was stated, in which more than twenty participants from the country and the region took part.
The global crises of the modern world, migrations, pandemics, wars, increasingly radical identity politics have shaken trust in institutional, cultural and symbolic tools, which, in a complex "civilizing process" (Elias), served societies as a support to free themselves from existential fears, thus establishing "bare life" (Agamben), limiting human rights and denying human dignity, through the restoration of "constitutional dictatorships" (Rossiter) and illiberal political orders. Almost all the levers on which modern constitutional democracies rest have been put to the test. Territorial integrity of states, sovereignty, constitutionality, democratic legitimacy acquire perverted and pathological forms. At work are: the return of pre-modern forms of political constitution; the destruction of the boundaries between external and internal sovereignty; demonstration of the "right of the stronger", followed by violent calls for classification and collective ostracism; constitutional hypocrisy, followed by the collapse of the rule of law; general militarization of contemporary political societies; extended mistrust in democracy and the rise of the "enemies of democracy" (authoritarianism, populism, nationalism, demagoguery, plutocracy), with the dominance of the semi-ideological construct of populism along with the depluralization of the public sphere.
These deep tectonic changes have a strong impact on the region, including Montenegro. The stabilocracies of this region, along with constitutional hypocrisies and low integrative potentials and the inability of the constitution to control the political sovereignty of the people, face old and new challenges of democratic transition, and the construction of a legal and civil state.
The change of government in Montenegro after two decades of stabilocracy opens up new horizons, but also challenges the unpredictability of an unconsolidated new government after 2020 in the form of a kind of fragilocracy. Political confusion sharpened the issue of inadequate and "unfinished", even non-existent, legal and constitutional solutions and truncated judicial institutions, all of which produces a constitutional crisis and deepens the problems of constitutionality and legality. A decade and a half after the constitutional establishment, the concept of the civil state is in serious crisis and the basic integrative question about collective identity and the foundations of common life is still open, and the process of ethnicization of public policies and nationalization of public discourse continued even after the political changes. All this in the constitutional and political order of Montenegro produces a form of tension between "constitutional identity" based on the construct of the civil state and "extra-constitutional identities" - which are based on the politics of pre-political or non-political identities. Civil state and civil identity require more complex mechanisms of organizing and producing consent. This meeting was an opportunity to open such a discussion.
Academician Dragan K. Vukčević, president of the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts, opened the scientific conference with the introductory presentation "Shaping the Citizen" and a welcome speech.
The scientific meeting had three thematic blocks.
The first, entitled "The state and the crisis of democracy: populism, depluralization of the public sphere and loss of trust in democracy", dealt with the initial questions, the basic theoretical and practical dilemmas of contemporary democracy. In this part of their reports, prof. dr Siniša Jelušić "About the citizen or how to become a personality?" prof. Dr. Nenad Dimitrijević "The Constitution as 'what is really happening' - a crisis of constitutional democracy or the end of the era of constitutional pragmatism?", prof. Dr. Alpar Lošonc "Deglobalization: restoration or transformation of statehood in Central and Eastern Europe", prof. Đorđe Pavićević, Ph.D. "Production and legitimization of the void: extraordinary premiums of the government and the impotence of citizens", prof. Dr. Miodrag Jovanović "Social contract - from 'form of association' to 'constitutional identity'", prof. Dr. Milan I. Marković "Constitutional democracy - problems and challenges", prof. PhD Nerzuk Ćurak "Crisis of cosmopolitan Europe and the triumph of sovereign populisms", prof. Dr. Petar Popović "How powerful is the EU? Analysis of European foreign policy positioning", prof. Dr. Marko Dokić "Individual freedom and changes in the role of the state" and prof. Dr. Marko Simendić "Citizens as they think they are and order as it can be: a few lessons from Machiavelli".
The second thematic block is dedicated to the regional socio-political and constitutional-legal dynamics: "Transformation and integrative properties of the founding constitutions and the reasons for the legitimation deficits of the new democracies in the region". In this segment of the meeting, the following spoke: prof. PhD Siniša Tatalović "Ethnic relations, minority rights and security in Southeastern Europe", Academician Slavo Kukić "Bosnia and Herzegovina in the gap between civil and national and the rule of law, crime and corruption", prof. Nebojša Vladisavljević, Ph.D. "Consociations without democracy and people's conflicts over self-determination in the territory of the former Yugoslavia", prof. Dr. Duško Radosavljević "The space of post-Yugoslavia between fascism and post-fascism" and prof. Dr. Asim Mujkić "The model of the Brčko district of Bosnia and Herzegovina as a pragmatic civil model of local self-government in an ethno-nationalist country".
The third thematic block of this scientific meeting was contextual and dealt with issues of contemporary historical, social and political reality of Montenegro, with the title: "State between civil and national: civil state understood contextually". In this part, their presentations were given by: prof. Dr. Milan Podunavac "Montenegro between charismatic and democratic legitimacy", prof. Dr. Ilija Vujacic "We the people in the Montenegrin 'key': integrative properties of the 'civil state' construct", prof. dr Srđan Darmanović "Montenegro from the rule of the dominant party to the fragmented party system", prof. dr Mladen Vukčević "Violation of the principle of constitutionality in the conditions of political crises (forms and answers)", prof. Dr. Živko Andrijašević "National identities in Montenegro in the 2020st century", prof. Dr. Nermina Mujagić "Trouble of multicultural states: Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro in search of their citizens", doc. Ph.D. Predrag Zenović "Post-August political horizon - Montenegro as a fragilocracy", doc. Dr. Branko Bošković "Media and democracy in Montenegro: challenges of freedom of speech", doc. PhD Nikoleta Đukanović "Democratization and Europeanization of Montenegro in the light of political changes after XNUMX", PhD Nikola Saranović "Religion and identity politics in Montenegro" and MA Boris Bastijančić "Review of the (un)constitutionality of the Law on the President of Montenegro".
After the presentations in the individual sessions, a discussion was held, and the audience had the opportunity to ask the participants questions. The scientific papers presented during the conference will be published in a special edition of the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts.
If Socrates was right when he said at the fateful trial that "an ill-considered life is not worth living", then the same could be true for the political life of a political community, whether we understand it cosmopolitan or, more realistically, in the key of the nation-state.
With this scientific gathering, the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts and the University of Donja Gorica made an undoubted contribution to the reflection of global and European socio-political currents, but also the challenges facing the political community of Montenegro and opened an academic forum of reasoned, diverse and different arguments, in the spirit the best traditions of socio-critical thought of this area.
Bonus video:
