Memory and Youth Activism in the Post-Conflict Balkans: The Lost Generation's Powerful Tweets

Over the past couple of decades, post-conflict justice processes in the Balkan region have included a variety of protagonists, including governments, international bodies, and civil society. These actors put in place various mechanisms to cope with mass atrocities committed during the conflict in the 1990s, such as international trials in The Hague, domestic trials in many of the former states of Yugoslavia, and several truth commission attempts. In recent years there has also been a rise in youth activism to confront human rights violations and war crimes. However, literature in transitional justice that addresses this phenomenon remains underdeveloped. In fact, current studies and reports analyze post-conflict youth issues from a normative perspective, often suggesting best practices and policy strategies on how to include traumatized youth in transitional justice processes. Little is known about why Balkan societies have witnessed the emergence of bottom-up youth activism across the region. Withstanding roaring youth unemployment and lingering political and economic uncertainty in the region, these youth have spun transnational advocacy networks to foster accountability, transparency, and remembering. What factors led to the formation of their ambitious goals? Who has shaped their ideas? This ethnographic study examines the young leaders’ motivations and aspirations against the backdrop of their socio-professional background. It explores the young leaders’ relationship to challenging questions on truth, justice, and memory, particularly in view of their personal war-related experiences. This research draws on over two-dozen in-depth interviews with youth activist leaders across the former Yugoslavia, supported by prosopographic analysis. In his findings, the author explains why the memory processes against violence—which are fostered by these youth activists—diverge from the apathy of the so-called lost generation in the Balkans and help the formation of a post-conflict identity.