Institute for European Studies, Belgrade

DEMOCRACY, HUMAN RIGHTS AND ETHNIC CONFLICTS IN

SERBIA AND THE REST OF THE EUROPE IN THE PROCESSES OF EUROPEAN INTEGRATION

AND GLOBALIZATION

Prof. Dr. Zlatko IsakovicProfessorial FellowInstitute for European StudiesBelgrade, Serbia

Full ProfessorInternational University, Faculty of the Humanistic SciencesNovi Pazar, Belgrade DepartmentMailing Address:Pozeska 92, apt. 611030 BelgradeSerbiaTel./fax: +381 11 3551-158Email: isa@bitsyu.net

zlatkoi@diplomacy.bg.ac.rs

The relationships between: ethnic conflicts and democracy and human rights

in Serbia and the rest of Europe within the processes of European integration and globalization

Democracy and Human Rights → Ethnic Conflicts

Impacts:Preventive andresolving

Ethnic Conflicts → Democracy and Human Rights

Negative impacts of the ethnic and some other conflicts (in particular, violently escalated ones)

Conclusions In some way and to some degree, the relations between democracy and ethnic conflicts could be compared with those between water and fire.

The more conflicts, the harder it is to achieve democracy and human rights protection and even more so to experience them and vice versa.

If a system cannot be qualified as democratic one and respectful for human rights, emerge the complex dilemma what should come first: Developing democracy and respecting human rights or

eliminating ethnic conflicts and/or preventing their escalations/deescalating them.

An analogous conclusion can be created for the relationships between ethnic conflicts (especially escalated ones) and European integration as well as globalization processes.

There are a few various practical and theoretical solutions and answers of these dilemmas.