Narrating Negative Peace: A Critical Analysis of Intelligence Support to the Dayton Peace Agreement

Abstract

This study applies methods from narrative analysis to declassified intelligence documents regarding the Bosnian War of the 1990s and the Dayton Peace Agreement. An examination of themes, characters and plots demonstrated construction of four narratives about the Balkans in intelligence analysis of the conflict: Perpetual Conflict, Muslim Victimhood, Lawlessness, and Fanaticism. Narratives of difference generated an understanding of the Balkan Other resulting in a necessarily coercive approach to peacemaking. Characterizations of the conflict suggested an Orientalist perspective in analysis which may have foreshadowed a neo-Orientalist security paradigm in the post-Cold War era. Additionally, Wild West imagery in the data was suggestive of a New Frontierism in the justification of an expeditionary project for the United States in Bosnia.