Politeia

THE ATTITUDE OF YOUNG PEOPLE IN BOSNIA AND HERZEGOVINA TOWARDS DIGITAL CONTENT - BETWEEN VIRTUAL AND REAL REALITY

Dragana Trninic, Anđela Kuprešanin Vukelić — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 19:24:30 +0100

Young people in Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH), members of Generation Z, most often get their information through digital media, i.e. social networks, mostly choosing entertaining, interesting and humorous content. Social networks are their first choice for information and they spend most of their free time with them. The focus of the paper is on digital media content that young people often use. The aim of the paper is to identify specific internet portals, social network accounts, influential individuals or groups that young people follow and whose content they consume the most. The results collected using the survey method using an online questionnaire indicate that young people in BiH visit the following internet portals the most: Nezavisne.com, Klix.ba, Rtrs.tv, while on social networks they most often follow the accounts of influencers and celebrities. Also, most young people do not distinguish between internet portals and social network accounts. Their favorite influencers or YouTubers are: Zorana Jovanović, Anja Blagojević, Adriana Džehverović and Baka Prase. It is concluded that young people in BaH do not often use digital media and social networks in a productive way and that they lack adequate media and information literacy skills to use the capacity of digital media for education, personal development, assistance in learning or navigating everyday life.

(UN)MEASURABILITY OF VIOLENCE: THE LIMITS OF QUANTIFYING VIOLENCE IN CONTEMPORARY SOCIETIES

Kristina Pejkovic — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 19:18:08 +0100

The central topic of this paper is to theoretically examine the issue of measuring violence in societies, with the aim of addressing the question whether violence in society can be measured at all. In line with this aim, the paper presents the fundamental challenges related to defining and classifying violence, as well as the established methods for measuring violence and their limitations. There is no single, universally accepted definition or typology of violence; they both depend on various cultural, ideological, and political factors. What all definitions share, however, is the recognition that violence results in different forms of injuries or the killings of individuals. A particularly controversial form of violence is the invisible, or structural violence, which—due to the scope of its consequences—should not be excluded from analyses attempting to assess levels of violence in societies, yet it often is. For this reason, the paper draws significantly on Galtung’s theory of structural violence. The main premise of this paper is that measuring violence in a society cannot be done precisely, as significant limitations persist. Some of these include: (1) the general problem of quantifying social phenomena; (2) determining what should be considered as violence and what is relevant for measurement; (3) less visible forms of violence, such as structural violence and domestic violence; (4) limitations in the recording of violent incidents; and (5) spatial and temporal constraints. Accordingly, the goal of this paper is to encourage reflection on which indicators—beyond the commonly used ones, such as homicide rate—should be taken into account when assessing the level of violence within a society.

ON THE IMPORTANCE OF INTUITIONS IN POLITICAL PROCESSES IN THE AGE OF POLITICAL APATHY

Srđan Prodanović — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 00:00:00 +0100

The paper explores the theoretical importance of intuitions in political processes, especially in the moments when there is a crisis in the reproduction of the dominant social norms. In this regard, particular attention is paid to the fact that today’s social institutions and conventional political organizations have largely lost their authority, which in turn has led to political apathy and the rise of post-political attitudes. Political intuitions, often based on experience and unconscious associations, can therefore play the key role in radical forms of democracy, most notably in times of crisis. The paper focuses on the difference between everyday political intuitions and intuitions about politics, emphasizing their importance in shaping public discourse and political decisions.

POLITICAL PARTICIPATION AND TRUST OF YOUTH IN SERBIA AND THE REPUBLIC OF SRPSKA IN POLITICAL INSTITUTIONS

Đorđe Vuković, Aleksandar Vranješ, Srđan Radanović — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 19:57:14 +0100

This paper examines the level of political trust and patterns of political participation among young people in Serbia and the Republic of Srpska, focusing on members of Generation Z. Using a mixed-method approach and a sample of 555 respondents, the study analyzes key dimensions of political culture, including media literacy, political involvement, cynicism, anomie, institutional trust, authoritarian tendencies, and attitudes toward national symbols. The findings reveal a strikingly low level of trust in essential political institutions—government, parliament, presidency, judiciary, and political parties—despite a relatively high rate of electoral participation. Most young people believe that political parties do not represent citizens’ interests, that media are not reliable sources of information, and that individuals have no real possibility to influence political decision-making. Although Generation Z shows strong attachment to national symbols and displays tolerance toward diversity, there is a growing sense of political cynicism, marginalization, and dissatisfaction with traditional democratic institutions for failing to meet the expectations of young people. The results point to a structural crisis of political legitimacy and emphasize the need for new mechanisms to meaningfully integrate young people into political processes. Strengthening the institutional trust of Generation Z emerges as a key prerequisite for democratic consolidation.

THE ILLUSION: AN OLD–NEW FORM OF IDEOLOGY IN THE SERVICE OF GOOD OR EVIL

BOZIDAR VASILJEVIC — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 20:47:10 +0100

The Illusion occupies a central place in the human quest for meaning, shaping the ways in which we perceive, interpret, and act upon the world. It is neither purely deceptive nor inherently liberating, but a dynamic interplay between construction and concealment. By creating symbolic frameworks, illusions allow us to transform uncertainty into coherence and chaos into orientation. Yet, the same force that sustains hope and collective identity can also distort reality, preserve power hierarchies, and silence alternative perspectives. Within contemporary societies — increasingly defined by media saturation, digital hyperreality, and fragmented truths — the role of illusion becomes even more complex and urgent. Understanding its double-edged nature is not a matter of rejecting illusions altogether, but of discerning when they serve life, creativity, and freedom, and when they become instruments of manipulation, control, and existential detachment.

(PARA)MILITARY UNIT »BLACK CORPS« (»AZOV«) AS THE MOST FAMOUS POLITICAL-MILITARY EXPRESSION OF EXTREME UKRAINIAN NATIONALISM

Marko Mijatović — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 20:57:19 +0100

After Ukraine gained independence in 1991 and a period of long-term equidistance between the East and West, Ukrainian politics definitively turned towards the West in the period after the »Maidan« events in the winter of 2013/14, when pro-Western – liberal, but also nationalist political forces willing to separate Ukraine from the Russian Federation in every respect came to power (for the second time). This was also the beginning of open tensions with the Russian Federation, and then came the Russian annexation of Crimea and the beginning of military conflicts in the Luhansk and Donetsk regions. The newly declared policy of Ukraine, led by Ukrainian liberal and right-wing politicians, was the »decommunization of the country« and the »nationalization of the nation«, which opened a wide space for extreme right-wing Ukrainian political movements and paramilitary groups, among which over time the most exposed one became the Kharkiv group Black Corps (later the battalion, the Azov regiment and finally the brigade ‒ the Twelfth Brigade of the National Guard, or the Third Independent Brigade of the Armed Forces of Ukraine). The aim of this paper is to systematize the previous knowledge, i. e. to present the history, ideology and activities of the (para)military unit „Black Corps” (later »Azov«), as the paradigm of the (para)military-political form of developing the contemporary extreme Ukrainian nationalism.

MIGRATION TOWARD EUROPE IN THE CONTEXT OF SAMUEL HUNTINGTON’S CLASH OF CIVILIZATIONS THEORY

Ljubiša Malenica — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 21:08:22 +0100

The article examines the phenomenon of mass migration of millions of people from African and Asian countries to Europe through the lens of Samuel Huntington’s theory of the clash of civilizations. The emphasis is placed on the security dimension of these processes and their potential to transform the countries of contemporary Western Europe within Huntington’s categorization of state types. The paper primarily focuses on the relationship between Western and Islamic civilizations, as defined by Huntington. The differing perceptions of migration in Eastern and Western Europe highlight Western Europe as the area most exposed to transformation driven by migration. By observing demographic trends among the indigenous European population and incoming migrant communities, along with demographic developments within Muslim countries, the article underscores the potential for the most significant Western European countries to transition from clearly defined members of Western civilization to the category of “cleft” and “torn” states. At the same time, the text also emphasizes the importance of individuals as carriers of identity, recognizing in that context a reciprocal link between the transitional processes at the state level, as formulated by Huntington, and the migratory movements and demographic trends of the migrant population. The conclusion stresses the importance of demography in Huntington’s theory of civilizations, as the demographic presence and strength ultimately determine both the borders of a state within a given civilization and the scope of the civilization itself.

THE IDEOLOGY OF SAMENESS

Dušan Dostanić — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 21:10:45 +0100

Review of the book ideology of Sameness

SOFT POWER AND GREAT-POWER COMPETITION

Vladana Šekara — Wed, 10 Dec 2025 21:12:48 +0100

Joseph Nye, Soft Power and Great-Power Competition – Shifting Sands in the Balance of Power Between the United States and China, Springer, 2023.