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11 JEMIE 80 (2012)
Between the Integration and Accommodation of Ethnic Difference: Decentralization in the Republic of Macedonia

handle is hein.journals/jemie2012 and id is 378 raw text is: Journal on Ethnopolitics and Minority Issues in Europe ii E Vol. 11, No. 3, 2012, 80-103 Copyright C ECMI 25 January 2013 This article is located at: http://www.ecmi.de/fileadmin/downloads/publications/JEMIE/2012/Lyon.pdf Between the Integration and Accommodation of Ethnic Difference: Decentralization in the Republic of Macedonia Aisling Lyon* University of Bradford The decentralization process in the Republic of Macedonia has been widely regarded as a success story by regional and international actors alike. It is frequently considered a suitable non-territorial model of ethnic conflict management that can be replicated elsewhere. By increasing the number of competences administered at the municipal level, in addition to replicating the central government's system of consociational power-sharing locally, the reforms seek to provide local, culturally diverse communities with greater control over the management of their own affairs and resources. This paper will begin with a theoretical discussion of how municipal decentralization may offer an institutional solution for managing and preserving cultural diversity within unitary states. It will seek to position Macedonia's decentralization reforms within the ongoing theoretical debate between integrationists and accommodationists, and will offer some initial observations on how the reform's implementation thus far have diverged from the original intentions of the Ohrid Framework Agreement. Key words: Decentralization; cultural pluralism; consociationalism; Macedonia; accommodation; integration. The decentralization process in the Republic of Macedonia' has been widely regarded as a success story by regional and international actors alike. It is frequently considered a suitable non-territorial model of ethnic conflict management that can be replicated elsewhere, such as in neighbouring Kosovo. The reforms, which form part of a more comprehensive peace process defined by the Ohrid Framework Agreement (hereafter, Framework Agreement) of 2001, offer limited autonomy to Macedonia's ethnic communities, in particular the ethnic Albanians. By increasing the number of competences administered at the municipal level, in addition to replicating the central government's system of consociational power-sharing locally, the reform process * Aisling Lyon is a Doctoral Student in the Department of Peace Studies, University of Bradford, UK. Email: amlyon@student.bradford.ac.uk and aislinglyon@hotmail.com. 80

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