The Yugoslav Wars as a Palimpsest. Ontological Security, Serbia’s Anti-Western Narratives, and the War in Ukraine

Abstract The Russian aggression against Ukraine triggered memories of the Yugoslav wars of the 1990s throughout the countries that experienced war. From the images of bombed buildings, similar in architecture, to narratives of “invented nations” and territorial claims, the Russian aggression echoes many themes and memories of the Yugoslav wars. The debates of the war have been primarily shaped by viewing the current war through the lens of the past war. The article will explore the perception of the Russian aggression against Ukraine in Serbia through the lens of the wars of the 1990s as an example of transnational memory, where the memorialization of the past engages with the perception of contemporary wars. It seeks to understand to what degree narratives are imported or transferred, or how preexisting memorial narratives are interwoven with more significant transnational debates and discourses about the war in Ukraine. Through the concept of ontological security, the research note explores how Serbian pro-government media construct narratives about the war in Ukraine. It will identify how the war is read through key themes that dominate the narrative of the Yugoslav wars. In doing so, it argues that the reading of the Russian war in Ukraine, as presented by the government to the public, rejects the emerging European memory framework and builds ontological security through an anti-Western narrative.