Regional Watch
Dr. Jared O. Bell
Inclusive Policy Expert, UNESCO
It is hard not to recall a similar scenario in 1995, when Bosnia and Herzegovina (BiH) emerged from one of the most brutal wars of the late 20th century, and the U.S.-brokered Dayton Accords aimed to build peace and long-term stability. While the Dayton Peace Agreement ended the bloodshed, it ultimately served as a temporary fix, bandaging the wounds of a 3½-year war without addressing its root causes or laying a foundation for reconciliation, a functioning government, or a shared national vision.
BiH’s postconflict strategy prioritized rapid institutional engineering over inclusive, grassroots healing, replicating top-down, externally driven frameworks. The result: a peace that endures in form, but not in substance—in other words, a textbook definition of negative peace—where violence stops but structural injustice, mutual mistrust, and institutional paralysis persist.
To overcome the legacies of authoritarianism, civil war, and sectarian fragmentation, Syria must uphold human rights and justice in accordance with international law and accountable governance.
So far, the transitional government has taken some tentative steps toward this imperative. A Transitional Justice Commission and the National Commission for the Missing were established in May to investigate Assad-era abuses, establish facts about missing persons, support truth-telling, and recommend reparations and reform. Meanwhile, local councils and civil society groups, some of which are backed by international partners, are initiating dialogues, documenting atrocities, and experimenting with small-scale reconciliation in former conflict zones.
These are promising starts, but these initiatives remain fragile and lack adequate resources. Without a comprehensive, nationally owned process, they risk becoming symbolic rather than transformative. As Syria navigates its transition, it and the international community must heed three critical lessons from BiH’s postwar experience.
BiH Failure: Postwar justice and governance frameworks were largely imposed from outside, thus sidelining domestic voices. Despite institutions like the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia (ICTY) and national courts, the country remains fractured, its politics mired in ethno-political rivalry and mutual distrust.
Syria Application: The processes of transitional justice, governance, and reconciliation must be Syrian-designed—and the very meaning of peace Syrian-defined. This step, even if it slows the process, is necessary to avoid both the perception and reality of foreign-imposed outcomes.
Stakes: Without Syrian buy-in, reconciliation and trust will wither, rendering institutions ineffective.
BiH Failure: The postwar Dayton framework entrenched divisions, embedding ethnic quotas and fostering zero-sum politics where one ethnicity’s interests routinely override the national good.
Syrian Application: Avoid embedding sectarian divisions in postwar governance; instead, establish electoral and administrative systems that strengthen national unity and promote shared citizenship.
Stakes: The alternative is to hardwire today’s wartime fault lines into tomorrow’s political map, locking in instability and stalling lasting peace and recovery.
BiH Failure: The Office of the High Representative had been intended to stabilize governance; instead, it stifled democratic development and accountability, with decades of foreign oversight eroding local legitimacy.
Syria Application: Oppose open-ended external control, accepting only time-bound, targeted aid on terms set by Syria.
Stakes: Lasting stability requires self-governance that allows Syrians to fail and recover, nurturing organic, locally led change. To avoid repeating the failures that have haunted other post-conflict recoveries, Syria’s reconstruction must rest on three pillars: truth, sovereignty, and accountability. First, reckon honestly with the past through credible truth-seeking and inclusive dialogue so that peace is anchored in reality, not revisionism. Second, center Syrian agency by ensuring governance, constitutional reform, and economic recovery are led by Syrians themselves, with international actors offering support, not scripts. Third, embed enforceable accountability mechanisms, both domestic and international, to guard against impunity and the return of repression. Ignore these three lessons, and neither peace nor genuine reconciliation will ever take root.
History shows that when these pillars are absent, fragile peace collapses, and cycles of violence resume. Syria has a fleeting chance to break the cycle, or to repeat the same failures, but only Syrians can be the authors of their own destiny.
