The schedule presents an outline. See the complete abstracts.
View the detailed schedule.

Casual Drop In Dinner

Drop in dinner in the "Hump Room" of Nick's English Pub

Continental Breakfast

Introductions

• Dean Robel
  Dean and Val Nolan Professor of Law
• Maria Bucur-Deckard
  Director, Russian and East European Institute, and
  Associate Professor of History
• Lois Wise
  Professor and Director, Center for West European Studies and European Union Center of Excellence
• Timothy Waters
  Associate Professor of Law

Panel I: Causes of Death

Milošević's death was the formal cause of the trial's termination, but is that what killed the trial? Was it murder, suicide, or a preventable accident? This section examines why the trial developed as it did: What strategies were adopted by the prosecution, defense and judges? What role did Milošević's self-representation play? Was the Prosecution justly criticized for attempting to 'tell the story of the whole war.' Did the ICTY's design and norms contribute to the ultimate demise? Was the trial fair — and to whom?

• Marko Prelec

  Justice, Truth and Peace at the Hague Bourse

  Discussant: Alexander Greenawalt

  Did the Milošević trial leave the public with a truthful image of Milošević, the Balkan wars, and his role in them? And if not, why not? The prosecution portrayed the accused as the man most responsible for the atrocities committed in wars in Croatia, Bosnia and Kosovo. This image was built up from the Tribunal's earlier case records, in which Milošević had figured as the wizard behind his curtain, and from a decade of media commentary. In several important respects the evidence uncovered during the trial showed this image to be largely false: His relations with the Bosnian and Croatian Serb leadership, and his relationship with Ratko Mladic, were all very different from what the prosecution sought to prove. Yet Milošević's public image remains largely unchanged. Why has the Tribunal's truth-telling work had such little impact? And if the ICTY has not changed settled attitudes in the Balkans, has it contributed in other ways that justify the peacemaking responsibility assigned to it by the Security Council?

• Zdenko Tomanović

  Milošević's Day in Court

  Discussant: Christian Axboe Nielsen

  Who is responsible for the fact that the most important trial of the most important defendant in The Hague lasted for so long, and yet remained unfinished? Was there selectivity and inconsistency in the practical application of the rights to a fair and speedy trial, as well as to other guaranteed rights of the defendant? This chapter critically reviews Milošević's "Hague Justice" — from his extradition contrary to the laws of Serbia, through the megalomania of the prosecution and their ambitions towards political implications and historical revisionism, until his death in the fifth year of the trial.

Lunch

Panel II: Reporting the Demise

From its first day, impressions of the trial varied widely — from dramatic catharsis to the tedium of an actual trial in real time. This section examines the role of narrative and media in the trial. What role did media play in the public perceptions? How did the Tribunal's parties use or abuse public aspects of the trial? Did events in the courtroom shape attitudes in the former conflict zone? Were courtroom strategies themselves affected by perceptions in the former Yugoslavia? The section focuses particularly on public reaction in Serbia, but will also consider reaction in Bosnia and Kosovo.

• Ljiljana Smajlović

  The View from Belgrade

  Discussant: Frances Trix

  Politically dead and buried in Serbia after defeat by NATO — toppled by a wrathful electorate and handed over to the ICTY as a common criminal — Slobodan Milošević found new identity in The Hague. Paradoxically his war crimes trial resurrected him politically: He convinced half of Serbia that all Serbs were on trial with him. However, he could not have done it without the help of an under-scrutinized court and an inept prosecutorial team. His detractors thus became his enablers and, when he died, the chasm between Serbian public opinion and the West's perceived wisdom was larger than at the start of the court proceedings: The West's 'obstructionist' who tried to cheat international justice was, to most Serbs, a man who died tragically for lack of proper medical treatment, neglected by prison authorities and ridiculed by the prosecution.

• Filip Erdeljac

  From Corrupt Dictator to Self-Sacrificing Martyr: The Portrayal of the Milošević Trial in a Serbian Newspaper

  Discussant: Dejan Anastasijević

  Like much of the literature on the collapse of Yugoslavia, the prevailing theory at the ICTY assumes that guilt should be individualized. The idea of placing blame for a widespread conflict on a few may seem appealing in principle, but the trial of Milošević shows that such an approach is more complicated in practice. After his removal from power, Milošević's image in Serbia was tarnished, but public perceptions changed drastically when he was extradited to The Hague: By standing trial in an international court, Milošević ceased to be seen as a dictatorial oppressor of Serbs and was quickly transformed into a defender of Serbdom. As the trial got underway, daily newspapers that once opposed Milošević enthusiastically reported every time he exposed the allegedly anti-Serbian aims of the ICTY. Milošević's premature death led many Serbs to see him as a martyr who successfully exonerating the Serbian people. Instead of fostering reconciliation, the ICTY's misguided attempt at manufacturing a history of the conflict conducive to future stability helped generate a second wave of nationalist conspiracy theories and denial in Serbia.

• Florian Bieber

  The Show and the Trial: The Political Death of Milošević

  Discussant: David Binder

  Diverging from the view of the previous chapters in this section, this chapter argues that despite the continued spectacle of the Milošević trial which was widely broadcast in Serbia and viewed by his supporters, Milošević's political significance declined in Serbia after 2000. The funeral commemoration marked a brief moment when the eclectic groups of supporters converged. This chapter examines the contradiction between the 'political death' of Milošević in 2000 and his revival as a 'show star' during the trial in Serbia. It will argue that despite the attention the trial enjoyed in Serbia, it marked the divorce between support for the politician Milošević and the narratives he helped popularize.

Dinner

Uptown Cafe's Back Room

Continental Breakfast

Panel III. Final Examination

The Milošević trial was only 40 hours from conclusion, at least on the official calendar. So what would have happened? What would the prosecution and defense have said? What judgment would the court have issued? This section dissects claims about the cases for conviction or acquittal. Two chapters consider the important if contested interim decision issued at the end of the prosecution phase — the strategic uses to which this decision has been put and its uses as history. The third chapter sums the evidence against Milošević, especially in relation to charges of genocide, and considers what that evidence says about the tribunal and its place in history.

• Timothy Waters

  Deploying the Rule 98bis Decision on the Motion to Acquit

  Discussant: Kevin Jon Heller

  Much of international criminal law's attraction rests on the claim that authoritative judgment that creates uncontestable narratives as the foundation for reconciliation, so what happens when there is no judgment? What can be salvaged from a terminated trial? This is precisely the situation that confronted the ICTY when Milošević died. One likely candidate for ersatz judgment was the Rule 98 Decision: Halfway through the Milošević trial, when the Prosecution rested, the court had to decide whether there was a case to answer. The judges declared that the trial should go forward, though what the judges decided was ambiguous and open to contestation: The prosecution had presented enough evidence that a court could find Milošević guilty – but they didn't say that they would. Of course, as it happened, there never was a final verdict, so the Decision has become a site of contestation. This chapter examines how the prosecution, defense attorneys, court and outsiders have deployed the rule 98 judgment to tell a story about Milošević's guilt or innocence and craft a final judgment in the eyes of the world, if not in the law. In so doing, it considers the question of how international criminal law — so concerned with death – should deal with death within its corridors.

• Christian Axboe Nielsen

  Can We Salvage a History of the Yugoslav Conflicts from the Milošević Trial?

  Discussant: Florian Bieber

  The ICTY has amassed an enormous amount of evidence, and its judgments offer detailed reconstructions of events that are tantamount to historical narratives. Dissection of these narratives affords an opportunity to probe the nexus of law and history, a burgeoning field of scholarly inquiry. Yet historians shared the general sense of disappointment at the untimely end of the trial. In the absence of a judgment, the court's earlier rule 98 decision provides the best indications of the judges' potential views. Most importantly, it found that the Prosecution had adduced "sufficient evidence to support each count challenged in the three indictments." This chapter subjects the decision to the kind of historical methodology we apply to final judgments in other cases to see whether one can obtain a useable "first draft" of history. Observers criticized the Prosecution for telling a story of the war rather than conducting an expedient trial, yet Milošević too viewed the courtroom as a theater of history and actively attempted to propound his version of recent Yugoslav history and his role. Can a final judgment by a court – let alone an interim decision – resolve these dueling strategic tensions?

• David Crowe

  Slobodan Milošević: 'Desk Murderer,' 'Architect of Genocide,' or Victim of 'Victor's Justice'?

  Discussant: Yuval Shany

  The Yugoslav wars shocked the Western world because they reminded it of the horrors of the Second World War; Milošević's trial was seen as a means to bring to justice the greatest war criminal in Europe since 1945. But do such charges justify calling him a 'desk murderer,' as Holocaust scholars describe bureaucrats like Adolph Eichmann who planned transports that led to the deaths of million of Jews, Roma and others from his office in Berlin? If Milošević did fit the bill, legally and historically, he would also qualify for another Holocaust charge – 'architect of genocide.' The key to proving or disproving such charges rested in his trial, which raises questions about the fairness of such undertakings: to some degree, Milošević himself was a "victim" of 'victor's justice.' This chapter explores these issues comparatively in order to judge the impact of “victor's justice” on the trial. Most problematic are the disparity between the lay and legal concepts of genocide and the lack of 'smoking gun' evidence for Milošević's command responsibility, which in turn raises questions about the type of evidence needed to prove such links. In judging the trial, we must view its failure or success not only through the prism of law, but also of history, looking at what the vast body of evidence tells us about the nature of the criminal acts committed during Yugoslavia's dreadful wars – and about the West's hesitancy to address those crimes as they were taking place.

Lunch and Plenary Speaker

• Veton Surroi (KOHA Media Group)

  Surroi will comment on his experiences in meeting Milošević and testifying at his trial, and the legacy of the Milošević trial in Kosovo.

Panel IV. Disposing of the Body

The purposes of international criminal law are as disputed as its processes and its decisions. The first two chapters in this section return the discussion to the effects of the Milošević trial and the ICTY: Is reconciliation an achievable purpose? What do international and local elites use the tribunal and its judgments to achieve? Then, in the third chapter, which provides a bridge to the next section, another historian considers what the body of evidence amassed by the ICTY could be used for, and what the obstacles to its use are, now that the ICTY's own demise is imminent.

• Dejan Anastasijević

  Justice from Above: The ICTY as a Reconciliation Tool - Why Did It Fail?

  Discussant: Nancy Combs

  This chapter examines why majority public opinion in the former Yugoslavia continues to resent the Tribunal, and celebrates suspected and even convicted war criminals as heroes. Using the Milošević trial as a point of departure, the chapter considers why the Tribunal's outreach and information strategies have not achieved greater success, what countervailing factors are at play, and what this suggests for the design of analogous efforts for the ICC and other post-conflict trial processes.

• Sanja Popović

  The Impossible Project: The Impact of the Milošević Trial on Reconciliation

  Discussant: Lea Brilmayer

  This chapter analyzes lessons the Milošević trial holds for the development of transitional justice. On notable occasions the trial affected the narrative of the conflict and showed potential to make a lasting impact on transition efforts in Serbia. However, the trial was effective only in conjunction with other mechanisms within Serbia. The ICTY or any legal positivist model cannot succeed alone without comprehensive institutionalization and socialization within the post-conflict society; formal justice mechanisms alone cannot suffice as reconstructive and stabilizing factors. Second, the trial illustrates the negative effects of imposing positivistic Western transitional justice mechanisms on fragile states whose populations have a weak sense of the rule of law, as it directly facilitated the opposite of its intended goal: the growth of Serb nationalist narratives. This chapter identifies ground between the judicial romanticism and skepticism that polarizes debate over international criminal law's impact. Trials can be beneficial, but their impact must be understood within a broader context. The transitional justice project may have to settle for the impossibility of attaining permanent long-term stability, and satisfy itself with temporary resolutions. Guidance is ultimately gleaned from the limitations of our potential. The trial of Milošević stands for the proposition that the transitional justice initiatives are subject to problematic restrictions and limitations.

• Robert M. Hayden

  What's Reconciliation Got to Do with It? The ICTY as War by Other Means

  Discussants: Lea Brilmayer, David Crowe

  This chapter argues that neither the Milošević trial nor the ICTY have promoted reconciliation or stability in the Balkans, but to the contrary are part of the reason that parts of the region remain unstable. This result should not be unexpected as there is very little evidence that protracted tribunals like the ICTY have ever had, or could have, beneficial effects on reconciliation. Specifically, empirical evidence suggests that the ICTY is not seen as satisfying anybody in the region, though the dissatisfactions are phrased in differing ways. Anecdotal evidence suggests that charges of genocide are primarily deployed in the course of day-to-day political battles in Bosnia; they are really not at all about the dead but rather how the dead can be invoked by the living. And who benefits? Follow the money: data show the extraordinary sums spent on international lawyers and human rights actors and the relatively small amounts spent on anything making life better for people in the region. The secondary beneficiaries are politicians in the region who use the unpopularity of the tribunal to advance their own political causes.

Dinner

Federal Room at the Indiana Memorial Union

Continental Breakfast

Panel V. Reanimation

For Milošević, the trial is over; for the rest of us, it lives on. Several of Milošević's codefendants have been convicted or acquitted, while the same crimes and claims alleged in Milošević's trial figure into cases before domestic war crimes courts in the former Yugoslavia. Farther afield, the trials of Saddam Hussein and Charles Taylor have been influenced by the experience of the Milošević trial. What role has his terminated trial played, and what role will it? What legacy and lessons does it hold for the design of justice in other courts and after other conflicts?

• Yuval Shany

  The Uneasy Relationship between Individual and Collective Forms of Responsibility as Manifested in the Milošević and Bosnia Genocide Cases

  Discussant: Tibor Várady

  Milošević's trial was not the only one in which claims of state-sponsored genocide by Serbia were raised. This chapter examines the coordination problems arising between the inter-state case between Bosnia and Serbia before the International Court of Justice and the prosecution of Milošević before the ICTY. The case illustrates some of the practical issues that parallel proceedings entail, and, more generally, the tension between addressing the individual criminal accountability of state officials and establishing inter-state responsibility. Such tensions, if left unaddressed, might complicate both sets of proceedings and weaken their legitimacy in the eyes of key constituencies.

• Gregory S. McNeal

  An Analysis of Western Media Coverage of the Milošević Trial

  Discussant: Caroline Davidson

  What is the legacy of the Milošević trial? To answer that question, scholars first need agreement on a descriptive foundation to assess their theories. This chapter contributes to this debate by providing descriptively rich content analysis of media portrayals of the trial, before turning to theory to suggest the implications of these portrayals. First, this chapter provides a descriptive foundation based on representations of the Milošević trial in English-language media (and their evolution over time) drawn from computer-assisted quantitative content analysis of news articles. Then the chapter analyzes that data, highlighting significant issues identified in trial coverage and how the media has used the Milošević trial to frame subsequent war crimes indictments and trials such as those of Saddam Hussein and Omar alBashir. One clear implication for international criminal law scholars and practitioners is the need to develop a communications strategy that recognizes the diversity of the audiences tribunals communicate with, if the expressive, historical, and denunciatory goals of international criminal tribunals are to be satisfied.

• Florence Hartmann

  Abdicated Legacy: The Prosecution's Use of Evidence from Milošević

  Discussant: Marko Prelec

  What remains from the Milošević mega-trial in The Hague? Did justice die with Milošević, as many victims are quick to say? This chapter examines the impact of the evidentiary aspect of the Milošević trial on other cases at the ICTY. It undertakes a review of crucial evidence introduced in Milošević, highlighting evidence that was later disregarded in other related cases. Developments in those trials show the Prosecution's ambivalence toward the Milošević case's evidentiary legacy. While the case related to Kosovo and Croatia was confirmed through subsequent judgments, the Bosnia-Herzegovina case legacy remains in limbo. In particular, the proceedings against Stanišić and Simatović and the Perišić trial demonstrate the changes and flaws in the Prosecution strategy. Though Milošević's death deprived the public and the victims of judgment, it was not him but rather other factors that killed the trial and part of the truth.

Lunch