Too Much

Prishtina, Kosovo

SOME OF THE FRESHEST and most distinctive voices of "new Europe"--Donald Rumsfeld's term for the former-Communist states that have joined the reunited continent as ardent supporters of capitalism, democracy, and other conservative values--are sounding off in a place so new, in its own way, that less than a decade ago most Americans had never heard of it: Kosovo.

Isolated by the Albanian language, an ancient Indo-European tongue with no obvious relatives, as well as by the long-standing hostility of their rapacious neighbors, the Kosovars have preserved much in their culture that is old and valuable. But young Kosovar Albanian intellectuals and civil society activists are aware they have a lot of catching up to do. And they are eager to get the process in motion.

The march of new Europe into global politics may prove surprising at many points. Western pundits once predicted that the Czech Republic of Vaclav Havel would inspire a neo-hippie revival, with a vision resuscitated from 1968. Instead, Catholic Poland, which just elected a militantly anti-Communist and pro-American government, has demonstrated that, in line with the religious sensibilities of its population, it will not accept "European" imposition of liberal standards on abortion and homosexuality. Given that many new European countries are traditional in their approach to religion and culture, more such declarations should be expected.

For their part, Kosovar Albanians are touching in their devotion to the United States and to the American model of entrepreneurship and popular sovereignty. Rumsfeld's trope about the European schism is so popular among them that it confers upon him an exaggerated reputation as an intellectual--one Albanian author asked me if it is true that the defense secretary is a Straussian. (I recommended he examine Rumsfeld's speeches online and read Leo Strauss's works for himself.)

Still, even five years after their rescue from Slobodan Milosevic by NATO firepower, Kosovars see themselves at the beginning, rather than the end, of a process of liberation. Communism--which most Albanians viewed as nothing more than an ideological mask for Slavic imperialism--is gone, and Serbia is held at bay by NATO troops. But the "international community" administering Kosovo embodies a new colonialism, represented by the United Nations, the European Community, and the Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe. (The OSCE uses American tax dollars to engage in such antics as offering to monitor the 2004 U.S. presidential elections for possible fraud.)

The United Nations administration is identified by most Albanians with a deliberate policy of preserving the old Communist economy by blocking privatization, which leaves Kosovo with an unemployment rate above 60 percent. In confronting the U.N.'s occupying authority, the Kosovars say they find themselves in a situation more like that of Belarus, which groans under a neo-Stalinist dictatorship, than that of Poland.

Furthermore, thanks to the enthusiastic endorsement of the Clinton State Department and its permanent staff as long as Colin Powell was in charge, the United Nations, OSCE, and their accomplices set up draconian restrictions on media and other public activities in the province. Political and cultural meetings, creation of print and broadcast media, and educational activities all require the permission of the international bureaucrats. (And many of those whose misrule has created discontent in Kosovo have, unfortunately, moved on to work in Iraq.) The most interesting political group in Kosovo, a movement titled Self-Determination (Vetevendosja, in Albanian), cannot function as a legal entity or launch a newspaper because it is denied registration under European-fostered rules for civic advocacy.

So Self-Determination has recourse to other means: Its members prowl abroad by night, adding spray-painted letters to the ubiquitous U.N. initials on white "international" vehicles, so they read "FUND," "the end" in Albanian, or "TUNG," "good-bye." Self-Determination activists who have appeared at public events have been arrested and beaten, just as in Communist times, except that the police abusing them are Germans and other foreigners rather than Albanians or even Serbs.