The falling apart of the federal state in 1991, followed by a blood-stained war, brought to hundreds thousands of deaths in Bosnia and Herzegovina, more than a million refugees, a collapsed economy and a deep social division that is still visible in everyday life. After the signing of the Dayton peace treaty the international community expected Bosnia and Herzegovina to become a united, democratic, multi-national and multi-religious political entity. However, seventeen years later it is hard to tell whether Bosnia and Herzegovina is a sovereign state. The ethnic and religious void between the three nations living there is greater than it was before the Civil War, there is no common agreement on the future of the country, the vast majority of Croats and Serbs does not regard it as their homeland, while the country is still under the international protectorate. Nationalism is a strong feature in all segments of life. The most pressing issue for the international community and all three constitutive nations in Bosnia and Herzegovina is how to reach a mutual agreement on the future of the country.

Razpad skupne drţave leta 1991, ki mu je sledila krvava vojna, je pustil za seboj v Bosni in Hercegovini skoraj sto tisoĉ mrtvih, veĉ kot milijon razseljenih prebivalcev, uniĉeno gospodarstvo in globoke delitve v druţbi, ki so vidne v vsakdanjem ţivljenju. Ĉeprav je po podpisu Daytonskega mirovnega sporazuma mednarodna skupnost priĉakovala, da bo Bosna in Hercegovina zdruţena, demokratiĉna, veĉnacionalna in veĉ religijska politiĉna celota, bi danes, ko se bliţa sedemnajsta obletnica sklenitve miru, teţko dokazali, da ta deluje kot suverena drţava v pravem pomenu besede. Etniĉna in verska distanca treh narodov je veĉja, kot je bila pred zaĉetkom drţavljanske vojne, v drţavi ni temeljnega dogovora o njeni prihodnosti, velika veĉina Hrvatov in Srbov je ne doţivlja kot svojo domovino in je še vedno pod mednarodnim protektoratom. Nacionalizem je stalnica v vseh segmentih današnje druţbe. Najbolj pereĉe vprašanje za mednarodno skupnost in tri konstitutivne narode v Bosni in Hercegovini je, kako doseĉi medsebojni konsenz o prihodnosti drţave.