ABSTRACT
This chapter presents Bosnia-Herzegovina profiles of longstanding democracies and of the European Union, and provides essential detail on history, electoral system, political parties and cleavages, and governments. Bosnia-Herzegovina became independent from Yugoslavia in 1992. It had been the most ethnically diverse part of Yugoslavia, and its ethnic Serbs never wanted to be part of the new country. The peace agreement signed in Dayton, Ohio in 1995 recognized the country as composed of two parts: a Bosnian-Croat Federation and a Serbian Republic. The electoral system for the Bosnia-Herzegovina parliament is party list proportional representation using the Sainte-Lague method. The overwhelming majority of votes in Bosnia-Herzegovina go to parties with an ethnic identity, and each of the three groups has had more than one Political party. There are multi-ethnic political parties in Bosnia-Herzegovina; the social democratic party, founded in 1991, has been a consistent such party.
