ABSTRACT
The 1995 General Framework Agreement for Peace in Bosnia and Herzegovina defines Bosnia and Herzegovina (B&H) as a compound of the Federation of B&H (FB&H) and the Republic of Srpska (RS). There have been several ill-fated proposals to simplify the tangled framework, mainly initiated by domestic and international non-governmental actors. The present state of affairs is a complex intermediate state in which the conflicting sides have substituted the battlefield for the institutions of government and their respective procedures. The Dayton Peace Agreement ended the Bosnian War among the three ethnic groups in B&H. The constitutional system of B&H is defined by constitutional asymmetries in status and powers and competences between and among different tiers of government. Ethnicity is a key ingredient of constitutional asymmetries. Subnational autonomy in B&H is high and the limitations of the central level are low.
