Abstract
This chapter discusses LGBT activism in Montenegro, focusing on how it has been shaped by complex relationships between NGOs, the state, international donors, the EU, and everyday forms of oppression. It is the result of a collaboration between two friends whose first encounter was a consequence of one of the events described in this text. We demonstrate that Montenegrin LGBT activists have invested a lot of effort in educating state institutions, such as the police, healthcare, and justice system, in how to “do their job” to ensure that basic conditions are met for the physical safety of LGBT people. We suggest that—according to a specific set of parameters—such efforts have been highly successful. However, LGBT activism has not up to now managed to break the historically forged conceptual link between “Europe” and “homosexuality”, because the very development of LGBT activism depended on and intersected with the dynamic of the EU accession process in Montenegro.
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Notes
- 1.
The grassroots origins of LGBT activism are also clearly visible in Slovenia, where, as Kajinić (this volume) emphasises, the first European festival of lesbian and gay film was organised in the mid-1980s, during the SFRY. See also Kuhar (2012).
- 2.
The interventions included legislative reforms, decentralisation of a portion of governmental responsibilities from the federative Yugoslav level to the governments of the Yugoslav republics and provinces, and the first discussions about decriminalisation of the so-called protivprirodni blud (unnatural fornication). Similarly to other Yugoslav republics, earlier Montenegrin legislature did not refer to “female sexual relations”.
- 3.
In November 2004, Free Rainbow hosted Atila Kovač, an editor of the first gay magazine in Serbia and Montenegro, Dečko (The Boy). When Kovač appeared in a TV show on the Montenegrin national television, fans of the sports club “Budućnost”, in Podgorica, gathered in front of the TV broadcasting company and threw stones at the building right after the TV show ended. In early December 2004, NGO Human Rights Action from Podgorica requested information from the public prosecutor about the criminal prosecution of persons who organised the attack. However, the prosecutor did not provide any response until the end of that year. Furthermore, although the police arrested three persons related to this attack, Kovač received no information from the relevant Montenegrin authorities about any legal case being led against his attackers. Additionally, newspaper titles from that period regularly represented homosexuality as inseparable from paedophilia and sexual abuse: for example, D. St. (2005) and Tanjug (2004).
- 4.
Despite many problems, the issues set in motion could hardly be stopped, and certain changes had happened in 2006, 2007, and 2008. For instance, in 2006 Juventas continued Free Rainbow’s activities on “capacity building”, particularly through a programme on sexual health and rights of men who have sex with men. The programme is still ongoing and provides strong support to LGBT initiatives in Montenegro, and it has served as a core for creating the organisation Queer Montenegro and Montenegro Pride.
- 5.
The 2008 European Commission Progress Report on Montenegro states that: “In the area of anti-discrimination policies, adoption of the draft law on the prohibition of discrimination is pending. LGBT people are marginalised and discriminated against in Montenegrin society due to homophobic attitudes and lack of legal and practical protection by the authorities. In addition to increasing legislative efforts, comprehensive anti-discrimination measures covering sexual orientation and gender identity are needed” (European Commission, 2008, online).
- 6.
Available at www.montenegro-gay.me.
- 7.
The first public promotion of human rights of LGBT people in Montenegro was organised on 17 May 2009, the International Day Against Homophobia. In Podgorica’s city centre, Juventas’ activists distributed questionnaires on attitudes towards homosexuality, as well as promotional material from the first campaign directed to decreasing homophobia in Montenegro, “So different, yet equal”. The event passed without incidents.
- 8.
For a longer account of this case, see also Zeković (n.d.).
- 9.
Fourteen NGOs made a request to Prime Minister Milo Đukanović to suggest the Parliament to release Dinoša from his governmental duties, but Đukanović did not respond to this public request. Instead, Đukanović has stated for the media that Dinoša had expressed his private attitude, rather than the opinion of the Montenegrin Government.
- 10.
The director of the neuropsychiatric clinic, Željko Golubović, also made homophobic statements publicly. Namely, in the TV show “Replika”, at the Montenegrin national television, Golubović stated that “According to the international classification of diseases (ICD 10), widely accepted throughout the world, homosexuality is as a diagnostic category—whether we consider it to be a disease, or not”. The Medical Chamber of Montenegro did not react or sanction Golubović in any way. Juventas had been trying to schedule a meeting with the Medical Chamber of Montenegro for a year, without success.
- 11.
During the round table, whose participants included the highest officials from the EU Delegation to Montenegro, Dinoša said that “Adam is not Adam without Eve. If someone understands life differently, that is his [sic!] right”.
- 12.
Due to a great pressure from the international actors, largely from the EU institutions, representatives of the diplomatic core, and NGOs, Dinoša’s function in the Ministry for Human Rights ended. Dinoša became Ambassador of Montenegro in Albania, although his homophobic statements were not listed as the reasons for the reassignment.
- 13.
In January 2010, Juventas conducted an interview-based study with LGBT people about, among other things, their problems and the ways of resolving those problems. The results of the study were used as a basis for formulating Action Plan Against Homophobia, which later became an officially adopted policy of the government for fighting homophobia and transphobia, “Strategy for Improving Life Quality among LGBT persons”.
- 14.
In June 2010, within the scope of the same project supported by the EU Delegation in Montenegro, Juventas organised a study visit to the LGBT human rights organisations in Serbia. Participants of the visit included representatives of the Ministry of Human and Minority Rights, the Institution of the Protector of human rights and freedoms, the Centre for Social Work Podgorica, and the Employment Institute of Montenegro.
- 15.
On 11 October 2010, Biljana Babović, a psychology teacher in Podgorica’s grammar school, stated in a TV show “Glamour Noir” (Atlas Television, 2010) that homosexuality is a disease and a disorder, that she has successfully cured four persons of homosexuality, that World Health Organisation is actively working on bringing back homosexuality to its list of diseases, and that homosexuals are the prime carriers of the HIV infection. The Coalition “Together for LGBT rights” and the members of the National coordinating body against HIV and AIDS reacted forcefully, while a gay man activist from Juventas submitted to the Montenegrin Ombudsman the first charge against discrimination on the basis of sexuality in Montenegro. Babović had to pay a monetary fine and Agency for Electronic Media of Montenegro published an analysis of the TV show, alongside a set of recommendations to all media regarding reporting on problems and human rights issues of LGBT people.
- 16.
Most domestic NGOs interpreted this as an attempt of to create a false impression that Montenegrin Government cooperated with human rights organisations. The cooperation was re-established after government representatives accepted several terms posed by the human rights organisations (Government of Montenegro, 2011).
- 17.
Together with the EU and other international representatives, Queer Montenegro has initiated a discussion about the public prosecution of hate crimes, resulting in two criminal charges related to the second Montenegro Pride in 2014.
- 18.
See Radio and Television of Montenegro (2013).
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Kalezić, D., Brković, Č. (2016). Queering as Europeanisation, Europeanisation as Queering: Challenging Homophobia in Everyday Life in Montenegro. In: Bilić, B. (eds) LGBT Activism and Europeanisation in the Post-Yugoslav Space. Palgrave Studies in European Political Sociology. Palgrave Macmillan, London. https://doi.org/10.1057/978-1-137-57261-5_6
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