Memoryscapes, tourism, and the environment in Croatia : slow memory and sites of conflict and slow violence

Abstract

What is the relationship between memory, tourism development, and environmental transformation in areas impacted by armed conflict? This article examines the Croatian War of Independence through the lens of slow memory in four Croatian regions, highlighting varied impacts on the country’s memoryscapes. By studying the physical and social legacy of the violence of the war thirty years after its conclusion, the authors trace the slow transformation of violence—from active to subtle—in spaces marked in great contrast by rapid change and development. The short distance from the Adriatic coast to the hinterlands of Slavonia and Dalmatia is counterbalanced by economic growth and a deflection away from the 1990s in the former and lingering, if not intentional, evidence of conflict, marked ubiquitously by museums and monuments in the latter. This article argues that practicing slow memory can provide an alternative to dominant narratives that neglect, erase, and silence legacies of the conflict.