Countries of the World/COUNTRYS.BIN/dp/0413/04139.txt

Text File | 1991-06-25 | 36KB | 552 lines

$Unique_ID{COW04139}
$Pretitle{299}
$Title{Yugoslavia
Chapter 4A.   Government and Politics}
$Subtitle{}
$Author{Stephan L. Burg}
$Affiliation{HQ, Department of the Army}
$Subject{party
political
federal
chamber
leadership
government
yugoslavia
central
economic
members}
$Date{1982}
$Log{Tito*0413901.scf
President Tito in his Office*0413902.scf
}
Country:     Yugoslavia
Book:        Yugoslavia, A Country Study
Author:      Stephan L. Burg
Affiliation: HQ, Department of the Army
Date:        1982

Chapter 4A.   Government and Politics

[See Tito: Josip Broz Tito-May 1892 to May 1980]

     The structure of government and the character of politics in contemporary
Yugoslavia have been shaped in large part by conflicts arising out of the
coincidence of ethnic and religious divisions in the population with
differences in the level of economic development of the regions, and by the
simultaneous commitment of the communist political leadership to maintaining
national unity and constructing the "self-managed" social order called for by
the official ideology. Each of these factors is reflected in both the formal,
constitutional system of government and the actual process of political
decisionmaking. Nationality conflict and interregional economic conflicts
have driven Yugoslav political development and, especially, the development
of formal institutions and organizations, in the direction of
decentralization. The dual commitments of the party, however, have led it to
play a changing role in Yugoslav politics. At times it has pursued policies
that reinforced the centrifugal impetus of nationality and regional conflict,
and at these times the society has been plunged into conflict and even crisis.
But at other times the party has been a strong, integrative force; and when it
has, Yugoslav government and politics have been stable.

     For most of the 1970s the integrative power of the party was largely a
product of the personal authority and activity of President Josip Broz Tito
and the cohesiveness of the older generation of political leaders he gathered
around him in the highest organs of the state and party. The deaths of Edvard
Kardelj in February 1979 and Tito in May 1980, however, marked the beginning
of a period during which that generation of leaders will be disappearing from
the scene. The generation coming to power in the early 1980s lacked the long,
common experience of underground revolutionary activity, wartime resistance
and revolution, and resistance to Soviet domination that unified these older
leaders. The continuing stability of the system in the post-Tito period,
therefore, will depend on the ability of the new leaders to maintain political
unity despite the nationality differences, regional economic conflicts, and
personal political ambitions that divide them.

The Development of the Contemporary Political Order

     Constitutions play several roles in Yugoslav politics. They are intended
by the leadership to provide normative guidelines for the ongoing development
of the political order. As one parliamentary functionary involved in the
drafting of the most recent reform put it during an interview conducted in
December 1980, constitutions in Yugoslavia "reflect our hopes for the future."
At the same time, however, this functionary pointed out that "we make a
constitution for real life, that is why it is not very general or abstract,
[why it is] more concrete and more detailed." Constitutions and constitutional
reforms in Yugoslavia thus also codify practices that have emerged in the
period since the previous reform and are used by the leadership to bring old
organizational and institutional formulas no longer appropriate to these
practices into line with them. In addition to these practical roles,
constitutions in Yugoslavia also serve important symbolic functions.

     Constitutional reform has provided the communist political leadership
with an important mechanism for responding to the pressures inherent in a
multinational society. Since the establishment of the state in 1918, the
structure of government, the procedural provisions for decisionmaking, and
even the delineation and status of the territorial units of government
themselves have been subjects of political conflict and have complicated the
drafting of constitutions. The communist political leadership has manipulated
one or more of these elements in the successive constitutions it has prepared
since coming to power in an effort to mitigate inter-nationality conflict by
fulfilling as many of the national (see Glossary) aspirations of each group
as is compatible with survival of Yugoslavia as a unified state and
maintenance of control over the state by the League of Communists of
Yugoslavia (LCY). The constitutional reforms adopted since 1966 have granted
progressively greater autonomous power and authority to the republics and
provinces and expanded their role in the federal decisionmaking process. They
have also incorporated important concessions to the distinct ethnic identities
of the population in each region, including the granting of a full range of
linguistic and cultural rights. (As used herein, region means the six
republics and the two autonomous provinces; see fig. 1.) Moreover the formal
political order in each region is defined by a separate republic or provincial
constitution that emphasizes the distinct national identity of the region and
the attributes of full statehood enjoyed by it.

     The symbolic importance of constitutions - both federal and regional - in
Yugoslav politics has also made them the continuing focus of political
struggle. At each stage, constitutional reform has reflected the political
balance in the party leadership between center and region; between supporters
of more authoritarian and more liberal visions of society; and between
supporters of more radical, ideologically motivated change and pragmatists.
Thus while the 1946 constitution reflected the wholesale adoption of Stalinist
formulas for the organization of the state, the Fundamental
Law - in effect, a new constitution - adopted in 1953 reflected the
establishment of a more liberal, anti-Stalinist leadership in the party.
Following soon after the momentous Sixth Party Congress in 1952, at which
that leadership - largely under the inspiration of Milovan Djilas - officially
renounced direct party control over society in favor of a more distinct
separation between the party as an organization and the government and
significantly decentralized the party itself, the 1953 constitutional reform
increased the power and authority of the federal and local governments and
introduced partial guarantees of individual civil liberties.

     The mid-1950s was a period of partial recentralization in the party.
The reforms of 1952-53 had introduced substantial confusion among the
rank-and-file members and resulted in a significant weakening of the
organizational coherence of the party and its influence over society.
Beginning in mid-1953, therefore, Tito and other members of the leadership
began to have second thoughts about the pace of reform. They initiated a
series of measures designed to restore party discipline and affirm the
continuing political power and authority of the party, including the January
1954 condemnation of Djilas for deviationism. This recentralization of power
did not, however, deter the leadership from continuing to construct a more
liberal political order through constitutional reform.

     The drafting of an entirely new constitution began in the late 1950s and
was completed in 1962. Formally promulgated in 1963, the new constitution
introduced important changes in the organization and operation of the
political system. The Federal Assembly, or parliament, was completely
reorganized. Created in 1946 as a bicameral body with a Federal Chamber and
a Chamber of Nationalities modeled on the Soviet Union's Supreme Soviet, the
Federal Assembly was reorganized in 1953. The Chamber of Nationalities
became a component part of the Fede