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1994-05-02
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<text>
<title>
Macedonia: History
</title>
<article>
<hdr>
Background Notes: Yugoslavia
History
</hdr>
<body>
<p>Note: The successor states to Yugoslavia are Bosnia and
Hercegovina, Croatia, Macedonia, Serbia and Montenegro, and
Slovenia. Bosnia and Hercegovina declared independence in April
1992.
</p>
<p> Prior to World War I, the area which became Yugoslavia
comprised the Kingdoms of Serbia and Montenegro, plus parts of
the Turkish and Austro-Hungarian Empires. This area occupied a
strategic geopolitical position and was the object of rivalry
between the great European powers. In 1914, world attention
focused on Sarajevo in central Yugoslavia, the site of the
assassination of Austrian Archduke Franz-Ferdinand--the spark
that ignited World War I. Serbia had led the movement for
unification, and in December 1918, the Kingdom of the Serbs,
Croats, and Slovenes emerged from the war a new nation. In
1929, its name was changed to Yugoslavia.
</p>
<p> Between the two World Wars, Yugoslav politics were dominated
by nationalistic conflicts between the Serbs and the Croats.
Adoption of the "Vidovdan" constitution of June 28, 1921,
placed all parts of the country under a centralized
administration based on the French system. The Serbs and their
political allies, the Slovenes, dominated the highly centralized
government at Belgrade. The Croats pressed for a federal
structure granting a certain amount of regional and ethnic
autonomy. The political struggle between the Serbs and the
Croats erupted violently in 1928, when a Montenegrin Serb shot
the Croatian leader, Stjepan Radic, in the parliament for
insulting the Serbs. In protest, the Croats withdrew from
parliament, and King Alexander established a royal dictatorship,
downplaying regionalism and nationalism and espousing
"Yugoslavism." Nevertheless, the struggles continued, and in
1939, on the eve of World War II, Croatia was granted
considerable autonomy.
</p>
<p> King Alexander was assassinated by emigre extremists at
Marseille in 1934. His successor the regent Prince Paul,
abandoned the King's pro-French foreign policy for one that
resulted in Yugoslavia's adherence to the German-Italian-
Japanese tripartite pact on March 25, 1941. Pro-allied Serb
military elements, aware of wide public opposition to this move,
staged a successful coup and replaced Prince Paul with the
17-year-old King Peter. Beginning April 6, 1941, the armed
forces of Germany, Italy, Hungary, and Bulgaria invaded
Yugoslavia and forced the royal family and the government into
exile.
</p>
<p> During the war, the country was torn by invaders and by
internal ethnic, religious, and political strife. A Fascist,
pro-Nazi, Croatian separatist group, the "Ustashe," seized
power in Zagreb and, on April 10, 1941, established the
so-called Independent State of Croatia that allied itself with
the Axis. Resistance forces in Yugoslavia were split into the
"Yugoslav Army in the Fatherland" (popularly known as Chetniks),
which had close ties to the exiled government, and the National
Liberation Army (the Partisans), led by Marshal Josip Broz Tito
and the Communist Party. In vicious and tragic fighting against
the occupiers and each other, the war cost close to 2 million
Yugoslav lives, about half of them at the hands of fellow
Yugoslavs.
</p>
<p> The Partisans developed a broader, more active resistance to
the invaders and established their own government in the areas
they controlled in late 1943. The Allies recognized the
Partisans' effectiveness by sending military missions to Tito's
headquarters in mid-1943 and by gradually allocating most of
the supplies and equipment available for the resistance effort
to his forces rather than to those of Draza Mihailovic's
Chetniks. The Partisans' increasing power was facilitated in
part by their control of considerable territory and arms during
the time Italian forces surrendered to the Allies.
</p>
<p> Allied pressure induced formation of a coalition government
in 1945, but communist-controlled elections produced a
provisional assembly that proclaimed the Federal People's
Republic of Yugoslavia on November 29. On January 31, 1946, a
Soviet-type constitution was adopted, and Yugoslavia officially
became a "people's republic," headed by Tito.
</p>
<p> In the immediate postwar period, Tito worked closely with
Stalin, but Yugoslavia's insistence on independence strained
relations. In 1948, Stalin ordered Yugoslavia's expulsion from
the Cominform and imposed an economic blockade.
</p>
<p> Economic and military assistance contributed by the United
States and its Western allies after the 1948 break helped Tito
to maintain Yugoslav independence despite Cominform pressure.
With this support, Tito embarked on policies to consolidate
public support, strengthen the economy, and justify
Yugoslavia's "independent road to socialism"--policies that
made Yugoslavia a maverick in communist theory and practice. The
rigid Cominform economic blockade from 1949 to 1953 led to a
reorientation of Yugoslav trade toward the West, and Yugoslavia
broadened its contacts with the free world in political and
cultural fields as well.
</p>
<p> Yugoslavia's search for an independent base produced efforts
in the mid-1950s to identify itself as a leader of nonaligned
nations, avoiding proximity to either the Soviet or the Western
military bloc. Yugoslavia has been active in the Nonaligned
Movement since the early 196Os and also in international
conferences dealing with trade and development.
</p>
<p>Current Political Conditions
</p>
<p> Since the early 1950s, Yugoslavia has followed a pragmatic
policy that moderates many features of more orthodox Marxist
regimes in pursuing the leadership's own interpretation of
socialism. Certain basic human rights are recognized and
protected in Yugoslavia, although they tend to be defined more
in social and economic terms than in Western terms of political
and civil liberties. Most Yugoslavs may travel abroad freely
and, until the introduction of austerity measures in 1982, did
so in increasing numbers. Emigration is permitted--there are
no divided family cases in Yugoslavia--and about 625,000
Yugoslavs work in Western Europe. Churches are open, and
seminaries are allowed to function and expand. Private property
rights are respected--84% of all farmland is privately owned--and in manufacturing, small, private firms have begun to
operate. Economic and social rights are so strongly protected
that it is difficult to fire a worker even with cause.
</p>
<p> Respect for some other civil liberties, however, varies
considerably from region to region. Although the League of
Communists (LCY) is the only political party permitted in
Yugoslavia, some regions--notably Slovenia and Croatia--have introduced hard-fought, multicandidate elections for some
important positions in both party and government. In much of
the country, a free-wheeling press recently has become a key
outlet for public expression, approaching Western standards of
openness in several republics. Nevertheless, some political
taboos, such as open criticism of Tito, remain, and individuals
continue to be prosecuted on political grounds. Currently, most
political prisoners have been jailed for publicly expressing
ethnic-nationalist antagonism toward other Yugoslav ethnic
groups or the current constitutional order. A majority of such
prisoners are members of the non-Slavic Albanian ethnic
minority, which generally claims to be the object of
discrimination in Slavic Yugoslavia.
</p>
<p> The concept of self-management, which is basic to the
Yugoslav system, affords operational control to workers'
councils in factories and other organizations and institutions.
The system of "delegate democracy," opposed to representational
democracy, is designed to elect "nonprofessional" politicians
and to ensure that workers have direct political power. The aim
is to produce a genuine federalism through decentralized
decisionmaking. In keeping with political decentralization, most
key na