"Historical Roots of the Yugoslav Conflict," by V.P. Gagnon, Jr.

Part 6

Ethnic/National Bases of Federal Units

One of the reasons confederalism effectively blocked the formation of cross-republic alliances of reformists was that conservatives could claim the "national" interest of the republic or province was being threatened by any ceding of "sovereignty." But because of the "ethnonationalist" bases of the federal units, the shift to a discourse of republic interest, especially when framed in terms of fears and injustices, tended to become conflated with a discourse of ethnic interest. This discourse of ethnicity provided conservatives with an alternative to their unpopular Marxist rhetoric. The resort to "national" interest was a way of countering reformist appeals to liberal democratic values, and by focusing on injustices to their ethnic group, conservatives invoked a rhetoric of fairness that was not totally alien to socialist ideology.

This concept of ethnic injustice was effective exactly because Tito's Yugoslavia had suppressed aspects of national cultures and, while stressing the guilt of each group for the atrocities carried out in its name during World War II, refused to permit open debate or airing of these issues, further contributing to the impression that national sentiment was being suppressed. Although appeals to past injustices were insufficient to provoke the descent into warfare, once the wedge of "threats to the nation" was inserted into the party's agenda, conservatives drew on historical imagery and mythologies in order to completely monopolize political discourse.

Thus it was no coincidence that the Serbian conservatives began their campaign by focusing on Kosovo, which has a tragic importance in the mythology of the Serbian past. By focusing on the demands of the ethnic Albanian majority there for a separate Kosovo republic, the Serbian conservatives stressed the danger that Serbs would once again lose their "Jerusalem" to Muslim aliens. Emphasis on alleged atrocities perpetrated by Albanians made the issue one of injustice rather than chauvinism.

These themes and ways of framing national questions were also seen in such forms as images that demonized Albanians, Croats, and Slavic Muslims by portraying them as viciously anti-Serbian [Banac 1992b]. Critical to this instrumentalization of history was the Communist party's monopoly over mass media, especially television, which was divided along republic lines. Television allowed the creation of very threatening images of the outside world and was particularly effective in conveying the message that Serbs in other Yugoslav republics were facing a new genocide and in including these Serbs in the political discourse of threatened Serbdom [Bakic 1994]. Through ethnic grievances the Serbian conservatives managed to create an identity between the Serbian people and the Serbian leadership. Indeed, the regime's statements all portrayed any criticism of itself or attacks on its actions as attacks against the Serbian people as a whole.

Of course this Serbian strategy brought backlashes in the other republics, where Belgrade's actions seemed threatening not only to the republic or province but also to the non-Serbian populations. In the Croatian communist party this reaction was somewhat muted at first, because its membership included a large percentage of Serbs. The party denounced Milosevic's policies and provocation of ethnic conflict but it did not respond in kind. And although the Croatian party ran on a very reformist platform and called for formal confederalization of Yugoslavia, it received the large majority of Croatia's Serbian votes in the 1990 elections.

But when the Croatian party was taken over by reformists, conservative Croats left the party and joined the nationalist Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ), and conservative Serbs allied with joined the Serbian Democratic party (SDS), which was controlled by Belgrade. (A similar pattern was seen among Croat and Serb conservatives in Bosnia when that republic's party leadership was taken over by reformists.) Thus in Croatia, too, conservative communists, both Croat and Serb, shifted to a rhetoric of threats to the ethnic group in response to reformist success, though now in the guise of anticommunism.

Outside the communist parties, of course, the reaction was much stronger, as intellectuals and nationalist-oriented conservatives responded in kind and demonized Serbs. Indeed, the HDZ, in the election campaign, made much of the Serbian threat and appealed to the injustices done to Croatia in 1971, cited the demonization of Croatian national sentiment in the entire postwar period, and even rehabilitated some aspects of the Ustasha Croatian state. Belgrade pointed to these actions as proof of its contentions about the renewal of genocide against Serbs and justified military occupation and expulsion of non-Serbs from areas of Croatia with significant Serbian populations.

The effect of this "ethnicization" of political discourse by conservative communists has been to ensure the continued existence of old structures of local power in both Serbia and Croatia. Indeed, in Croatia both the HDZ and the SDS (in areas under its control) strengthened state control over the economy, obstructed political pluralism and democracy, cracked down on the free press and open dissent, and continued to use enemy imagery defined in ethnic terms in order to marginalize reformist democratic forces. The dynamics in Bosnia were similar, although complicated by the existence of three major national groups (Slavic Muslims, Serbs, and Croats), two of which were "represented" by parties controlled by forces from outside the republic (Serbian and Croatian conservatives) and all three of which were, before the war, members of a coalition government.

Thus the ethnic/national basis of the federal units, although responding to the need of the Yugoslav communists for some level of popular support, when combined with a confederalized center with few integrating factors, meant that autarky in the realm of political rhetoric was a real possibility. As the reformists came to define self-management in terms of liberal values, conservatives attempted to shift the focus away from this universalist rhetoric toward a discourse of national and ethnic particularism. They did so first in Serbia mainly because they were most threatened there, but also because the Serbian party was one of the few that was relatively homogeneous (80 percent Serb). Once the discourse of ethnic injustice took root in Serbia, the dynamic of relations among the republics took a different turn and became an interaction of nationalist and ethnic claims and counterclaims, especially once the communist party was no longer relevant. This cycle of confrontation was possible mainly because of the republics' control over mass media, especially television.

The result of this dynamic was that even a renegotiated Yugoslav confederation based on liberal democratic lines became difficult to imagine. Once actual violence along ethnic lines was provoked, as a means of deepening the sense of victimhood and difference, such a joint state became almost impossible. This was a very important goal of conservatives throughout the country because one aspect of the ethnicization of political discourse is that it works only if a large majority of voters are of a specific ethnic group. Yugoslavia of course was a prime example of a multiethnic state, with many highly intermixed regions. But in order for this strategy to work the country had to be deconstructed into ministates where nationalist discourses could continue to dominate. Thus the most tragic result of this shift in discourse away from universalist rhetorics of self-managing socialism or liberal democracy toward ethnic particularism has been the attempts to create ethnically pure regions out of areas that had been highly heterogeneous for centuries.

Forward to part 7, The Yugoslav People's Army

Back to part 5, Confederalization

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