Yugoslavia’s breakup is often overshadowed by the breakup of the Soviet Union or the protests in the PRC, yet its effects can still be seen in Europe: From the poverty suffered by those living in that region, to the gap in the EU. Yugoslavia was described by its president as 1 country with 2 alphabets, 3 languages, 4 religions, 5 nationalities, 6 republics, surrounded by 7 neighbors, with 8 ethnic minorities. And in this article, we will talk about how and why Yugoslavia. Had. Been. Divided! [HISTORY OF THE PEOPLES] But before we can talk about how it fell apart, we need to talk about how the country was created. Yugoslavia started as an idea. For centuries, this region of the world had been ruled by foreign powers, mostly the Ottoman Empire and the Austro-Hungarian Empire. But most of the people who lived here were neither Austrian, Hungarian, or Ottoman… They were slaves. And slaves saw themselves as a distinct ethnicity with its own culture, history, and traditions. [IDEA OF NATION] And so Yugoslavia was the idea of a unified state inhabited by Slavic people and ruled by Slavic people. And this idea came about around the same time countries like Germany and Italy unified into distinct countries, with their unification also, in part, based around the idea that Italians and Germans each had their own unique ethnic identity. But there was a problem with this Yugoslav idea: While Serbia and Montenegro had gained independence from the Ottoman Empire in 1878, most of what would become Yugoslavia was still under Austro-Hungarian rule… and the Austro-Hungarian Empire wasn’t going to give up a large part of its territory just so Slavs could have their nation right across its borders. [CORFU] But then WW1 happened. {PAUSE AND PLAY HABANERA} And in WW1 Serbia and Montenegro were occupied by the Austro-Hungarian Empire and their governments fled to allied countries. And there, in 1917, leaders of Montenegro, Serbia, and representatives from the Astro-Hungarian regions of Slovenia, Croatia, Vojvodina, and Bosnia-Herzegovina declared that they would join together to form a new nation. A nation they called: The Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes. This nation was supported by the allies, who liked the idea of breaking up the Astro-Hungarian Empire into smaller countries. [ACTUAL FORMATION] And by the end of WW1, Austria-Hungary started falling apart: There were revolutions in Vienna and Budapest, the capitals of the Austrian and Hungarian parts of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. Czechia and Slovakia declared their independence shortly after… And amid this breakup, the southern territories of the empire declared its independence, Serbia and Montenegro were liberated, and the three regions joined together to officially form the Kingdom of Slovenes, Croats, and Serbs. Over time, a few more territories were added to the kingdom such as 4 small Bulgarian territories, and the Monastery of St. Naum. In 1929 they decided that the British way of naming their country wasn’t very catchy and they became the Kingdom of Yugoslavia. With “jug” meaning “south” and “slave” meaning “Slavs”. And so the country was called “the land of the south Slavs”... and they were right to call it Yugoslavia because “south Slavs” is too much of a tongue twister {WHEN YOU SAY IT WRONG, KEEP THAT IN THE RECORDING}. [WW2] But this kingdom didn’t last long because, in 1941 Hungary, Germany, and Italy came to visit for a World War. And while Yugoslavia’s army surrendered… its people did not. Instead, Yugoslavia organized the largest resistance of all the occupied nations in Europe. By 1945, the people of Yugoslavia managed to completely kick out the axis forces from their soil with only minor support from allied countries at the very end of the war… Because Yugoslavia was a strong independent country that needed no foreign liberation. The faction which liberated the nation was communist. {PLAY FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE} So after taking control over the government, they turned Yugoslavia into a socialist nation and called itself the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. They also gave their old flag a 1-star review and made THAT their new flag. This new nation was founded on three basic concepts. Firstly, it recognized various ethnicities within the country as equals through the idea that they all helped to liberate the country from foreign occupation. The second was that the nation’s economy would be managed through socialism. And thirdly, that the country was governed as a federation of 6 equal republics with a large degree of autonomy. They were: Slovenia, Bosnia-Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, Macedonia, and Croatia… And looking at Croatia’s flag, it’s no wonder why they have so many chess grandmasters for such a small country. Additionally, the regions of Vojvodina and Kosovo were granted autonomy, while still being part of the Republic of Serbia. While there were other foundations upon which Yugoslavia was formed, it is these three which were the most important. And it is also these three foundations which would cause the eventual breakup of Yugoslavia. Because the fall of nations rarely has a single cause. Rather, it’s a combination of various issues which together cause the collapse of nations and Yugoslavia is no different in this regard. So first, let’s talk about the Yugoslav political system. {PLAY FROM RUSSIA WITH LOVE} Being a communist country, Yugoslavia was a close friend of the Soviet Union and the Yugoslav governments controlled many aspects of the nation. But in 1948 the country politically distanced itself from the Soviet Union, after the leaders of the two countries disagreed on what the future relationship between the two nations should be. In the 60s and 70s, the country began reforming its political system by handing over more and more control away from the central government towards the individual republics. These changes included, among other things, giving the republics and autonomous regions more control over their economies, giving them more influence in the central government, and giving the individual republics local armed forces that were separate from the national army. But there was one thing which barely changed during this time: the presidency. After WW2, a man named Josip Broz Tito became president of Yugoslavia and retained this position until his death. He controlled a large part of the national government and was an important force in keeping the nation stable… But there is a large problem with relying on a single person to run essential aspects of your government, rather than relying on an institution: If a king dies, a president loses an election, or a prime minister falls ill, then that position will be filled by somebody else while the institution of the monarch, president, or prime minister remains… In Yugoslavia, the country relied on a single person: Josip Tito… Until he died in 1980 and there was nobody to replace him as president. Instead, the presidency was transformed into a collective presidency. This meant that the 6 republics and 2 autonomous regions would each get ⅛ of the presidency and would need to make decisions via a majority. So while before the country relied on a single person to make certain important decisions, it now relied on 8 different groups of people ruling 8 different regions of the country to make collective decisions. And these 8 different regions each had a different vision for the future of Yugoslavia and their place within it. Serbia wanted a stronger federal government… in which they would likely have gotten a disproportionate amount of control; Kosovo wanted more autonomy for itself, such as becoming the 7th republic in Yugoslavia; Slovenia was the most liberal republic and wanted a more liberal Yugoslavia; Slovenia and Croatia were the richest regions of the country and wanted more control over their economic policies instead of sending money to poorer regions; Bosnia-Herzegovina wanted to become its independent nation… With all these different political forces, each with different and often opposing political goals, the country became less and less manageable in the 1980s. The second major factor leading to the breakup of Yugoslavia was its economy. While in countries such as China and the Soviet Union the leadership took decisions based on communist ideals, in Yugoslavia the government tried a lot harder to implement policies which it believed would be an effective means at providing wealth to its citizens, often disregarding socialist philosophy if it proved ineffective at achieving that goal. So while China lost millions due to avoidable famines and the USSR through industrialization, Yugoslavia never saw such types of destructive policies in its country… And its economy performed quite well. At first, Yugoslavia was similar to other communist nations where the government-controlled large parts of the economy directly, with a central authority dictating how supply chains are managed, how resources are distributed, and how businesses are run. But the Yugoslav leadership soon realized it would be more efficient to let people manage their workspaces, as they had greater knowledge and expertise in their fields than distant bureaucrats do. And so Yugoslavia reformed its economy over the coming decades, becoming the most reformed socialist economy in the world at that time. This reformed economy would eventually consist of 4 main aspects: market mechanisms, whereby prices are determined by supply and demand; decentralized decision-making, where businesses would be able to make their own decisions; social ownership, where employees of business automatically owned a share of the business they worked at; and worker’s self-management, where those employees who owned a share in business were the ones making the decisions of that business, rather than shareholders who bought a part of the company without ever having to have worked at said company. While these are generally quite good economic policies: A healthy supply and demand generally make sure that enough products are being made and that there is an incentive to find ways to make those products cheaper and better. And businesses owned by employees are generally more profitable than businesses owned by shareholders or the government… But it’s the implementation of this system where things went wrong. You see, employees didn’t get to directly vote on decisions in the business they worked at. Instead, they were run by so-called ‘management boards’. And if you wanted to get on this management board, then you needed the votes of your colleagues… So, how do you get these votes? Well, for many it was to promise higher salaries. And so in the 1980s, the salaries of the employees went up… and this might seem like a great idea at first, after all, more money for average people instead of rich CEOs. But business has a limited amount of resources which it needs to manage. And eventually, the salaries became so high that businesses were running out of money. So what did the management boards do? Well, many decided they didn’t want to lower salaries and instead opted to increase prices. And now all across Yugoslavia prices were going up. But think about this for a moment: your salary was going up… but so were the prices of products… Making your wage increase completely useless. This increase in prices is called inflation. And many businesses couldn’t keep up with this inflation and went bankrupt… And so the government decided to step in by providing welfare for the unemployed, giving money to businesses to prevent bankruptcies, and trying to keep the economy from collapsing. At first, they had enough money, but then the cold war came to an end in the late 1980s. Why is this important? Well, Yugoslavia sat right between the capitalist West and the communist east. Both sides wanted Yugoslavia to join their side, or at the very least, not join the other side. And they did this by giving Yugoslavia money… This was a common tactic during the cold war: give money to countries so they will be on your side, or at least don’t join the enemy. But by the late 1980s, the Soviet Union was breaking apart and the cold war was coming to an end. As a result, the Soviet Union sent less money to other countries such as Yugoslavia. But if the USSR wasn’t sending that much money anymore, there was no reason for western countries anymore to do the same. And so all of a sudden Yugoslavia was receiving A LOT less money from other countries. So by now, the prices were going up, businesses were being mismanaged, and the government didn’t have enough money anymore to keep everything under control… And so they decided they would simply borrow money to make up for this… But the problem with loans is that people will only give you a loan if they believe you will pay those loans back with interest. And as Yugoslavia’s economy got worse, that belief was evaporating. Soon people were no longer willing to give Yugoslavia more money. And so how could Yugoslavia get enough money to stabilize their economy when investors were no longer willing to give them any loans? Well, they went to an organization called the International Monetary Fund, or IMF for short. This is an organization owned by various world governments which, among other things, sells loans to countries… But they were only willing to give a loan to Yugoslavia if the country would reform its economy and government finances in such a way that it could repay this loan. These reforms included the government to cut spending, allowing private businesses not run by workers unions in their economy, and restructure their property market and various other minor changes. While this is great for a country’s ability to repay debt, it also creates large issues for the country as a whole. The Yugoslav government provided a lot of money to people and businesses to avoid poverty and mass bankruptcies… but if the government has to spend less money, they can no longer provide as much support. And changing your economic system is also likely to cause severe economic issues. And this is where the politics were making things difficult. Because Yugoslavia had 6 republics and an additional 2 autonomous regions, it meant that they needed to figure out together how to implement the IMF’s demands to get that loan. And Yugoslavia had quite a bit of wealth inequality. The average person in Slovenia was 8 times richer than the average person living in Kosovo. So while Slovenia was on par with countries such as Israel or Ireland, Kosovo was on par with third world countries such as Sudan or Papua New Guinea. This economic inequality caused quite a bit of strife. Richer regions such as Slovenia and Croatia argued that they had spent the last few decades building up a healthy economy while poorer southern regions such as Kosovo, Bosnia-Herzegovina, and Montenegro spent their money on inefficient businesses and prestige projects. And that therefore, those southern regions should take the brunt of the reforms as they had the weakest economies with the most inefficient governments. While on the other hand, those southern regions argued that Yugoslavia should have a unified approach to the issue with all republics taking equal responsibility no matter how rich or poor that region may be… Suffice to say, reforms were slow and the economy of Yugoslavia faced a long recession in the 1980s and early 90s. [ETHNICITY] And now we get to the third issue that was facing Yugoslavia: ethnic tensions. Yugoslavia had many different ethnic groups living within its borders. An ethnic group is a group of people who share a common cultural or national tradition. Such as, for example, the Zulu people of Southern Africa, African Americans of the USA, or the Han Chinese of East Asia. Yugoslavia had several officially recognized ethnic groups. They were the Serbs, Slovenes, Croats, Macedonians, Montenegrins, and later recognized Bosnian Muslims as well. And being recognized as an official ethnicity came with certain rights: you were allowed to openly express your religion, you would receive free education in the dominant language of your ethnicity, and they were given their ethnic republic. When the borders of the Yugoslav republics and autonomous regions were drawn after WW2, they closely corresponded to where the different ethnicities lived… But this system failed over time because people tend to move to other places and by the 1980s the ethnicities were a lot more spread out. At the same time, some ethnicities weren’t officially recognized. A prominent example was the Albanians who lived in Kosovo. They were a larger ethnic group than the Macedonians or Montenegrins… yet weren’t recognized as an official ethnic group. And so they often felt like second-class citizens in their own country, resulting in protests by the 1980s which were put down by the military. And by the late 1980s politicians exploited the ever-growing ethnic tension for their gain. Because in 1989 Serbia got a new leader, a man named Slobodan Milosevic. And under this new leadership, Serbia’s government envisioned a Greater Serbia. In this ‘new’ Serbia, the regions with ethnic Serbian majorities would be added to the Serbian Republic. Ethnic-Serbs accounted for about ⅓ of all the people living in Yugoslavia, meaning there were many regions outside of Serbia which had an ethnic-Serbian majority. The goal was for Yugoslavia to become a Serbian-controlled country. One of the ways it sought to control Yugoslavia was through the presidency: there were 8 seats, one for each of the republics and autonomous regions… but both of these autonomous regions were within Serbia. So the first thing it did was to control these two regions and thus control their seats of the presidency. Then it installed a pro-Serbian government in Montenegro, thus controlling 4 out of the 8 seats of the Yugoslav Presidency. Therefore, any policy that wasn’t explicitly in Serbia’s interest wouldn’t have the majority vote and therefore no major policies could be passed without the approval of the Serbian republic. And so by now, it’s 1990 and Yugoslavia is facing a combination of 3 issues: the republics and autonomous regions couldn’t agree on how to govern the country, it’s economy was in a recession without clear solutions, and ethnic tensions were being exploited. And so Croatia and Slovenia decided that they did not want to be part of a government-controlled by ethnic Serbians, didn’t want to pay for the economic crises in the other regions, and didn’t want to be part of a country whose government couldn’t agree on major policy issues. The Yugoslav Constitution gave each republic the right to independence if a majority of that republic voted in favor. And so they each held such a referendum on independence in 1990, each passed said referendum, and each decided to secede from Yugoslavia on June 25th, 1991. And so the people of Croatia and Slovenia decided that Yugoslavia. Will. Be. Divided. But as often happens when you break up with someone: they might not let you go so easily… and Yugoslavia was no different. Without Croatia and Slovenia, it meant that Serbia had substantial influence over 4 of the 6 remaining republics and autonomous regions. So what did the Serbian government do with this influence? Well, they still wanted to create a ‘Greater Serbia’ and 12% of Croatia’s population were ethnic Serb. So while Croatia was trying to become independent, Serbia was going to finance a counter-revolution by the ethnic-Serbs by trying to convince them that the Croatian would persecute ethnic Serbs living in Croatia. And so, almost immediately after declaring independence, Serbs started blockading roads and train tracks, armed Serbs attacked Croatian targets, and the Yugoslav army provided air support while invading Croatia… And so the Yugoslav Wars began. Slovenia, however, was a bit further away. While Yugoslavia tried subduing Slovenia, they ended hostilities after only 10 days of fighting when the European Community, a precursor to the EU, helped negotiate a peace treaty. But Croatia was not so lucky. And so it managed to use the regional army each of the republics had control over to hold off the Yugoslav army in 1991… even though it still lost about a quarter of its territory. And then on September the 8th of that same year, Macedonia, now called North Macedonia, held its independence referendum, passed it, and seceded from Yugoslavia 2.5 weeks later, on September the 25th. It managed to remain at peace with Yugoslavia and did not join the Yugoslav Wars… so now 3 republics had seceded. Things escalated when Bosnia-Herzegovina held its referendum, also voted in favor, and declared its independence on March 3rd, 1992. But they also had a large Serbian population… so Yugoslav forces invaded the new country while Croatian forces came to support the new country. With only 2 republics and 2 autonomous regions left of Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro decided to create their own Yugoslavia, removing the “socialist” in their name and called itself the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. But from 1992 until 1995, Bosnia-Herzegovina and Croatia would be the major battlegrounds of the Yugoslav Wars. In these wars, people committed genocide, filled mass graves, and committed a wide range of war crimes for three years. The death toll is estimated to be around 100.000-200.000 with another 4 million people becoming refugees. And it’s at this point that other countries started to get seriously involved in the Yugoslav Wars. Particularly, the European Community. Even early on, it was predicted that the Yugoslav Wars would likely bring millions of refugees, something those European countries weren’t fond of. It might bring the naval conflict in a sea shared with Italy, a prominent member of the European community, which wanted to keep the region stable… And it might destabilize more of Europe, in a time when Eastern and Central Europe was going through a major social, political, and economic change. So the European Community at first tried peace negotiations… While this worked with Slovenia, it failed with Croatia and Bosnia-Herzegovina. And so by 1993, they asked NATO for help. NATO was a military alliance between primarily North American countries and Western European countries at the time. Many countries who were a member of the European Community were also a member of NATO. With a resolution from the United Nations, they set up safe havens where civilians would be protected from the war, while also establishing a no-fly zone to prevent the Yugoslav air force from bombing Bosnian and Croatian targets. This war eventually ended in 1995, when NATO began bombing Serbian-held positions, Croat and Bosnian forces managed to kick the Serbian troops out of their territories, and Serbia sued for peace. In November 1995, the war came to an end with the Dayton Peace Accords. This peace accord included letting 60.000 NATO troops maintain the peace, Bosnia-Herzegovina would become a federation consisting of a Muslim-Croat and Serbian republic, and Serbia would get to keep Kosovo… Although Kosovo would later declare independence in 2008. But… the country still hadn’t completely broken up because Serbia and Montenegro were still united. But over the next decade separatism grew in Montenegro after the wars had ended and decided in 2006 to hold a referendum on Montenegrin independence. With 55% of the votes in favor, Serbia and Montenegro officially became separate countries on June 3rd, 2006. And there was one final matter to address: the war crimes. Many countries did not want to let the atrocities go unpunished, and so the United Nations established a tribunal to put various people on trial who were suspected of committing or ordering war crimes. This Tribunal was called the... {AUDIBLE BREATH IN A LOT} “International Tribunal for the Prosecution of Persons Responsible for Serious Violations of International Humanitarian Law Committed in the Territory of the Former Yugoslavia since 1991” {INHALE} or simply the “International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia”. The people indicted ranged from presidents and prime ministers to common soldiers and generals. In total, 161 people were indicted for various types of war crimes, of which 18 were acquitted, 91 were convicted, 13 cases were transferred to the national courts of former Yugoslav countries, 20 indictments were withdrawn, and 17 died before they were sentenced. If you’d like me to do a video on these trials then you’ll need to wait because 1 person is currently appealing their conviction, but once that’s over I’ll let you guys vote on whether I should cover these trials. The last of these hearings occurred in 2017, after which the institution ceased to exist. And this is how Yugoslavia broke apart.
