Issues

Institutional framework:
(supported by Freedom House)

Constitutional Questions
Types of Political System and Political Elites 
Party Systems
Electoral Systems
Judicial System
The Question of Territorial Organization
Stability Pact and European Integration

Constitutional Questions
Responsible researchers:
Serbia and FRY, Montenegro - Nenad Dimitrijevic
Croatia - Arsen Bacic

This topic explores the meaning and function of the fundamental laws in the countries that emerged after the breakup of the socialist Yugoslavia. Special attention will be paid to the constitutional question in contemporary Croatia, Serbia, Montenegro, and Yugoslavia. In order to prove the thesis of the perverted importance of the three fundamental laws, the question of the character of the constitution-making process will be addressed first. The Croatian (1990), the Serbian (1990) and the Yugoslavian (1992) constitution were passed under the label of constitutional continuity with the previous regime, and special attention will be paid to legal and political implications of this feature of the constitutional engineering. Both the Serbian and Yugoslavian constitutions were enacted in violation of the minimum necessary requirements of a democratic constitution-making process. Both actions were tailor-made to suit one particular man and his political followers (this holds as well for Croatia's Constitution). This personalization of the constitutions can be further illustrated by analyzing their content: both institutional arrangements and catalogues of human rights are formulated in a manner which makes it possible to manipulate and violate basic values of constitutionalism for the sake of preserving the power of ruling elite. Particular attention will be devoted to the analysis of: 1) constitutional aspects of the current process of democratic consolidation in Croatia; and, 2) the constitutional aspects of possible establishment of democratic normalcy in Serbia, Montenegro, and Yugoslavia. It will be argued that a radical revolutionary break with the previous authoritarian regimes is both unlikely and undesirable. The positive argument will be that - if the fall into a 'state of nature' is to be avoided - a strategy of continuity is the only possible way out of the vicious circle: the radical transformation ought to be carried out, in legal and institutional terms, as a reform. The process of creation of the new system is supposed to meet the Kelsenian test of legal continuity, while its foundational principles, its institutional structure and content of its rules, would all be substantially new.

top of the page

Political Systems and Political Elites
Responsible Researchers:
Serbia and Montenegro - Slobodan Antonic, Srdjan Darmanovic 
Croatia - Alija Hodzic, Smiljana Leinert Novosel

The comparative analysis of the types of political system established in Croatia and FRY (Serbia and Montenegro) after the breakup of the former Yugoslavia is aimed at clarifying some central issues pertaining to the character of the post-communist transition and consolidation. Consequently, questions of relations between legislative, judicial and executive power (considering both the constitutionally prescribed and the factual quality of these relations) will be explored.
Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia had opted - up to the recent political changes - for a form of semi-presidential system, with an extraordinarily strong executive power composed of a powerful head of state and government. In such a context, parliaments tended to play only a secondary role, acting sometimes as a mere democratic façade. However, at the same time, the one-party monopoly and majoritarian ´dictatorship´ developed in somewhat different directions and dynamics in these countries, and those differences will be comparatively taken into consideration. There will be also undertaken the comparative analysis of similarities and differences, as well as specific problems with which each of these countries has been faced, in the recently started processes of diminishing the above-mentioned characteristics of the political system and of gradual progress toward a genuine liberal democracy and establishing a parliamentary system in Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia.
top of the page

Party Systems
Responsible Researchers:
Serbia and Montenegro - Vladimir Goati
Croatia - Goran Cular

The structure and genesis of party systems in Croatia and FRY will be analyzed - each of them separately as well as comparatively. The following issues will be considered: the character of pluralism, the political programs of the most relevant parties, the value orientations of the parties (civic vs. nationalist orientations), the social structure of party members and supporters, the character of political leaders, and the relations between leadership and membership within different parties.
The common feature of the party systems in Croatia and FRY (with certain exceptions in Montenegro in the last few years has been the domination of one big party (and its coalitions), the prevalence of nationalist orientation inside the biggest party as well as generally, authoritarian relations inside the parties, the spirit of intolerance in mutual party relations, and the low level of political culture inside the party system as a whole. However, there are some important changes towards liberal democratic improvement of party systems in Croatia and Montenegro, and from recently also in Serbia. Special attention will be paid to the unequal participation of women in party systems and political elite in Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia.

top of the page

Electoral Systems
Responsible Researchers:
Serbia and Montenegro - Vladimir Goati, Veselin Pavicevic
Croatia - Srdjan Vrcan

The electoral system is one of the core features of any political system. Therefore, a decision to establish a certain type of electoral system - or to change it - always bears an important influence upon political life. The type of electoral system (majority, proportional, or some combination) has powerful effects on the political process because of the different consequences for realization of basic democratic values concerned with participation, proportional representation, equality, consensus, majority rule, strong government etc. Therefore, political parties as well as the social blocks (represented by different parties) have different attitudes towards the various types of electoral systems. An explanation will be kept in mind - in contrast with electoral law changes in FRY and Croatia - as to why electoral formulas - once established in stable democratic countries - rarely change. Both Serbia and Croatia opted for an identical - majority electoral formula (majority system in two rounds) in 1990, and then later both countries opted for proportional and combined electoral formula. In the FRY, the situation has been even more complicated. Namely, there had been a combined system on the first elections for the Federal parliament (May 1992), but soon (December 1992) a proportional system was introduced.
After December 1992 a proportional system existed in all elections - for Federal parliament and for parliaments of both republics (Serbia and Montenegro). But there were frequent changes in the number of electoral units and of 'electoral threshold'. That, of course, influenced electoral results.
As far as the electoral system in FRY is concerned, attention should be paid not only to federal and republican level but also to the region of Kosovo - which has been, since 1999, a UN protectorate.
The comparative analysis of the electoral systems in FRY and Croatia should, first, point out similarities and differences in the dynamics of changes as well as factors, which determine such changes. Special attention will be also paid to the question of gender perspective of electoral laws.
 
top of the page

Judicial System
Responsible Researchers:
Serbia and Montenegro - Radmila Vasic
Croatia - Alan Uzelac

This part of the Project will explore judicial systems in countries of former Yugoslavia (Croatia, FRY). This analysis will not be limited to formal-legal description of judiciary. These systems will be approached from both legal-normative and empirical perspectives.
The legal approach will consist in examining laws, including their compatibility with international legal standards. Special attention will be paid to existing practices of violation of hierarchy among statutes (e.g. laws which violate constitutions, or - in the Yugoslavian case - laws of member-states which violate federal statutes). This level of analysis is likely to demonstrate that the judiciary in, for example, Serbia/Yugoslavia was - before the political changes at the end of the year 2000 - frequently reduced to an instrument of ruling party. On a more general level, by analyzing violations of legal hierarchy in this area, we will examine the question of the uneasy status of judicial branch in political regimes, which do not respect the principle of separation of powers.
The empirical approach will concentrate on the analysis of interconnected processes. We will try to explore practices and techniques of subjection of judiciary to ideological and interest-based preferences of rulers and causes of overextended corruption in judicial practices of Serbia, Montenegro and Croatia. There will be also included the policy-oriented effort. Namely, the experts from the project team will prepare a set of model-laws on judiciary, and offer it for examination to legal professionals, NGOs and actors in the recently elected democratic governments. We believe it to be very important to present in clear and legally unambiguous terms the minimum standards that a well-ordered judicial system should meet. This is seen as a step toward democratic normalization, especially in countries like Croatia, Montenegro and Serbia - since the previous regimes had almost completely ruined the judicial systems.

top of the page

Territorial Organization
- Regionalism -
Responsible Researchers:
Serbia and Montenegro - Alpar Losonc
Croatia - Lino Veljak

As the FRY and Croatia became constituted as independent states, they had similar tendencies of regimes forcing strong centralization against regional attempts to decentralize. The FRY has been established with the so-called 'Zabljak`s constitution' and as a two-part federation of Serbia and Montenegro, while Croatia has been established as unitary state.
Relations between the members of new-Yugoslav federation represent a special state-legal problem, which cannot be considered in the context of the problem of regionalism. For that purpose it would be much more important to consider the problem of destroying the autonomy of two autonomous regions (Vojvodina and Kosovo), which had been done before the breakdown of SFRY. Namely, those autonomous regions were formally maintained but lost almost all their original power. At the same time, there was a strong centralization of power in the rest of Serbia, with the establishment of administrative zones (districts) as the bodies of the central government. The strengthening of autonomist intentions not only in Vojvodina but also in Sandzak (which has been extraordinarily ethnically different in comparison with the most parts of Serbia), but practically also in all parts of Serbia, objectively leads towards the real possibility of restructuring Serbia in accordance with the European concept of regionalism. Croatia became, with the Constitution of 1990, an extraordinarily centralist state. The counties ('Zupanija') established in 1992 primarily represented the central state government and only secondarily as bodies of local self-government. They did not bring any essential changes in the extraordinarily centralist political order of Croatia. The 1994 constitutional revisions established districts (`kotari`) in the regions with Serbian majority. There were strong elements of regional autonomy in those districts, but they had never been put into practice. Moreover and on the contrary, after military actions 'Bljesak' ('Lightning Bolt') and 'Oluja' ('Storm'), the constitutional-legal norms of local autonomy in Serb-majority districts were suspended. On the other hand, the regionalist concept had always been a dominant political movement in Istria, and also existed in various forms in other Croatian regions. With the change of government in 2000, regionalism received more public recognition. One regionalist party took part in the leading coalition and two more voted with the parliamentary majority. The Constitutional changes in 2000 established the legal framework for regionalization in Croatia.
Cross-border regional cooperation (in a sense of establishing European cross-border regions) has become an issue in FRY as well as in Croatia. This has also raised the issue of multiculturalism and interculturalism (especially the relationship between 'regional' and 'ethnic'.) This issue demonstrates the connections between institutions and political culture.
 
top of the page

Stability Pact and European Integration
Responsible Researchers:
Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro - Nebojsa Vucinic

This project will certainly have positive consequences for the Stability Pact ideas and purposes, as well as the European integrative processes. The common work offered here by certain scientific institutions and academics from Croatia, Serbia and Montenegro represents exactly the practical cooperation and interrelations in Southeast Europe as imagined by the conceivers of the Stability Pact. This project's subject and especially the method of work will immediately and concretely contribute to a realization of the main ideas and aims of the Stability Pact. In other words, this project will contribute to a free circulation of people, to the exchange of ideas and opinions concerned with state, society and individuals, and consequently, to peace, stability, prosperity and economic development in the region. This project represents one of the first concrete steps in practical academic connections in Southeast Europe.
Furthermore, the project investigation will enable an objective insight into the social and political processes that caused the breakdown of SFRY, as well as deeper knowledge about the nature and character of newborn states, and their social and cultural basis and backgrounds. Such insights should be considered when encouraging cooperation and interrelations in new countries, especially in the context of their involvement in European integrative processes. These comparative and multidisciplinary investigations will result in very concrete and useful, scientifically based conclusions about social relations and political processes. This study will make clearer causes and actors that either enable or disable an establishment of democracy, market economy, rule of law, limited and controlled government, and respect for human rights. In other words, this project will elucidate those factors that would move states and societies either closer to or further from European integrative processes. This project's theoretical and empirical investigation will help the European Union conceive of a long-term political and economic strategy towards integrating the states of Southeast Europe.
 

 

 

cedet home

top of the page