UDC 930.85(4–12) ISSN 0350–7653 SERBIAN ACADEMY OF SCIENCES AND ARTS INSTITUTE FOR BALKAN STUDIES

BALCANICA XLVI ANNUAL OF THE INSTITUTE FOR BALKAN STUDIES

Editor-in-Chief DUŠAN T. BATAKOVIĆ Director of the Institute for Balkan Studies SASA

Editorial Board JEAN-PAUL BLED (Paris), LJUBOMIR MAKSIMOVIĆ, ZORAN MILUTINOVIĆ (London), DANICA POPOVIĆ, BILJANA SIKIMIĆ, SPIRIDON SFETAS (), GABRIELLA SCHUBERT (Jena), NIKOLA TASIĆ, SVETLANA M. TOLSTAJA (Moscow)

BELGRADE 2015 438 Balcanica XLVI (2015)

Sabrina Ramet, The Three : State-Building and Legitimation, 1918–2005. Woodrow Wilson Center Press with Indiana University Press, 2006, xxii + 817 p. Reviewed by Dragan Bakić*

Professor Sabrina Ramet is a well-known of (1918–1945), Tito’s com­ author specialising in the history of Yugo­ munist Yugoslavia (1945–1991) and the slavia and post-Yugoslav era who distilled rump Yugoslavia consisting of and her decades-long study of the subject in Montenegro alone (1992–2003), the fi­ this book. Being a political scientist, she nal stage of the country’s demise – with analyses the tormented history of the a view to vindicating her hypothesis. Un­ ’ state in the twentieth century fortunately, even the most cursory glance through the paradigm of their inability to at the content of Ramet’s book reveals establish political legitimacy as the basis glaring methodological deficiencies that for state-building project. Ramet explains render it completely and utterly unreli­ the tenets of political legitimacy in the able. To begin with, one would expect the first chapter setting a theoretical frame­ writer of a Yugoslav history to thoroughly work for her writing; these are equated research primary material in the Yugo­ with the values of liberal project compris­ slav archives unless he/she opted to draw ing, above all, the rule of law, individual entirely on secondary sources – which is rights, tolerance, respect for the harm also legitimate. Ramet has done neither. principle and state neutrality in religious She has undertaken research primarily in matters. The central argument of politi­ the National Archives of the USA instead cal legitimacy is, of course, unobjection­ and managed to consult a single fond in able in itself but also rather self-evident, the Croatian national archives in which thus raises doubt as to its utility as (Hrvatski državni arhiv). She did not set historical explanation. Tito’s Yugoslavia, a foot in a single archive in Belgrade, not for example, was communist dictator­ even the Archives of Yugoslavia (Arhiv Ju- ship emerging from civil war and relying goslavije) the very name of which suggests on terror and repression for its continued its indispensability for what she was doing. existence; it was, as any other dictatorship, In addition, her secondary sources clearly an antithesis of liberal values and free ex­ show the tremendous extent of her pro- pression of popular will. What is then Croat and anti-Serb bias. Ramet heavily the point of proving something that is draws on a number of Croat authors many axiomatic, namely that a communist dic­ of whom were not reputable scholars or, tatorship collapsed because it failed to es­ for that matter, not scholars at all; they are tablish the rule of law and lacked political often people who had participated in the legitimacy? Another problem is that ret­ events they wrote about later or recounted rospective measuring of historical events in interviews that Ramet conducted with against the criteria firmly grounded in our them; some are widely regarded as promi­ times is always at serious risk to neglect nent Croat nationalists. It should be ob­ or misinterpret contemporary historical vious to any undergraduate student that context and consequently present a dis­ their accounts could not be taken at their torted reflection of the past. face value before being critically examined Be that as it may, Ramet embarks on a and compared with other sources includ­ lengthy exposition of the history of three Yugoslav states – the interwar Kingdom * Institute for Balkan Studies SASA Reviews 439 ing those from “the other side”. The same independent country for four decades and can be said of Ramet’s use of newspapers a member of the victorious Entente Pow­ including the most extravagant propagan­ ers coalition. She claims all Macedonians da. Needless to say, secondary sources and to have been pro-Bulgarian because of literature of Serbian provenance are con­ which the terrorised them and “the spicuous by their absence. Even non-Serb Macedonians fought back”, a reference authors offering more balanced assessment to pro-Bulgarian Internal Macedonian of Yugoslav history are ignored, except in a Revolutionary Organisation’s (IMRO) few instances where their works were dis­ “resistance” (p. 47). This is certainly a missed, although the latter are given in the novel interpretation of what is generally bibliography for the sake of appearances. agreed upon in historiography – leaving A full list of factual errors, misinter­ aside the question of the competing Ser­ pretations, intentional omissions, con­ bian and Bulgarian claims on tradictions, not to speak of typos would – namely, that IMRO carried out terror­ be impossible to compile here due to the ist campaign in Macedonia against the space constraints of a review. What fol­ Yugoslav authorities and those among lows is just a brief overview of the most local population who were loyal to the astonishing instances of the abovemen­ new state, and that the authorities con­ tioned which proves beyond any doubt sequently clamped down on IMRO and that the author was not entirely guided their supporters among native population. by scholarly agenda. From the very be­ In Montenegro, Ramet goes on, civil strife ginning, Ramet presents a picture of the was waged between “the widely popular failed attempts to form a viable Yugoslav pro-independence ‘greens’ and the less state in which the Serbs are invariably popular but better armed pro-Serbia cast in the role of vicious villains. The ‘whites’” (p. 47). In fact, the whites were principle of national self-determination more numerous, but perhaps that is less to which royal Yugoslavia owed its birth of a mistake than presenting the greens as is disputed but Ramet does not suggest willing to accept a union with Serbia pro­ what the alternative was. With the benefit vided that were recognised of hindsight, she inveighs against the fact as citizens with equal rights when they ac­ that no referendum was held concerning tually wanted Montenegro to be part of a the issues of union, dynasty and internal Yugoslav federation and maintained their organisation of the state, i.e. constitu­ loyalty to the ex-king Nikola Petrović. In­ tional framework (p. 36). It seems that it cidentally, the greens regarded themselves does not occur to her that referendum was as Serbs and not a separate Montenegrin not deemed necessary because of what nation, but that is not mentioned in the she notes herself: the Corfu Declaration text. In her treatment of religious mat­ of 1917 settled the first two issues by an ters in this region, Ramet should rectify agreement between the representatives of her factual error that there existed “the Serbs, and Slovenes (p. 42). Montenegrin patriarchate”. The Croats Nevertheless, the author is certain are said to have been repressed by Serbs that the Serbs never entertained the pos­ and the competency of what had been the sibility of treating the others as equals Croatian autonomous province within (pp. 35–39). To prove this point, Ramet Hungary severely reduced. This is backed puts forward a number of blatant false­ by the often repeated but nevertheless hoods – to be sure, the Serbs did have a inaccurate claim that Belgrade dissolved preponderant position which is hardly the Croatian Assembly (Sabor) (p. 52) surprising given that Serbia had been an which, in fact, dissolved itself more than 440 Balcanica XLVI (2015) a month before the creation of Yugoslavia ed as early as 31 August 1941 when the after having proclaimed itself unnecessary liberated the town of Loznica in in the new Kingdom. Other false claims western Serbia. Anyone slightly familiar are simply bizarre: Ramet would have us with the history of Yugoslavia in the Sec­ believe, placing her trust in the brochure ond World War must be equally stunned of an IMRO/Bulgarian propagandist to read that after the defeat in Decem­ published in Budapest in 1929, that the ber 1941 “Mihailović’s Chetniks barely Yugoslav authorities “shipped large quan­ maintained any presence in Serbia” and tities of books from to Belgrade that the centre of their “activity moved to on the argument that they were no lon­ the NDH” (p. 145). Ramet insists on the ger needed in Croatia!” (p. 50). Another instances of Chetnik collaboration with such source is sufficiently reliable for ­Ra the Axis, particularly with the Italians, met to reproduce from it that “more than although it is perfectly clear that such 100,000 Croatia Catholics converted to activities were designed to facilitate the Serbian Orthodoxy in 1935 alone” (p. 96). struggle against the Ustasha and, as she Ramet’s account of the Second unwillingly concedes, partisans were also World War in Yugoslavia could best be prepared to make arrangements with the described as closely following the lines Germans, as in March 1943. All this does of the communist-partisan mythology not prevent Ramet from laying down that which served to justify Tito’s dictatorship “it is more than a bit disappointing that after 1945 and have long since been de­ … people can still be found who believe constructed. Although she acknowledges that the Chetniks were doing anything the Ustasha committed against besides attempting to realise a vision of an the Serbs in the fascist Independent State ethnically homogeneous Greater Serbian of Croatia (NDH), she does not fully ap­ state, which they intended to advance, in preciate that the mostly killed the short run, by a policy of collaboration each other during the war. The revolu­ with Axis forces” (p. 145). The true sig­ tionary agenda of Tito’s partisans that put nificance of this blatant misinterpretation the seizure of power before the fighting becomes clear in later text covering more against the Axis troops – though they recent events. certainly fought against the occupiers – is Communist Yugoslavia emerged from entirely overlooked. On the other hand, the war and it was founded on the com­ her interpretation of the royalist Chetnik plex and often contradictory constitutional movement might as well have been writ­ settlement that breaded the seed of nation­ ten by a communist apologist. Brushing alist discontent – the federation consisted aside that Dragoljub Mihailović’s fighters of six republics and two autonomous prov­ constituted a legitimate movement sup­ inces within Serbia. Ramet’s treatment of ported by the Yugoslav government-in- the developments under Tito runs along exile in London and were the first guer­ the same pro-Croat and anti-Serbian lines rilla force that rose to arms against the as in the case of the interwar Kingdom. Germans in occupied Europe, as well as She sympathises with the surge of Croat one of the participants in the waxing civil nationalism peaking in 1971 (the so-called war, Ramet portrays them as refusing to or MASPOK meaning engage against the Wehrmacht from the “mass movement”). Ramet considers the start and turning against the partisans nationalists from the ranks of the League despite Tito’s pleas to join forces (pp. of Communists of Croatia liberals just as 143–144). Nothing could be further from Serbian liberals from their own section the truth. The Serbian insurrection start­ of the communist party – the latter, how­ Reviews 441 ever, renounced nationalism and insisted fall of Aleksandar Ranković, a Serb and that Serbia should mind her own busi­ head of the security service; in fact, na­ ness and not interfere with other republics. tionalism “animated a large portion of The opponents of Croatian nationalists the Serbian population, from the peas­ within Croatia are dubbed “conservatives” antry to those on the rungs of power”. although one should expect that Ramet And yet all the evidence that the author would find their more liberal antinational­ advances for such a sweeping assertion ism closer to her heart. More specifically, amounts to a cryptic reference in a news­ Ramet discusses four alleged grievances of paper and the lame jibe uttered by the Croatian nationalists: “the use of textbooks prominent Serbian communist Slobodan to suppress Croatian national sentiment, Penezić–Krcun who “sought to pay Tito the Serbianization of the Croatian lan­ a compliment by saying that he had only guage, the demographic displacement of one shortcoming – he was not a Serb!” Croats by Serbs, and the encouragement But this sort of logic does not come as a of Dalmatian sentiment in order to split surprise when Ramet even explains the Croatia in two” (p. 230). Without explicitly flare-up of Croatian nationalism in 1971 saying so, Ramet takes these complaints as a “reaction to the hegemonistic pos­ quite seriously although at least the latter ture adopted by the Serbian and Mon­ two were unfounded to the point of be­ tenegrin parties, the Serb communists ing absurd. The claim that emigration of within Croatia, and Ranković’s people Croatian workers to Western Europe, for in general” (pp. 242–243). The concrete example, was a plot “to move able-bodied nature of the hegemonistic posture dur­ Croats out of the country, so that Serbs ing this time, however, is not addressed at could take their places” (pp. 232–233) all, whereas Ranković was ostracised from could only serve to point out pathological political life of Yugoslavia in 1966. The manifestations of chauvinistic hate. The fixation on Ranković is very revealing as language issue, in particular, reflected the he is presented as something of a com­ depths of nationalistic frenzy as the Croa­ munist equivalent of Nikola Pašić and his tian intellectuals gathered in the cultural Radicals, or “the Devil” as Ramet prefers association Matica hrvatska repudiated to refer to them (p. 67). She professes that the 1850 Vienna agreement between the Ranković conducted “repressive Serbi­ prominent Serb and Croat philologists es­ anization policies” which “were concen­ tablishing the common Serbo-Croat lan­ trated in , Vojvodina, and Bosnia- guage. Perhaps Ramet did not perceive this linguistic controversy as a manifestation of Herzegovina (i.e., against the Albanians, nationalism since, in her view, “pupils in the Hungarians, and the Muslims)”; the Croatian elementary schools were exposed elevation of Bosnian Muslims to the sta­ to the Cyrillic alphabet” (p. 312). She pre­ tus of one of the constituent Yugoslav sumably knows that pupils in Serbia or, for nations is also construed to have been fa­ that matter, Macedonia were equally “ex­ cilitated by Ranković’s downfall (p. 286). posed” to the Latin alphabet in what was Once again, not a shred of evidence is envisioned as a policy of upholding the provided for these categorical statements. equality of both alphabets throughout the One might wonder how it was possible country. for Serbian communists to supress all If Croats’ grievances were legitimate, other Yugoslavs at will and yet be so im­ then they must have been provoked from potent at the same time to prevent virtual some quarters. Indeed, Ramet charges the confederalisation of their own republic Serbs with being affected with “national­ with anomalous status of the autonomous ist chauvinism” both before and after the provinces of Kosovo and Vojvodina which 442 Balcanica XLVI (2015) remained in Serbia but nearly became re­ bore sole responsibility for the bloody publics in their own right. war that ensued through his pursue of the As for nationalism among Serbs in Greater Serbian project. In Ramet’s view, Croatia, it is said to have derived from that conflict was not a civil war, but rather their religious distrust felt towards Croats Serbia’s war of aggression against Croatia – perhaps a reference to their centuries- and (BiH, and long experience with proselytism of the later Kosovo). The utility of Ramet’s pre­ Roman Catholic Church, but the author vious gross distortions and misinterpreta­ remains vague – and the activities of the tions of earlier history becomes evident in Serb cultural society , “a forum her account of the War of the Yugoslav for former Chetniks” (not a single name Succession (1991–99). To begin with, she is given). In particular, Ramet finds it designates all “Serb nationalists”, which inadmissible that “Serbian nationalists” in her narrative means the vast majority of wanted an autonomous province within Serbs, as Chetniks. Since Milošević is said Croatia, or that Prosvjeta demanded that to have masterminded what Ramet quali­ both Croatian and Serbian be recognised fies as the Greater Serbian aggression, as official languages in Croatia and that which is, as she assures us, the same polit­ the interests of the Serb community be ical program as that pursued by Chetniks, protected through the agency of a Cham­ it is only natural that the Serbian presi­ ber for Interethnic Relations within the dent rehabilitated the Chetnik movement framework of the Croatian Assembly. It and “even erected a monument to Chet­ seems almost incredible that the author nik leader Draža Mihailović” (p. 389). does not comprehend, for example, that The said monument is a sheer fabrication the request concerning language was but and, in general, Milošević embraced com­ a reaction to the Croatian nationalist de­ munist legacy and partisan movement mand for separation of Croatian from whereas his political opponents from the : the use of Serbian as right stood for rehabilitation of Chetniks. an official language in Croatia would be But if facts do not fit in with Ramet’s a logical ramification of what was, after construction, so much worse for the facts. all, championed by Matica hrvatska. This Historical falsification dating back to is a fine example of how Ramet turns the Second World War is compounded hard facts upside down. She even poses here by another intentional misinterpre­ a rhetorical question: “What would have tation: Ramet denounces “the Chetniks” been the reaction in Serbia if the Croats for imposing the principle of ethnic con­ of Vojvodina had made the equivalent dominium over majority rule in Bosnia demand?” This would suggest that the insofar as they denied the right of Cro­ Croats constituted a sizeable minority ats and Bosnian Muslims to detach BiH in Vojvodina and that was not the case from Yugoslavia. She would no doubt be – Hungarians were the largest minority correct unless the constitution of BiH there – and Vojvodina did enjoy autono­ had been predicated on the principle that mous status on account of its ethnic di­ the three ethnic groups were constituent versity (pp. 242–243). nations whose consensus was therefore The account of the history of both in­ necessary for any substantial change in terwar and Tito’s Yugoslavia with all its the status of their republic. However, blunders and distortions is but a prelude Ramet chooses to pass in silence over for the discussion of the latter’s breakup. this crucial fact for understanding the This is explained in simple black and outbreak of war in BiH (p. 419). Instead white terms: for all the deficiencies of oth­ she proceeds with the list of pathological er non-Serb actors, Slobodan Milošević deviations typical of “Chetniks” which Reviews 443 includes their pride of “enjoying superior been recognised as separatist manifes­ capacities for sexual performance” (p. tation. She would also have us believe 420). If one would expect that the au­ that an estimated 400,000 Albanians thor is, for good measure, equally harsh fled from Kosovo from 1987 to 1989 (p. in her treatment of Croatia’s role in the 512), a fantastic piece of information no war, one would be very much mistaken. doubt designed to justify what would Despite admission that Croat veterans’ happen in the following decade. “Alba­ organisation displayed the Ustasha ver­ nians knew instinctively that the time sion of Croatian flag and that Tudjman’s for armed struggle had arrived”, reads government fulfilled Pavelić’s dream of Ramet’s explanation for the outbreak of uprooting the Serbs from Croatia and insurgency led by the Kosovo Liberation strove to extend the Croatian borders at Army (KLA) in 1998 (p. 513). Ramet the expense of BiH, Ramet saw no paral­ admits that the findings of Finnish pa­ lel with the political program and prac­ thologist Helena Ranta gave lie to the tice of the NDH. In fact, she almost ex­ official version of the alleged Račak mas­ cused Tudjman’s territorial ambitions on sacre confirming that rather than being the grounds that he truly believed what innocent Albanian civilians some of the Ante Starčević and Ustasha had believed dead were members of Serbian forces before him – that all Bosnian Mus­ and others KLA terrorists (p. 511). Nev­ lims were Croats (pp. 421–422). More ertheless, the refutation of this fabrica­ broadly, Ramet sees no inconsistency, to tion exploited as an excuse to threaten say the least, in the proposition that a Serbia with force does not evince any multiethnic Yugoslavia had to disappear kind of explanation. The ensuing negoti­ as an illegitimate creation while at the ations at Rambouillet are grossly misin­ same time BiH had to be preserved at all terpreted as having failed because of Bel­ costs regardless of the fact that it was a grade’s rejection of a compromise which miniature version of Yugoslavia riddled sought “to find a middle ground between with the same ethnic conflicts between the Serbian and Albanian positions” its constituent nations and no more “le­ (p. 516). In reality, Federal Republic of gitimate” than Yugoslavia was. Yugoslavia was demanded under the The anti-Serbian pattern is also ap­ threat of NATO military intervention plied to what was going on in Kosovo. to abandon Kosovo to NATO troops Ramet admits the pressure exerted on and agree to an eventual referendum in Serbs by their Albanian neighbours in that province about its status which in the Albanian-run autonomous Serbian practice meant to agree to an indepen­ province which resulted in a massive ex­ dent Kosovo. Since Belgrade refused this odus of the former throughout the 1980s ultimatum reminiscent of Hitler’s deal­ and earlier. Nevertheless, she claims that ing with Czechoslovakia in 1938 NATO the Serbs who had fled Kosovo from embarked on the illegal bombing of Yu­ Albanian terror “began to talk of their goslavia – without UN authorisation. own alleged sufferings and to demand As it is well-known, the NATO cam­ special benefits in Kosovo”; because of paign ended in the establishment of the that Serbia was “aflame with national­ UN-mandated Kosovo in 1999 which lat­ ism” by 1986 (p. 305). Ramet would have er, after the publication of this book, was us believe that from the 1970s until the recognised by a large number of states, late 1980s just a minority of Albanians but not the UN as a whole, as an inde­ favoured separatism (p. 511) although pendent state. Particularly cynical is Ra­ she herself described nationalist rioting met’s subsuming of increasing ethnically in Kosovo in 1981 which has universally motivated kidnappings of and assaults on 444 Balcanica XLVI (2015)

Kosovo Serbs after 1999 into the ordinary banner”. If Tudjman was guilty for any­ criminality rubric (p. 539). Such attitude thing that was his decision upon assuming is further emphasised when often fatal the office to authorise the firing of Serbs attacks on Serbs by “vengeance-minded from Croatia’s police because they consti­ Albanians” are simply put down to “the tuted 75 per cent of policemen (p. 356)! anger which had built up over more than One can only guess what the source for a decade of repression by Milošević’s this extravagant claim was since the author agents” (p. 542). Striving to vindicate her omitted the reference. Ramet is also more version of the conflict between Serbs and than generous in treating Tudjman’s mili­ Albanians in Kosovo in the late twentieth tary involvement in BiH as opposed to the century Ramet again resorts to rewriting assistance that Milošević provided to Bos­ earlier history. One is simply astonished nian Serbs portrayed as aggressors – and to read that the Albanians and Serbs war criminals – in their own native land. “maintained civil and often friendly rela­ In a small but telling example she refers to tions with each other well into the 1980’s” “the Croatian liberation of Sanski Most” (p. 541). This incredulous claim designed (p. 465) when speaking of the conquest of to support the incredulous argument that the predominantly Serb-populated town it was Milošević’s rule alone that was re­ in western Bosnia in 1995 by the regular sponsible for what happened in Kosovo in . the late runs contrary even against Ramet’s interpretation of Yugosla­ the evidence provided in the book. In­ via’s demise is perhaps best summed up deed, Ramet herself identifies five periods in her endorsement of the Croatian Dep­ since 1878 during which the Serbs were uty-Prime Minister in 1991/2, Zdravko persecuted by Albanians and four periods Tomac’s “comparison of U.S. president during which the roles were reversed (p. [George] Bush’s handling of Milošević 552). with Neville Chamberlain’s handling of The account of the War of the Yugo­ Hitler in 1938” (p. 411). In addition to her slav succession amounts to little more than profession that the Greater Serbian pro­ a reproduction of wartime propaganda ject was “articulated by Ilija Garašanin, from the media outlets including, for ex­ Vuk Stefanović Karadžić, Vladimir Karić, ample, the accusation levelled at the Bos­ and others, and embraced by Nikola Pašić nian Serb forces of systematically using and … King Aleksandar” (p. 99), a se­ rape to spread terror and drive non-Serbs ries of most important Serb political and from their homes (p. 430). Ramet is espe­ cially prone to turning a blind eye to the cultural personages from the nineteenth raging nationalism of the Franjo Tudjman and twentieth century, it becomes clear government in Croatia and minimising that she views the entire modern Serbian its unashamed flirtation with the Ustasha history as an uninterrupted quest for na­ legacy. In her interpretation, it was “rising tionalist expansion. Such naked condem­ Serbian nationalism” emerging from the nation of an entire nation comes close Kosovo crisis that “in turn infected Serbs to ethnic-cultural prejudice at best and in Croatia, leading to renewed difficulties spreading dangerous intolerance thinly in Croatia” (p. 306). Ramet would even veiled as scholarship at worst, some­ have us believe that the Croatian com­ thing that is exact negation of Ramet’s munists were about to win the elections avowed espousal of the liberal project, to in 1990 but “the rising tide of Serbian na­ borrow from her discourse. With this in tionalism, both within Serbia and among view, an important question springs to the , produced a backlash mind: is there such a thing as illegitimate among Croats, who steamed to Tudjman’s scholarship?