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H- Banda on Niebuhr, 'The Search for a Legitimacy: Foreign Policy and Tito's '

Review published on Thursday, August 27, 2020

Robert Niebuhr. The Search for a Cold War Legitimacy: Foreign Policy and Tito's Yugoslavia. Leiden: Brill Academic Publishers, 2018. 268 pp. $126.00 (cloth), ISBN 978-90-04-35887-4.

Reviewed by Paul Brenard Chiudza Banda (Tarleton University) Published on H-War (August, 2020) Commissioned by Margaret Sankey (Air University)

Printable Version: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showpdf.php?id=55253

In this book, Professor Niebuhr analyzes the domestic and foreign policies of Yugoslavia’s Marxist postwar leader, , who lived from 1892 to 1980. To do so, he grapples with the question of Tito’s claim to “legitimacy” both at home and internationally. In Yugoslavia, Tito had to maintain domestic support in a multiethnic country coming out of the devastation of the Second . Internationally, he had to balance satisfying the Eastern and blocs during the Cold War while also playing a key role in the . The author’s understanding of “legitimacy” is drawn from the works of such scholars as Max Weber and Seymour P. Lipset. For both, “legitimacy” entails the use of physical force by the government to channel the people toward national goals. It also involves the government creating and maintaining the belief that those in power and the institutions they create are the most appropriate for the entire society’s socioeconomic well-being.

The book has five main chapters, written using data drawn from various archives. These include the Open Society Archive in Budapest, the Archive of Yugoslavia, and other archives in the USA and , from which he mined government reports, newspaper articles, and other party materials. Surprisingly, the author did not consult any archive in the so-called Third World, considering that a significant part of the book, especially chapters 3 and 4, focuses on Tito’s influence in the Nonaligned Movement (NAM).

Niebuhr argues that his study is different from earlier works in the field, especially those that paint a picture of Tito’s Yugoslavia as a country characterized by historically divisive ethnic-based and dysfunctional politics. This current study focuses on how Tito held the country together. Yugoslavia was comprised of multiple ethnic groups, including Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Bosnia Muslims, Macedonians, Hungarians, and Montenegrins. Tito’s charisma, ideological reforms (especially the Marxist-Leninist ), and his foreign policy helped to avoid state disunity and collapse.

These processes, which came to be defined as “,” offered the Yugoslav people the illusion of a common identity. Locally, this ideology was called “socialist self-management” and was applied across the state. Tito adopted and adapted the Soviet ideology to fit in with the changes that he envisaged for Yugoslavia. Titoism also included creating a foreign policy, especially since the early , in which Tito stood out as the “strongman” of the Balkan region at the peak of the Cold War.

Citation: H-Net Reviews. Banda on Niebuhr, 'The Search for a Cold War Legitimacy: Foreign Policy and Tito's Yugoslavia'. H-War. 08-27-2020. https://networks.h-net.org/node/12840/reviews/6373203/banda-niebuhr-search-cold-war-legitimacy-foreign-policy-and-titos Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 License. 1 H-War

The reformulation of the Yugoslav state under Tito followed the devastation of the invasion of World War II. He united Yugoslavs under the umbrella ideology of Marxist-. However, his efforts to expand the state’s territory were soon checked by the Soviet , , who, in 1948, expelled Yugoslavia from the Communist Information Bureau (). Stalin was suspicious of Tito’s expansionist ambitions, especially to areas where the Soviets also held interests, including , Carinthia, and . From then onward, Tito kept a watchful eye for any possible Soviet invasion.

As Yugoslavia lost ’s support, Tito and his party cohorts in the Yugoslav Communist Party (LCY) took it as an opportunity to rebuild the state in their own ideological orientation. The so-called socialist self-management, or Titoism, was based on giving people a voice (or decentralization). It also focused on patriotism, collectivization, and rapid industrialization. Tito also purged the party and state of remnant “Cominformists,” used the to repel domestic competitors and foreign invaders, and relied on American to rebuild the state, independent of Soviet influence. He also joined forces with leaders of the newly decolonized states of and to form the NAM. Working with such leaders as (), Nehru (), Nasser (), and Nkrumah (Ghana), Tito took the opportunity to ideologically influence global affairs. For Tito, this also helped to propel his state’s legitimacy both at home and internationally. He even hosted the movement’s conferences in in 1961 and 1969.

Domestic legitimacy was also enhanced by both the army (the Yugoslav People’s Army, or JNA) and the LCY. These two bodies collaborated to ensure national unity, regime survival, and territorial defense. When Tito’s age advanced and became a significant concern throughout the , the JNA and the LCY also championed patriotism and instituted constitutional reforms to bind the people together. Such state stability allowed Yugoslavia to continue being a key global player, championing such causes as the respect for rights and fundamental freedoms.

This book is an impressive contribution to the field of , especially in the post-World War II era. It will be an essential read for those interested in studying state construction and consolidation in the Balkan region, the global Cold War, or the politics of the NAM. On the other hand, this book could have benefited more if the author had consulted archives from the so-called Third World, especially from countries ruled by leaders of the NAM. This could have helped to explain why such countries accepted the openly communist Tito in their midst, thus defeating the whole concept of “nonalignment.” Furthermore, the author could have also acknowledged that the NAM never triumphed because of operational and economic challenges and the varying interests of the movement’s member states. This saw the leaders of other member states seek and depend on support from either the East or the . Such oversights aside, many will find this book a worthy addition to their collection and compelling to read.

Citation: Paul Brenard Chiudza Banda. Review of Niebuhr, Robert,The Search for a Cold War Legitimacy: Foreign Policy and Tito's Yugoslavia. H-War, H-Net Reviews. August, 2020.URL: http://www.h-net.org/reviews/showrev.php?id=55253

This work is licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0

Citation: H-Net Reviews. Banda on Niebuhr, 'The Search for a Cold War Legitimacy: Foreign Policy and Tito's Yugoslavia'. H-War. 08-27-2020. https://networks.h-net.org/node/12840/reviews/6373203/banda-niebuhr-search-cold-war-legitimacy-foreign-policy-and-titos Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 2 H-War

United States License.

Citation: H-Net Reviews. Banda on Niebuhr, 'The Search for a Cold War Legitimacy: Foreign Policy and Tito's Yugoslavia'. H-War. 08-27-2020. https://networks.h-net.org/node/12840/reviews/6373203/banda-niebuhr-search-cold-war-legitimacy-foreign-policy-and-titos Licensed under a Creative Commons Attribution-Noncommercial-No Derivative Works 3.0 United States License. 3