YUGOSLAVIA'S FIRST POST-TITO PARTY CONGRESS Part I: Problems on the Agenda by Dennison I. Rusinow 1982/No. 39 Europe [DIR-2-'82] The first post-Tito Party Con- been signs since the congress that gress emphasized continuity, this may happen sooner rather than later, but it had been clear for some despite the obvious fact that months before the comrades Tito's own guiding hand has assembled in Belgrade that it would been replaced by collective not happen then or without a few leadership. The political prob- more hard knocks from "life itself," lem attendant to this change in as Marxists are fond of calling the a conflict-prone multinational ultimate confounder of even best- society is equaled and reinforced laid schemes.- woes, by Yugoslavia's economic Continuity as the theme of the Con- gress was still unavoidable in June 1982 for a regime whose slogan since its founder's death has been "Continuity" was unavoidably, if "After Tito--Tito," and whose inappropriately, the name of the leaders have been unable to agree game for the Twelfth Congress of on reforms that they also fear would the League of Communists of be interpreted as the beginning of a Yugoslavia ("the Party") which met general "de-Titoization." in Belgrade from June 26 through It is generally and probably correctly 29, 1982. In the light of economic believed that even a widespread problems so grave that they ought suspicion that a general overhaul of to have serious social and political "Titoist" principles and institutions repercussions and the experience of is on theway would be singularly de- other countries after the passing of stabilizing. It is, after all, a regime a "charismatic" founding father or with no other persuasive claim to an overweening dictator--the Soviet legitimacy governing an historically Union after Stalin, Spain after conflict-prone multinational society Franco, and China after Mao--it where almost any change is seen, might in principle have been often rightly, as likely to benefit one otherwise. This was, after all, the or two jealously watchful national first congress of the LCY since the communities at cost to the others. It death of Josip Broz Tito, in May is also highly uncertain that radical 1980, removed his octogenarian but changes would produce a system still authoritative guiding hand from that many Yugoslavs would like the Party he had. led since 1937, the better than the one they have. state he and his Communist Par- Almost anything might come out of tisans refo.unded during World War Pandora's box once it is open. Many II, and the Yugoslav experiment suspect that in. present political and with a "different road to socialism" economic circumstances the like- that the rest of the world calls liest outcome might be a system "Titoism." But anyone who ex- more like those to the East, in the pected this first post-Tito Party Con- Soviet bloc, even if almost none of gress to reveal major changes, for the players in the game originally better or for worse, in systems or wanted that to happen. policies or even collective leader- ships was disappointed. Such If continuity was therefore the iiiili changes may come, and there have unavoidable theme, it was also a 2/DI R-2-'82 singularly inappropriate one for nants of "state-bureaucratic" and that serious differences had sur- Yugoslavia in 1982. The same Party rule would be open and faced within the new Central Com- leaders and led who fear discon- manageable. What should be done mittee on the very day the congress tinuity are at the same time acutely to impel such a change in behavior ended. These had led to a month- aware that many aspects of Yugo- without changes in the system and long series of secret, unpublicized slav federalism and "socialist self- its rules was still, as always, unclear. meetings of the Party leadership management," the two pillars of "dealing with questions in our "Titoism," are not functioning well The most logical conclusion for mutual relations.., and not with in terms of either efficiency or pro- those who followed the congress carrying out the Congress Resolu- claimed values; thus the conse- debates closely, which the leader- tions."1 The situation in the leader- quences of no change can sooner or ship should hope were few, would ship was ominously described as later prove more fatefully "desta- be that present leaders should be reminiscent of 1971, the year of bilizing" than timely if also risky awarded a medal for valiant self- Yugoslavia's most serious postwar reforms. criticism and then be dismissed for political crisis. lack of vision about the way out of The dilemma was described by a the situation they had participated in This last may prove to be an exag- leading Party social scientist, in a creating. conversation on the day after the geration, as several Yugoslav news- papers suggested hopefully in congress ended, as follows: "This is How long this paradox and the un- their a time when changes, including editorial comments. Outsiders of resolved dilemma it represents can two overlapping kinds--those who those affecting basic matters, are remain tolerable to the political essential; but it is also a time when wish Yugoslavia well and those who establishment or the populace was consider the stability of this stra- changes affecting basic matters are also unclear, although one congress impossible." tegically located nonaligned Balkan delegate proposed a specific dead- country important to European sta- The net result was a congress of line. Bogdan Crnobrna-- once Tito's bility along the East-West dividing paradoxes. For 30 years, beginning chef du cabinet, sometime Ambas- line and therefore to world peace-- with the Sixth Congress in 1952, sador to the United States, and so a have good reason to hope so too. Yugoslav. Party congresses have prestigious if not a powerful voice-- Some clues to the answer may be been notoriously more open, self- suggested that a special Party found in the subject of this Report: critical, and occasionally marked by Congress should be convoked in problems on the agenda of the conflicting views than is usual in one year's time if the present leader- Twelfth Congress and what hap- Communist Party congresses, espe- ship had not achieved "significant" pened and did not happen there. in states. progress in solving the country's cially Communist-ruled economic and political problems. The Twelfth Congress outdid all The Economy earlier ones on all these a The implication was that heads counts, would then have to roll. His speech The Yugoslav economy is in bad point rightly emphasized in most how bad is debatable. Western media reports. was given prominent attention, with shape. Just Party implicit approval, in Belgrade's in- So is Yugoslavia's ranking on inter- leaders and rank-and-file delegates creasingly free-wheeling and critical national scales of current economic vied with one another in pinpointing daily and weekly press. The misery and realistic "best-case" weaknesses, mistakes, lack of re- congress, however, declined to potential for recovery in the fore- sponsibility, and macro- as well as hang such a time-fused sword of seeable future-- prospects evaluated micro-facults in the system itself, Damocles over the Party and state's in terms of genuinely available re- and in calling for the removal of (horizontally rotating)leaderships. sources, technology, comparative those responsible for the short- In an apparent concession to this advantages, etc., but also assuming comings. sort of proposal, a change in the that appropriate economic policies What was missing, with a few Party statute merely provided that a can be devised and implemented. exceptions and apart from pious special Party conference--i.e., a As the congress assembled, Yugo- generalities, was a prescription of meeting without the power of a slavia's standing was certainly remedies. Keynote speeches and congress to elect new leaderships-- better on both scales than that of Congress Resolutions offered little may be convened annually and on Poland or Romania, some other more than a reaffirmation of a time- demand to "review the work of Soviet bloc countries, and most of worn but unhelpful proposition: leading bodies." the Third World. Certainly it was Political and economic actors and worse, at least on the first scale, decision-makers (especially those in The first public hint that papering than neighboring Austria, Switzer- the Party!) must finally and "gen- over differences and shying away land, and some other relative uinely" implement and obey the from the horns of Yugoslavia's "islands of the blessed" in a world- rules of"socialist self-management" dilemma may not last long came wide sea of assorted economic woe. set forth in the 1974 Constitution, only a few weeks later, on Septem- It was perhaps, better and perhaps the 1976 Law on Associated Labor, ber 13, and from the Party's most worse than next-door Hungary, the and especially "the economic laws" authoritative source, the current rest of Mediterranean Europe, of supply and demand in a competi- President of the Central Committee's Mexico, and Brazil, with sufficient tive market economy. Were this to 23-member Presidency. Described similarities in levels or distribution of happen, the congress told itself and more fully in a companion Report development or in the source, the country, the way out of current about post-congress developments, nature, or magnitude of their prob- economic difficulties and the _en- it included the revelation, dramatic lems to warrant valid and useful tangling and antidemocratic rem- by recent Yugoslav political norms, comparisons. DI R-2-'82/3 Such rankings deserve mention creeping back up again.