More extra years for communism : What will happen to Yugoslavia?

The absence of Tito, followed by immense devolution of power to constituent republics and collective presidency pit Yugoslav republics again the Serbs and rendered the union dysfunctional. The rise of Slobodan Milosevic brought Serbian populist backlash against non-serb republics seeking to contain them down and brought full scale ethnic tension and the dissolution of League of All Communists in 1990. In the same year, communism fell and the democratic wave swept across Eastern Europe, prompting transition to democracy within Yugoslav republics, which empowers nationalism even more that flared tensions within Serbian population in non-Serb Republics, sparking Serbia's action and thus, war.

But say, had Communism lasted for a couple more years, between 2 to 4, would it simply mean delaying the meltdown until then? Or will Yugoslavia collapse even sooner then that?
 
I'd like to think a Soviet-American intervention would prevent the collapse of Yugoslavia. Assuming this is Glastnost USSR, both the US and USSR would want Yugoslavia to maintain territorial integrity and they both would want free elections. I can imagine elections being held, but with independence parties in the republics being banned. This would probably lead to a Dengist-Gorbechevist Serbian candidate being elected. This would piss off the Croatians, but with the entire UN breathing down their neck, there would be no secession.



Warning: I know very little about the Yugoslav collapse...
 
Given that a later collapse of Communism will not change the economic or the structural factors behind the collapse of Yugoslavia, I highly doubt that the Yugoslavian collapse is going to be delayed. That being said, if the Soviets in TTL are belligerent enough, I could see the US/Western Europe bailing out Yugoslavia to swing the region more firmly into the capitalist camp. However as this wouldn't solve the structural issues, any infusion of cash would only be a temporary solution and would likely only delay the inevitable.

If it's something close to OTL. I'm not certain that the Soviets are going to bother intervening in Yugoslavia in TTL as their plate's going to be rather full to say the least from the get go. That and Yugoslavia was never truly considered part of the Soviet Bloc.
 
if a delay of just a couple of years . . .

You have the better world economy of (?) '95, '96, '97 [even longer, maybe even a little earlier]

and thus less scapegoating against ethnic minorities.
 
if a delay of just a couple of years . . .

You have the better world economy of (?) '95, '96, '97 [even longer, maybe even a little earlier]

and thus less scapegoating against ethnic minorities.

The problem is there were too many economic problems related to the way the ethnicities were managed.

Yugoslavia tried to relieve tensions by building industry in the poorer republics - often this meant industry was thus put in places where the infrastructure and local manpower could not effectively support the factories built, which meant vast sums were spent building things that did the locals no good while fueling the resentment of the richer republics. That spoils system couldn't keep going much longer, the inefficient factories needed to be shut down, but since so many people had jobs in inefficient industries, doing so would fuel inter-republic tension.

Honestly, the more I read about Yugoslav Communism, the more I think it made Soviet Communism look good! The GINI coefficient for Yugoslavia in the 80s was something like 0.55. (Certainly it was higher than most equivalently developed capitalist countries.) The GINI coefficient was so high mostly due to inter-republic income disparities, rather than inter-class income disparities as in capitalist economies, which again, contributed to fragility, since it meant that the haves and have nots were each concentrated in discrete territorial blocks.

fasquardon
 
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