Relations between east expanding NATO/European Union and surviving Yugoslavia

What if Yugoslavia manages to keep itself together still under communist (at leat by name) dictatorial government ? What if Serbian and other Ultranationalism was somehow a little bit modified ? Maybe there is even some Chinese style economic developement which leads to a more acceptance of Yugoslavian peoples for Yugoslavia ? How would this effect the European stability in a post-Cold War era, with Soviet Union dissolved? The EU founded in 1992 with the Maastrich treaty, in the late 90es Romania and Hungary became NATO members-both bordering Yugoslavia. In 2004 several East European nations joined the European Union.
 
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What if Yugoslavia manages to keep itself together still under communist (at leat by name) dictatorial government ? What if Serbian and other Ultranationalism was somehow a little bit modified ? Maybe there is even some Chinese style economic developement which leads to a more acceptance of Yugoslavian peoples for Yugoslavia ? How would this effect the European stability in a post-Cold War era, with Soviet Union dissolved? The EU founded in 1992 with the Maastrich treaty, in the late 90es Romania and Hungary became NATO members-both bordering Yugoslavia. In 2004 several East European nations joined the European Union.

That would not be possible.

It's barely imaginable to imagine Yugoslavia managing to survive the reform process and become a sort of Spain in the Balkans, a multinational federation that survived the conflicts and totalitarianism of the past.

It is not imaginable to have Yugoslavia remain an authoritarian state even as Communism collapses elsewhere. Tito's particular variant of Communism was actually relatively decentralized and liberal: the federal units had all sorts of powers that Soviet republics, say, lacked, and the pop culture scene was vibrant. It was popular among Yugoslavians partly because life in Yugoslavia was substantially nicer than almost everywhere in the Soviet bloc.

Chinese-style economic growth was not a possibility. Among other things, he Chinese trajectory was only possible in a country that had a large population of peasants who could be shifted into the industrial sector and starting from low levels of output. Yugoslavia had already gone through that phase of economic growth. Not unreasonably, many Yugoslavians compared themselves not with China, or even with countries like Romania and Poland, bu Italy and Austria. That, especially over the 1980s, they found their country lacking was a critical problem. The prospect of Yugoslavia staying outside of European clubs was a major impetus for separatism in Slovenia and Croatia, the two wealthiest and most West-aligned Yugoslav republics.
 
It is hard to see any kind of surviving Communism in Europe in the 1989-1992 period. Communism was just discredited, and people wanted to "join Europe" - that didn't meant just ditching Marxist economics, it meant adopting rule of law, pluralistic society, and democracy.

A remaining dictator (or party dictatorship) would get zero support from the West at a time when the Yugoslav economy desperately needed aid. A dictatorship would have no obvious base of support within the country either. The dynamics of both domestic politics and foreign politics are completely different than in those countries where Communist dictatorships survived.

I think Yugoslavia could have survived as a whole. There are many factors against it, but it is possible to survive past the danger zone when economic difficulties inflamed ethnic tensions.

If Yugoslavia remained united and transitioned to full democracy and free market economy, it probably would have joined the EU in 2004 or 2007. It would likely join NATO in 2004.
 
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