The article analyses the influence of the leadership of the British Labour Party on the first Cold War dissident, Milovan Djilas. Up until his dissidence in 1954, the main Yugoslav official for ...official relations with the British Left was Djilas. He had many contacts with the members of the British Labour Party such as Morgan Phillips, Aneurin Bevan and Jennie Lee. While many of these contacts were professional, Djilas established a firm friendship with Bevan, under whose influence Djilas gradually abandoned communism and embraced the Labour movement. When he called for another party in Yugoslavia (one similar to the Labour Party), he was condemned by Tito’s regime.
In the first political analysis of unemployment in a socialist
country, Susan Woodward argues that the bloody conflicts that are
destroying Yugoslavia stem not so much from ancient ethnic hatreds
as ...from the political and social divisions created by a failed
socialist program to prevent capitalist joblessness. Under
Communism the concept of socialist unemployment was considered an
oxymoron; when it appeared in postwar Yugoslavia, it was dismissed
as illusory or as a transitory consequence of Yugoslavia's
unorthodox experiments with worker-managed firms. In Woodward's
view, however, it was only a matter of time before countries in the
former Soviet bloc caught up with Yugoslavia, confronting the same
unintended consequences of economic reforms required to bring
socialist states into the world economy. By 1985, Yugoslavia's
unemployment rate had risen to 15 percent. How was it that a
labor-oriented government managed to tolerate so clear a violation
of the socialist commitment to full employment? Proposing a
politically based model to explain this paradox, Woodward analyzes
the ideology of economic growth, and shows that international
constraints, rather than organized political pressures, defined
government policy. She argues that unemployment became politically
"invisible," owing to its redefinition in terms of guaranteed
subsistence and political exclusion, with the result that it
corrupted and ultimately dissolved the authority of all political
institutions. Forced to balance domestic policies aimed at
sustaining minimum standards of living and achieving productivity
growth against the conflicting demands of the world economy and
national security, the leadership inadvertently recreated the
social relations of agrarian communities within a postindustrial
society.
The work analyzes the historical and political circumstances under which the arrest of Milovan Djilas was planned in 1981, immediately after Josip Broz Tito's death and during the new wave of ...repression in Socialist Yugoslavia. The presidency of SFRY and Security Service thoroughly examined the possibility of arresting Djilas on the grounds of 'decades of subversive work' against the regime in the context of confrontation with the dissidents in almost all the republics at the beginning of the 80s. Djilas was supposed to be some kind of counterweight for the arrests in Croatia (Veselica, Tudjman). However, he didnt end up in prison mostly because of opportunistic reasons and the regime's aspirations not to lose the image of a country of liberal communism and cause the world's reaction because of arresting a world-famous dissident. In this sense, Djilas's case represents a paradigm of general political repression in Socialist Yugoslavia, therefore it is analyzed in detail here.
The relationship between the Milovan Djilas and the British Labourists, are important concerning his later dissident activities. This article reviles the origins and character of these relations, in ...period when Djilas was in the political power and after 1954 in the first phase of his dissident status. The establishment of the first contacts, exchanging the ideas and developing of personal relationship will bring the harsh political and personal consequences. Djilas was arrested after his article in the New Leader magazine in 1956 where he criticized the Yugoslav standpoint on the events in Hungary. This article is written upon the archival research as well on the wide literature.
THE QUEST FOR AN OPEN SOCIETY Gruenwald, Oskar
Journal of interdisciplinary studies,
01/2012, Letnik:
24, Številka:
1/2
Journal Article
Recenzirano
This essay explores the intellectual and spiritual ferment in Tito's Yugoslavia focusing on its two major protagonists, Milovan Djilas and Mihajlo Mihajlov. Their quest for an open society and the ...first freedoms-thought, speech, press, assembly, and association-inspired a phenomenal rebirth of civic culture and civil society that toppled communist rule in the 1989 peacefid revolution which swept across Eastern Europe and shook the Kremlin. This Third Revolution is set in the larger framework recalling the unique features of Yugoslavia's "independent road to socialism," following the Tito-Stalin split in 1948, which made "Djilasism" possible. Titoism as a case study of modernization highlights the promises and pitfalls of Marxist- Leninist ideology whose utopia of a classless society remained a straitjacket limiting efforts at liberalization and democratization. Thus, post-Tito Yugoslavia became a cauldron of nationalist contestations for Tito's mantle of leadership. Mihajlov warned of the consequences of ethnic or identity politics in a multi-ethnic state, resulting in the division of post-Tito Yugoslavia along national/ethnic lines, which triggered the 1990s civil war and "ethnic cleansing" on all sides. The essay concludes that both Djilas and Mihajlov by championed freedom. Yet Mihajlov's is the more enduring and universally redeeming vision whose transcendent grounding in a Christian metaphysics resonates across time and space, ennobling cultures. PUBLICATION ABSTRACT
The conflict between Stalin and Tito, commenced in 1948, came as a great surprise to the whole world. Its outcome proved to be contrary to the anticipated effects. Yugoslavia abandoned the Soviet ...camp and set off on its independent path. A characteristic feature of the controversy was the 'battle waged with quotations' - the search conducted by Yugoslav ideologues for a new trail, concurrent with the Marxist teachings and emphasising the deviations committed in the Soviet Union. Milovan Djilas (1911-1995), the head of agitprop, made a significant contribution to the criticism of the USSR and the creation of the foundations of Titoism. Upon the basis of the Marxist theory he justified the thesis that the USSR was an example of state capitalism. He was also one of the first to indicate the governance of a narrow group of bureaucrats, profiting from the results of the work conducted by millions of Soviet citizens. These theoretical quests granted Marxism-Leninism a fresh approach, comprised an alternative vis a vis musty Stalinism, and proposed new solutions and conceptions. In 1950 Djilas still regarded the Party to be the motor force of development and a causal force in the destruction of bureaucracy. Subsequently, he became firmly convinced that considerable reductions in the state apparatus had not weakened the rule of the bureaucracy, since the latter remained enrooted in the Party hierarchy. The struggle against bureaucracy thus had to come down to weakening the rank of the Party in the state, since the former became, logically thinking, an obstacle for further progress. Djilas did not intend to conceal his views, and in 1954 he ultimately parted ways with Tito. The Yugoslav criticism of Stalinism in 1948-1953 was a fascinating process, constantly discovering new facts and drawing equally novel conclusions; contrasted with the colourless and ineffective anti-Yugoslav Stalinist propaganda, it managed to win numerous supporters. Milovan Djilas was the actual star of this critical current, and in view of an encroaching conciliation with the USSR the Yugoslav authorities decided to dissociate themselves from him. Reprinted by permission of Semper Publishers, Warsaw, Poland
The article analyses the change of Milovan Dilas' views as he split from the Union of the Communists of Yugoslavia in 1953/54 and became a critic of the Communist system. Explaining such a dissenting ...U turn isn't possible without connecting several key elements of Dilas' intellectual development. Particularly important for Dilas' understanding of politics are spiritual heritage of Montenegro and his deep zeal for literature. They shaped Dilas' political way in the spirit of idealist understanding of politics and the Communist revolution was seen as fulfillment of absolut freedom. The post-war reality brought about the clash between his views and the methods of work and Dilas became the critic of shortcomings of the Yugoslav society. The begining of his critique lay in the ideological defence of the country against the Soviet Union. However, it was transferred to the Yugoslav experience too, so that Dilas, in his articles in Nova misao and Borba vehemently attacked Party privileges, bueraucracy, the issue of property, corruption, and inquality in Yugoslavia. The sharpening of Dilas' critical thought and development of the concept of socialist democracy diverged from the orientation of Tito and the state leadership which strove to curb the democratization which had been proclamed at the 6th Party Congress of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia. Developments in foreign policy after Stalin's death directed Tito to normalize his relations with the Soviet Union. Politically and intellectually Dilas split from this stream. His downfall marked the limits of democracy and freedom of thought in Yugoslavia and the beginning of a far-sighted critique of Communism.
This work sheds light on British official and unofficial responses to the ‘Djilas affair’ in its early stages. The analysis is centred around two letters written in April 1956 - by Milovan Djilas to ...Morgan Phillips, the Labour Party Secretary, and a letter Phillips wrote to the Yugoslav President Tito, expressing his concern for Djilas’ predicament. The article contributes to a better understanding of the Djilas affair in several ways. Djilas’ letter offers a good insight into both his character and the predicament in which he found himself 2 years after the conflict with the Yugoslav leadership began and only 7 months before he was first arrested. Phillips’ action reveals that some leading members of the Labour Party were prepared to act on Djilas’ behalf. The governing Conservative Party, on the other hand, was more concerned with keeping good relations with Belgrade than with the destiny of the first significant dissident in Eastern Europe
Michelle Napierala, Thomas Summers, Dick Brox, Nicholas McCabe, Dr. Ross Guarino, Walter L. Rooth III, Roxann Hassett, Randall Allen, Regan O'Leary, Mike Kubiak, Marci Blattenberger, Jack Janiszeski, ...Paul Sasiadek, Greg Kuminski, Sister Mary Christinette, Louise Fronczak, James Niwinski, Sal Gullo, Paul Gerace, Jacqueline Graham, Marie Fenelon, Beverly Rogalski, Martha AnneKavanaugh, Eugene Schuta.
