Rokkan Rules? Communist Elites and the Choice of Electoral Systems in the Yugoslav Republics, 1989–1990

Abstract

We use the previously neglected cases of the Yugoslav republics to revisit the question of how electoral systems were formed for the first elections during the transition from communism in 1989–1990. By exploring archival and other sources created contemporaneously by the relevant decision-makers, we build on Rokkanian interpretations of electoral system design. Unlike Rokkan, however, we do not see parties as unitary or united actors. Our analysis instead focuses on the leadership and the dominant wings of the ruling parties and shows that their preferences regarding electoral rules served their intra-party ambitions and reflected their intra-party power capacities.