Workers’ Power in Transition Economies: the Cases of Serbia and Slovenia

Abstract

The root of the differences between the successful transition inSlovenia and the abortive transition in Serbia, the impetus for the divorce between Serbia and Slovenia which was the starting point of the disintegration of the former Yugoslav federation, lay in the qualitatively different reactions ofthe Serbian and Slovenian political elites to the workers’ strike movements of the second half of the 1980s and the early 1990s. In Serbia, the political faction which rejected market reform was the political victor. This faction used nationalism as an instrument for aggressive labour pacification. In Slovenia, the option of gradual market reforms won out. This option offered a ‘voice’ to the labour movement.