Broken Bonds

Struggling against high odds, Yugoslavia managed to survive from its 1918 inception until the early '90s. But now, tragic ethnic & regional conflicts have irrevocably fragmented the country. Lenard Cohen explores the original conception & motives underlying the Yugoslav idea, looking at the state's major problems, achievements & failures during its short troubled history. He answers a broad range of questions concerning contemporary Yugoslavia: How did the state plunge from its position as a positive model to an essentially negative case of socialist reform? What measures for recovery were proposed by the country's ethnically & regionally segmented one-party elite? What were the reasons for the eventual abandonment of reform socialism, the elimination of the single party's monopoly & the rapid delegitimation of the country's federal political institutions? What programs have been offered by the noncommunist & born again communist leaders elected to power during the revival of multiparty pluralism in '90? How did their efforts to achieve regional & ethnic sovereignty place the country in such a precarious & ultimately fatal position? Concluding chapters offer an analysis of the causes & horrifying consequences of the military conflict & civil war from 1991 to 1994, including a discussion of the impotent efforts at peacekeeping, the dynamics of the complex & savage struggle in Bosnia-Hercegovina, & an examination of the problems faced by Yugoslavia's successor states.