Sociologija (Jan 2015)
Why is contemporary Serbia close to the (economic) collapse?
Abstract
Nowadays Serbian society is faced with a deep and long-lasting socioeconomic crisis. Actual Serbian government, in order to prevent county’s economic collapse, intend to introduce „new reform“ aimed at the financial consolidation and enhansing new, primarily foreign, investments. First measures of the „reform package“ will be in reduced salaries paid to individuals employed in public sector and reduced pensions of persons getting pensions from public pension fonds. The paper is devoted to the analysis of the overt and hidden justifications of such measures. Actual Serbian political leaders seem to consider „building of socialism“, „worker’s self-management“ and „socialist egalitarism“ as the key causes of the long-lasting socio-economic crisis in Serbia. „Working people“ who, allegedly, had supported previous socialist order seem to be considered as beneficiaries of that order. Therefore, actual measures for reducing governmental spendings should fell on „shoulders“ of „working people“. The paper is presenting findings which should show in a different light functioning of former socialist order in Yugoslavia and Serbia. It accentuate specific societal orientations and public policies that have contributed to the excessive spending of former „socialist“ and new „postsocialist“ Serbian state. Leading political forces, former and actual, played crucial role in designing and in the implementation of economically destructive public policies, not „working people“, in spite of former „worker’s self-management“ and actual „rule of democracy“. The author suggests an alternative strategy in confronting the long-lasting socio-economic crisis in Serbia, a strategy of increasing, efficiently, the use of all disposable resources. A new and thorough redesign of the ownership relations in the society is seen as the key measure of this strategy.
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