Social Struggles in the Former Yugoslavia

A new book on social struggles in former Yugoslavia has been released in German language and had its first presentation at the Zagreb Subversive Forum.

Content
After two decades of social and economic transformation in the former Yugoslavia resistance against the devastating effects of neoliberal policies, corrupt elites and the neo-colonialism of the European Union is intensifying. The economic crisis which has hit the Balkans hard from 2008 onwards has joined an already long-standing crisis of representative politics. For a long time, the ‘natural laws’ of the free market, the bounded economic rationality and the set-up of the liberal state have remained unchallenged in the political, economic and social mainstream. However, in the wake of the global capitalist crisis, the first cracks in this narrative are now appearing. People are starting to question a future imagined by neoliberal EU technocrats and local elites and asking themselves whether these painful reforms dictated by the EU are worthwhile. For the first time since the break-up of Yugoslavia broader movements are coming into existence which are struggling for social justice and are questioning capitalism.
The book assembles contributions of theorists and activists from the region. After a general introduction to the current global protest cycle and the macro-situation in the region the two main themes examined in the book are workers’ struggles and deindustrialisation as well as student protests and direct democracy. The topics covered range from forms of social resistance and new political subjectivities in the recent protests in Slovenia, the student movement and New Left in Croatia to the workers’ struggles and self-management in Serbia. The book closes a geographical gap and opens a critical counter perspective to the hegemonic narrative of the "successful enlargement of the Union to the East".


With contributions from

Dario Azzellini, Heiko Bolldorf und Željko Klaus, Boris Buden, Stipe Ćurković, Peter Haumer, Srećko Horvat and Igor Štiks, Mate Kapović, Michael G. Kraft and Boris Kanzleiter, Jovica Lončar, Andrea Milat, Goran Musić, Dragan Nikčević and Primož Krašovec, Milenko Srećković, and Darij Zadnikar.


Michael G. Kraft (ed.):
Soziale Kämpfe in Ex-Jugoslawien
ISBN: 978385476-621-6
309 pages
Vienna: Mandelbaum 2013, edition kritik & utopie
Format 12 x 19 cm