ИНТЕЛЕКТУАЛНА ОПОЗИЦИЈА У ЈУГОСЛАВИЈИ: СЛУЧАЈ ЧАСОПИСА ЈАВНОСТ (1980/1981)
INTELLECTUAL OPPOSITION IN YUGOSLAVIA: CASE OF MAGAZINE THE PUBLIC (1980/1981)

Summary/Abstract: Josip Broz Tito was the highest authority in the SFRY for almost the entire time of its existence, but there was no one who would be equal to him afterwards, and most of his successors just acted on his behalf. Nevertheless, his death that followed in 1980 did not lead to significant changes in the Yugoslav system, regardless of what many people expected. In such circumstances, Dobrica Ćosić and Ljubomir Tadic, already known for their roles as the opposition, gathered a group of prominent intellectuals and tried to launch the magazine which would be named The public and which would enable public political and social criticism, with the support of a noteworthy number of intellectuals throughout Yugoslavia, also members of the creative intellectuals. In the Letter of Contributors, which represented the ideological platform of the magazine, one can see that the journal emerged from the position of socialism inseparable from democracy, invoked the tradition of the same ideas in that area, and that the initiators were dissatisfied with the situation in the world and Yugoslavia. They considered themselves responsible for public discussion about the system and thinking about its change. The British press was the first one to publicly announce this initiative, and afterwards many others in Europe and the world paid attention to the activities of the magazine The Public, each of them a month before any Yugoslav media. The League of Communists of Yugoslavia, the highest political institution in the country, and later on the lower instance of the ruling parties, sent condemnatory attitudes, and the initiative was not accomplished at the time. The members of the ruling political elite and the local media almost equally condemned the initiative. The initiators tried to respond to convictions in domestic media, but they did not get the opportunity to do so. However, they were not criminally responsible for their activities.

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