Product Description
In authoritarian and clientelist states, membership in the ruling party has often proven to be the most reliable path to personal advantage and social security. This was the case for decades, and the underlying patterns remained largely unchanged. In socialist Yugoslavia, all political parties except the Communist Party were banned, making it clear where real power resided. By the late 1980s, when nationalism and religion were added to the existing ideological framework, the conditions were set for the mass political mobilizations that followed.
This photograph shows the arrival of Serbs from Kosovo, as well as from other cities and republics, to the town of Vrbas, then renamed Titov Vrbas. The organizational pattern was familiar and repeatedly applied elsewhere: groups entered the town from different directions, chanting slogans such as “Join us, brothers!”, “We are all from Kosovo!”, or “Oh Serbia, divided into three parts, you will be whole again.” At an agreed time, the groups gathered in one of the main city squares, where a series of fervent speeches—most often infused with nationalist rhetoric—began.