Orthodoxy and solidarity: competing claims and international adjustment in Yugoslavia

Abstract

Yugoslav policies of domestic adjustment to world economic changes during 1973–85 are the result of two sets of constraints imposed by the strategy of the ruling communist party for retaining its power:(1) an open international strategy for economic growth and national autonomy, chosen in the 1940s, that includes extensive use of foreign capital resources, and (2) the coalition of competing political and economic interests gathered within the party, which has been maintained by granting autonomy to producers, limits on the economic role of the state, and successive devolution of financial and administrative authority. The first imposes external budget constraints, the terms of which are defined by foreign creditors and supported by domestic economic liberals; the second imposes domestic political constraints that narrow the policy alternatives, limit their effective implementation, and require compromises that encourage further borrowing and political reform. The policy result is central party determination of policy orientation; macroeconomic stabilization policies that have continually given priority to maintaining the external balance and that combine orthodox deflation with administrative controls; periodic alternation in structural adjustment policies between a developmental, redistributive emphasis and an exportoriented, liberal, market emphasis, depending on the external constraints; and political and institutional flexibility in response to each policy shift and in order to maintain political order.