Yugoslavia

Yugoslavia was a country in Southeast Europe that existed in several political forms between 1918 and 2003. The most widely known form was the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY), a federation of six republics, from 1945 to 1992, led by Josip Broz Tito. The name Yugoslavia means “Land of the South Slavs.”

Its six constitutive republics were Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia (now North Macedonia), Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia. In Serbia, two autonomous provinces—Vojvodina and Kosovo—had special status within the federation. The SFRY pursued a policy of non-alignment in the Cold War and developed a mixed economy with social welfare programs and heavy industry.

The earlier kingdom formed after World War I as the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes in 1918; it was renamed the Kingdom of Yugoslavia in 1929. It faced internal ethnic tensions and external invasion in 1941. After World War II, Tito led a socialist federation from 1945 onward, shaping a federal system that emphasized unity among diverse peoples.

Following the collapse of communism in the late 1980s, nationalist movements led to the dissolution of Yugoslavia. Slovenia and Croatia declared independence in 1991; Bosnia and Herzegovina and the Republic of Macedonia followed in 1992. The remaining union, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, consisted of Serbia and Montenegro from 1992, later renamed Serbia and Montenegro in 2003, and dissolved when Montenegro became independent in 2006.