Talk:Croatian Spring/Archive 1

recent edits by anonymouses
I'd like to see an explanation of why this was chauvinist (there was no prejudiced belief of the superiority of the Croatians involved, at least none that I can see) or nationalist (as opposed to simply patriotic).

When was Jasenovac i Gradiška Stara exactly sung during the Spring? Never heard of any such thing. Former Yugoslavia was particularly harsh on fascism, there's no way that this would ever have been done by the movement leaders.

The rant in the later paragraph is just junk. What was so covert about the constitutional change and the actions of Croatian politicians between 1971 and 1980s? How does this expression of Croatian patriotism put the atrocities of NDH in "the second plan" - did any expression of Croatian patriotism somehow become inherently wrong because of NDH? How does the Spring relate to any sort of goal of getting an "ethnically pure Croatian state"? How did the Croatian secession "purge Croatia of Serbs"?

I guess some people just don't care about common sense... --Joy &#91;shallot] 17:01, 16 May 2006 (UTC)

statistics
June 6, 2006 - I would like to see some proof behind the statistics provided on the page - i.e. that Serbia used 46% of transfer funds, and that Croatia retained only 7% of the tourism money it made. Although possibly true, I don't think the Croatian Spring movement could really be said to have been motivated by an economic philosophy - nationalism and ethnic ideology had everything to do with it. Still, I would like to see the author of those 'statistics' back it up with some data. Thank you. —Preceding unsigned comment added by 70.68.184.12 (talk • contribs) 00:28, 6 June 2006

comment by Dt6265
maybe it should be mentioned that the repudiation of croatian and serbian national symbols held, only 23 years after the second world war, a certain rationale behind it. it seems to me that there is at least an issue in that attempting to (and i understand how incredibly miserable the tightrope walk is) mediate between balkan nationalities and their claims, nonetheless we should not negate the objective reality of what the NDH for example actually was (and citing, though probably out of the scope of explaining why the communists had no interest in allowing croat or ustasa symbols [and i did say "or"] to gain any nationalistic currency, studies of the activity of cetnik organizations in eastern bosnia, and sorry don't know the rules for formulating diacritics). just to say that speaking the language(s), having lived there, but not being of any of the ethnicities represented in the former yugoslavia and having lived in four of the republics, i think (and i think that any who's being honest) will note that it's important to point out that "bratsvo i jedinstvo" wasn't just stupid communist paranoia, and the communists didn't see it as just being paranoid towards nationalism but had a visceral feeling that movements like the croatian spring or the albanian protests of 1981 and even later with the "slovene spring" were a terrible omen of something that (and you have to be bruatally honest here) did actually happen between 1991 and the present. —Preceding unsigned comment added by Dt6265 (talk • contribs) 06:05, 13 September 2006

suppression?
I think that is absurd. Their national symbols were part of the yugoslav emblem. see here *http://hem.bredband.net/vuk-sfrj/grbhrv.gif, http://hem.bredband.net/vuk-sfrj/grbsrb.gif, etc.*.. so this article, is in a sense, false. Tito's government banned nazi symbols (like germany does today). Please do not use wikipedia to post bias material. With this in mind, I am altering this article to fit its neutral stand. —The preceding unsigned comment was added by 24.151.136.19 (talk) 05:11, 4 January 2007 (UTC).

"several other notable political prisoners in Croatia from this period"
Claim of "several other notable political prisoners in Croatia from this period" links to a list of 3 (three) names, all poorly sourced, with broken links or not sourced at all.

Clearly, all "very" notable. And while "several" does technically mean "more than two but not many", either "few" or simply "three" would be far more correct. --37.203.98.175 (talk) 09:17, 29 April 2016 (UTC)

"Croat far-right terrorism"
, this section does not establish a causal link with the topic (i.e. the rest of the article), except by a single unreferenced statement ("The crackdown on the Croatian leadership led to heightened anti-Yugoslav activity by Croat emigrant groups.").

Unless there are reliable sources that show that the 1970s Croatian far-right terrorism and the Croatian Spring are directly related, the section needs to go. 21:00, 4 January 2017 (UTC)


 * I have removed the section. I believe the content is best suited for Far-right politics in Croatia. GregorB (talk) 21:37, 17 January 2017 (UTC)

Croatian -> Serbian
could you please explain this edit, namely the edit summary ("Croatian" doesn't exist)? GregorB (talk) 13:10, 26 June 2019 (UTC)

Comments on copyedit

 * Some harv errors: Grbić 2012, pp. 347–348. Harv error: this link doesn't point to any citation. Mrkalj 2019, p. 76. Harv error: this link doesn't point to any citation.
 * Fixed. Missed those completely.
 * I think the infobox may be too detailed. For example, "Distribution of Yugoslav tourism industry earnings" isn't mentioned in the lead.
 * I trimmed it down a bit, I'll see what else could be compacted.
 * The etc. in the lead is probably too informal, so I replaced it with "other expressions of Croatian culture"; let me know if that's mistaken. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  11:33, 7 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Agree.--Tomobe03 (talk) 16:10, 7 May 2021 (UTC)
 * What is an "extended central committee"?
 * The central committee had two categories of members - "senior" members (not necessarily by age or duration of service but by rank) and "junior" members. When both groups were attending a session, the central committee was the "extended" central committee. The actual word was prošireni and could also be translated as widened or expanded.
 * When speaking of governments that restrict civil liberties, "oppression" and "repression" are not synonymous. The former includes the judgement of injustice, while the later is descriptive and therefore better for WP:IMPARTIAL.
 * Did not know this. Thanks for pointing out the difference. I'll watch out for the difference.
 * "He was accused of plotting to seize power disregarding the decisions of the eighth congress of the SKJ, and abuse of the State Security Administration directly or through allies" Is this something that Ranković actually did or was the accusation made up to get rid of him?
 * Hard to say. Sources seem quite reserved - probably for the same reason. He (+allies) certainly disregarded a lot of decisions of the eighth congress of the SKJ by dragging their feet, taking no action to implement reforms/decentralisation decisions or working to reverse decentralisation measures already in place. He was not formally the head of UDBA, but one of his allies/appointees was. It would not be inconcievable that a communist secret service without real judicial oversight would wiretap whoever was deemed interesting - UDBA were generally tought of as untouchable. The lack of oversight also made it impossible to refute accusations (well-founded or otherwise) of wiretapping Tito or anyone else. Ranković was deemed the successor to Tito before the affair (and was the vice-president of the Republic), but he would not be the first VP to plot takeover or to seek to improve his chances in post-Tito succession with compromising information on potential competitors. There was no formal investigation (except the political one by the commission to decide if he and his allies erred against the socialist order) and no trial.--Tomobe03 (talk) 08:24, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I think the background section is longer than it needs to be. Try to see if you can cut out some details. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  05:20, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I'll also have another editor take a look at the article as a part of the WP:FAM and will point the background issue out to them. I'd prefer to shorten whatever is possible (i.e. not necessary), but I'll wait for their opinion too.--Tomobe03 (talk) 08:28, 9 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "It was noted... it was complained" should be rewritten in active voice with who complained. E.g. "Critics of the government noted". Or else drop this entirely by deleting "It was noted that" and "Furthermore, it was complained that".
 * Dropped. The dominant market position of Belgrade based foreign-trade companies (and the banks supporting them) in foreign trade is not in dispute anywhere.--Tomobe03 (talk) 09:11, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "a genuine perception of cultural and demographic threat to Croatia" who perceived this?
 * The source says "Croatian nationalists" and "the public". While this is somewhat vague, in light of the Batjer report, this might have been a sizeable part of the population - or at least a large part of SKH membership and general population could have been convinced of this. I tried to add some clarification, but I'm unsure if this makes it appear as a fringe view.--Tomobe03 (talk) 09:17, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "orchestrated threats" orchestrated by whom?
 * The source does not say specifically beyond "Serbs". I understand from the source that there was no specific individual or group thought of as running such campaign. I see it would be far better to have this attributed, so I'll remove the word until I find an appropriate source.--Tomobe03 (talk) 09:33, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "unrelated" (in Grievances section) unrelated to what?
 * Unrelated to each other - many people thought that the four threats were somehow coordinated to reinforce each other.--Tomobe03 (talk) 09:36, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Language question—are the mentioned dictionaries notable? I expect so, so they should be wikilinked per WP:REDLINK.
 * Now that you mentioned this, I had a more thorough look and found a wiki article on the dictionary. It appears to have a fairly complicated title, and I never thought to look under that. Linked now.--Tomobe03 (talk) 09:58, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "An unrelated contemporary Serbo-Croatian dictionary" can we be more specific on the publication date than "contemporary"?
 * Added info. Not sure the dictionary itself is notable though. Serbian wiki has article on the author and notes the dictionary in the article, but does not have redlink or blue link for the dictionary.--Tomobe03 (talk) 09:45, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * RL stepping in for a couple of hours... I'll pick this up again later today.--Tomobe03 (talk) 10:01, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "taking aim at" exactly what does this mean? Depending on what the source says, it could be rephrased as something like, "This step would disadvantage the many Serb bureaucrats in Croatia."
 * The source literally says "taking aim at". I expect the move would disadvantage Serb bureaucrats and your proposal should be fine in that respect.
 * "several denunciations from the SKJ" from whom?
 * Unfortunately the source used (Ramet) does not say who exactly. I'll see if I can source the information elsewhere.--Tomobe03 (talk) 12:21, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Institute for the History of Workers’ Movement of Croatia Is it a notable institution? If so, redlink is appropriate.
 * Redlinked using an ill template. The Institute changed its name a couple of times post-1990 (per ) so the link points to the modern name instead.--Tomobe03 (talk) 11:53, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "The reaction was linguistic purism"... Whose reaction?
 * The source doesn't say specifically except - among Croats. I'd add such acceptance was not universal and degree of accepted linguistic purism varied (and still varies).--Tomobe03 (talk) 12:35, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Some of the points above may be impossible to fix if the sources are vague but try to be as specific as possible. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  08:45, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * The "SKH factions and involvement" section should be split into subsections if possible. On my mobile device this section takes more than 7 whole screens, making it unnecessarily difficult to read for those on mobile. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  09:26, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Maybe it would be best to split it to have the second paragraph start with "In December 1970, the SKH candidate lost the election..."?--Tomobe03 (talk) 12:25, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "The SKH also opposed the underrepresentation of Croats..." Did they want proportionate representation of all ethnic groups or overrepresentation of Croats in these jobs?
 * All sources I consulted imply that they complained that the representation was not proportional. I assume this means they wanted proportional representation. Actually very little attention was paid to anyone except Croats and Serbs in the relevant claims and counterclaims. This is probably because (according to this ), Hungarians, Slovenes, Czechs, and Italians combined accounted for about 2% of Croatia's population in 1971 as the third-, fourth-, fifth- and sixth-largest ethnic groups after Croats and Serbs.--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:51, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "student pro-rector" This makes it sound like a student who is also a pro-rector. Otherwise it should be rephrased to something like, "pro-rector of student life". (t &#183; c)  buidhe  13:35, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Actually, he was a student then. A student was elected at the post as a student representative. Higher education legislation enacted in Yugoslavia in 1960s prescribed student participation in University bodies (including a pro-rector post) as a form of implementation of self-management at the universities.--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:40, 10 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I think you need a really brief explanation of who Tavelic is.
 * Added a little bit.--Tomobe03 (talk) 14:11, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Are the SKH's claims that Yugoslavia did not develop as ZAVNOH envisioned accurate? Was it true that ZAVNOH's vision was similar to what the SKH was striving for?
 * At least in part yes. Hebrang (and thus ZAVNOH as Hebrang led the KPH which dominated the ZAVNOH) claimed that the WWII struggle meant national (i.e. Croatian) liberation as well as class struggle (i.e. communist revolution). He came into conflict with Tito during the WWII over this. Tito prevailed in this although Hebrang was only removed from Croatia, i.e. his "power base", by being assigned to the federal government minister post and ultimately eliminated politically during the Tito-Stalin split. He died in prison, but more importantly for this issue, his arrest meant that his views (which he previously touted through ZAVNOH) on the federation became entirely unacceptable for the SKJ due to their association with Hebrang.--Tomobe03 (talk) 10:58, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * OK, I think it would be beneficial to clarify that this is an accurate view of the past. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  11:11, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "SKH's attempts to reinterpret the wartime Partisan struggle." Reinterpret how? Should be more clear (or just drop this sentence if not that important).
 * As above - meaning that the Partisan struggle meant not only a communist revolution and fight against foreign occupation and collborationist regimes, but also national (meaning Croatian, Slovene, etc. and not Yugoslav) emancipation - within the Yugoslav framework.--Tomobe03 (talk) 10:58, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "Croatian nationalist émigré magazine" should be named
 * Named. Not sure if it is notable though.
 * "attributed to its Moscow correspondent" was this person named? ("attributed" already introduces doubt, so I don't think "alleged" is necessary even if it's not known if this person existed
 * The sources I managed to find did not specify the correspondent's name. I'll have a look to see if I can find the information on his/her name.
 * "By November, Croatian nationalists were advocating" Which year? I assume 1971 so I'm confused by the later mention of "the SKH's January 1970 shift".
 * Yes that's November 1971. I meant to say in the second sentence that the Bosnia and Herzegovina leadership avoided reacting to political developments (especially shifting of the SKH leadership views in January 1970 and later to resemble those held by Matica hrvatska more closely) in Croatia as much as it could and then with caution not to inflame the situation when it did react . This changed in November 1971 as the events started to affect Bosnia and Herzegovina more directly through Matica hrvatska's (or its representatives') actions. I can appreciate that this bit is confusing though. Do you have any suggestions how to untangle this?--Tomobe03 (talk) 12:09, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * I would rewrite this paragraph so it's in chronological order to alleviate confusion. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  11:13, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Rearranged as suggested.--Tomobe03 (talk) 14:37, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "It was proposed by some" By whom?
 * The source used says "Throughout May and June, some members of the Croatian central committee likened Brezhnev’s offers to the offer made to the Czechoslovak leadership in 1968. Some argued that Tito probably invented the call in order to use the threat of a potential Soviet intervention to strengthen national unity and force the party leaders to compromise." I would say this means "unspecified members of the SKH central committee".--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:36, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "ahead of the Prague Spring", I'm confused, I expected this to be "ahead of the Warsaw Pact invasion of Czechoslovakia"? Why would the Soviet leadership indicate there was some sort of crisis prior to the Prague Spring?
 * Of course. I made a mistake - corrected now.
 * "more likely" according to whom was it more likely?
 * I removed this. I just read the source once again and even though the State Department reacted to a statement made by the Yugoslav ambassador saying that Nixon supported Croatian separatists in a way which might be consistent with a denial of such claim, I misread it the first time around and understood that it was made during the Nixon administration. In fact it was only made in 1976 and dismissed the ambassador's statement as "an attack on the policy of a former president and might be construed as having implications today" (i.e. in 1976 and not actually commenting what Nixon thought of the issue).--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:48, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "ensure United States political, economic, and military support" how would a state visit ensure that this support would be available or forthcoming? I think maybe this sentence is trying to say something more like, "reassure Tito of the United States' political, economic, and military support for Yugoslavia"?
 * I agree with your interpretation. Just to clarify, since the Tito-Stalin split Yugoslavia was expecting the USSR to attack it and relied on the US for military support (importing or receiving as aid large quantities of weapons and training through the Mutual Defense Assistance Act) or deterrence (Yugoslavia concluded defensive Balkan Pact (1953) with Greece and Turkey which remained in place when Greece and Turkey joined the NATO). Yugoslav-Soviet relations warmed after the death of Stalin but Soviet interventions in Hungary and Czechoslovakia convinced Tito that the Warsaw Pact might attack anyway and Tito was careful not to give an impression of becoming too close with the USSR in order not to jeopardise US support.--Tomobe03 (talk) 14:00, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * It's not clear to me how the third paragraph of the "Foreign policy considerations" section is related to the Croatian Spring (t &#183; c)  buidhe  08:47, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * The Brezhnev call added an aspect to the political power struggle in Yugoslavia between reformists in various constituent republics (SKH leadership included) and conservatives over decentralisation. Brezhnev's offer to help (i.e. intervene) made Tito's decision to throw support to one of the factions more urgent to deny the USSR excuse for an intervention. The Nixon's visit is relevant because of the toast controversy (after all it took place in the relevant period) and as a part of the response to the Brezhnev's offer. Admittedly this is not central to the issue, but I think it adds some comprehensiveness to the coverage. I'll be sure to point out this issue in the next (FAM) step, just to make sure.--Tomobe03 (talk) 14:08, 11 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "The protest was formally against federal regulations on hard currency, banking and commerce. Additional political demands were added at Paradžik's urging." If the meaning is "initially, the demands were X, but later other demands were added", then "formally" is the wrong word. "Formally" would mean that officially the protestors demanded X but in fact wanted Z as well although Z was not in their formal demands. Also, what demands were added?
 * Yes the word should be "initially". The source (Ramet) says there were additional demands were creation of a separate military district covering only Croatia where the Yugoslav People's Army units would be directly subordinated to Croatian authorities (the source used says "...to become, in effect, a Croatian army,..." and relocaton of the Yugoslav Navy HQ to Split; the demand for greater banking autonomy/authority was expanded by addition of a demand for establishment of a Croatian national bank, representation of Croatia in the UN and other demands. However, Ramet does not specify which of these were added at Paradžik's urging except that "most of the various demands ... outlined above" were adopted. I'll see if I can dig up something more specific--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:47, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * , I managed to find specific information and added it to the article. There's quite a few of them... Should that bit be trimmed down?--Tomobe03 (talk) 14:28, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "Tito particularly criticised Matica hrvatska and said it had created a political party pursuing establishment of a state like the NDH." For clarity, I changed this to: "Tito particularly criticised Matica hrvatska, accusing it of being a political party and attempting to establish a fascist state similar the NDH." If this is inaccurate, it should be changed back.
 * That's consistent with the sources. I'm fine with the change.--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:49, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * "broadcast to the nation" All of Yugoslavia or just Croatia?
 * All of Yugoslavia. Reworded accordingly.
 * "Nonetheless, it failed to propose any action which would address the situation swiftly" This is pretty much an opinion-based statement: "failed", "swiftly" according to whom? What exactly would "address the situation"? I would either rewrite or remove this sentence. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  12:59, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * The criticism was largely that by Bakarić. I have reworded the passage to try to make the situation clearer and attribute the accusations to Bakarić. Could you take another look?--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:34, 12 May 2021 (UTC)
 * Looks good to me. (t &#183; c)  buidhe  13:51, 12 May 2021 (UTC)

Light c/e and tweaks from PM
G'day Tomobe03, great job on this. As I've made quite a few edits, I won't be reviewing at GA, but once the final few tags are resolved this article will be in great shape, and should sail through GAN. Cheers, Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 08:43, 14 June 2021 (UTC)
 * Thank you very much for your input. I believe I have addressed all the tags now. I'd appreciate if you could have a quick look at the most recent edits too. Cheers--Tomobe03 (talk) 13:57, 14 June 2021 (UTC)
 * They all look good. Nice work. Peacemaker67 (click to talk to me) 07:34, 21 June 2021 (UTC)