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Abstract
The 1980s caught Albanians in Kosova in interesting social, political, and psychological circumstances. Two diametrically opposed dogmatic dilemmas took shape: “illegal groups” – considerably supported by students – demanded the proclamation of the Republic of Kosova and/or Kosova’s unification with Albania. On the other side of the spectrum, “modernists” – gathering, among others, the political and academic elites – pushed for the improvement of rights of Kosovars guaranteed under the “brotherhood and unity” concept advocated within the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (SFRY). This paper outlines the nature of demonstrations that took place in March and April 1981 and the corresponding responses of political and academic elites. Stretching beyond symbolic academic reasons – demands for better food and dormitory conditions – the study points to the intense commitment of the students to their demands, often articulated in nationalistic terms. Was it inevitable that the structure of the SFRY would lead to those living in Kosova as a non-Slavic majority in a federation of “Southern Slavs” to articulate demands for national self-rule? It is necessary to highlight these political and social complexities through analytical approaches in order to track the students’ goals and to reexamine assumptions behind the “modernist” agenda. In that vein, the paper analyzes the conceptual connections and differences between student reactions and modernists’ positions during the historical period under discussion here.
Notes
1. The name Kosova (Ottoman/Turkish and Albanian) is used here instead of Kosovo and Metohija (Serbian). For more information about dual names of various entities, please refer to Nathalie Clayer (Citation2013), “Kosova: The Building Process of a Territory from the Nineteenth to the Twenty-First Century.” This paper is also accessible at the author's personal profile at Academia.edu (https://www.academia.edu/14430022/Kosova_The_Building_Process_of_a_Territory_from_the_Nineteenth_to_the_Twenty-First_Century).
2. The field research was supported in part by a grant from the Open Society Foundations.
3. The materials collected in the archives and most interviews conducted for this research were in the Albanian and/or Serbian language. All the materials appearing in this paper are translated into English by the author.
4. Ježernik considers that Serbia’s most offensive propaganda campaign against Albanians in general began with Vladan Đorđević’s (1844–1930) book Arnauti i Velike Sile (Albanians and the Great Powers) (Citation2004).
5. Various sources estimate that stigmatization of Albanians continued uninterrupted when, between 1944 and 1946, many Albanians were the victims of systematic mass executions by Communists during the days of revolutionary fervor and were later, killed in “search and destroy missions,” “pacification,” “disarming,” and “rehabilitation programs,” police torture, and typhoid epidemics affecting military units (Repishti Citation1986). Several Albanians who had been participants in the signing of the Bujan Resolution in 1944 paid with their lives for the ideal of the unification of Kosovo and Albania. Rifat Berisha died fighting in the hills of Drenica in 1948 and Xheladin Hana was murdered by the UDBA (Yugoslav State Security Service) in 1948 (Rusinow Citation1977).
6. Before the establishment of the University of Pristina in 1970, higher education institutions in Kosova (1958–1969) were part of the University of Belgrade.
7. Adem Demaçi was a chairman of the Council for the Defense of Human Rights and Freedoms of the People of Kosova. He is also an activist of “illegal political groups” who spent a total of 29 years in prison for speaking out against the treatment of ethnic Albanians in SFRY.
8. Organizata Marksiste-Leniniste e Kosovës (OMLK) [Marxist–Leninist Organization of Kosova].
9. Lidhja Nacional Çlirimtare e Kosovës (LNÇK) [Kosova’s National Liberation League].
10. Partia Marksiste Leniniste Shqiptare e Kosovës (PMLSK) [Albanian Marxist Leninist Party of Kosova].
11. Azem Vllasi (1948) was a member of the SFRY LoCPC and became the leader of the Kosova LoC and the president of Kosova in 1986.
12. Jusuf Buxhovi (1946) is a Kosovar-Albanian author, journalist, intellectual, and political activist.
13. Aleksandar Ranković (1909–1983) was a Yugoslav Communist of Serb origin, considered by some as the third most powerful man in SFRY. He ran Kosova as a police state and supported a hardline approach against Albanians in Kosova until his fall from grace in 1966.
14. Fadil Hoxha (1916–2001) was an SFRY-era Kosovar-Albanian politician. Throughout his career, Hoxha held the positions of president of Kosova, first prime minister of Kosova, and vice president of the SFRY.
15. Rilindja (established in 1945) was the first Albanian-language newspaper in SFRY. In 1945, Rilindja published only 60 issues in Prizren and from 29 November 1958, it became a daily newspaper and moved its layout and printing activities to Pristina.
16. Besmir Fidahić is a professional translator and interpreter in combination Bosnian/Croatian/Serbian and English with extensive professional experience gained during and after the wars in Bosnia and Herzegovina, and Kosova,. His doctoral study “Translation and Interpretation at the ICTY OTP: Lessons Learned and Unique Challenges” will be published by his home institution, University of Maastricht, The Netherlands.
17. By the late 1970s, around 95% of Kosova children received elementary education. There were advances in training of medical personnel and in general health care. By example, in 1952, there was one doctor per 8527 inhabitants; by 1978, the ratio was 1:2009. Similarly, life expectancy, which in the immediate post-war period was estimated at 45, had risen to 68 by 1980 (Pipa and Repishti, Studies on Kosova, 133; cited in Vickers Citation1998).
18. Sonja Biserko (1948) is a founder and president of the Helsinki Committee for Human Rights in Serbia.
19. Petrit Imami is a professor of Albanian origin at the University of Belgrade since 1981. Among his publications is the book Srbi i Albanci kroz vekove (Serbs and Albanians throughout the centuries) (Citation2017), which makes him one of most accomplished scholars on Serb–Albanian relations.
20. Albanians blamed the Berlin Congress of 1878 for the partition of some Albanian-inhabited territories, which “unjustly [gave] Serbia the eastern part of Kosova, and Bar, Podgorica, and Gusinje to Montenegro.”
21. Albanians also blamed the peace conference in Paris because it gave the area around Prizren to the new Yugoslavia (the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes), southern Albanian areas were given to Greece, and Italy was made the defender of Albania’s territorial integrity. Albania was not represented at the conference.
22. Prizren League or the League for the Defense of the Rights of the Albanian Nation (Lidhja për mbrojtjen e të drejtave te kombit Shqiptar), commonly known as the League of Prizren (Besëlidhja e Prizrenit) was a political organization whose official foundation in the Kosova Vilayet of the Ottoman Empire on 10 June 1878 is regarded as marking the Albanian state.
23. For detailed information, please see also Stavro Skendi The Albanian National Awakening 1878–1912 (Citation1967).
24. Victor A. Friedman is a professor emeritus in the humanities at the University of Chicago. His multidisciplinary research involves fieldwork in the Balkans for more than 40 years.
25. Dragoslav Marković (1920) was the president of the Assembly of the Federal SRS and chairman of the SRS and SFRY Presidency (1969–1984).
26. Dušan Janjić (1950) was a member of the SRS LoC (1968–1988), as well as founder and vice president of Social Democracy (1997–1999).
27. Economically, Kosova was the least-developed area of SFRY. The gap between Kosova and the most-developed SFRY Republic, Slovenia, was widening: In 1952, Slovenia had a GDP per capita 4.1 times larger than Kosova; in 1981, the ratio was 5.4 times larger and growing. Other economic data show an even greater difference, approaching an 8:1 ratio. Kosova was lagging behind not only Slovenia, but also all other SFRY regions. Although in 1955 its GDP per capita was 43% of the SFRY average, in 1984, this fell to 26%. “With a ratio of 6.1:1 and projected annual growth rate of 2%, Kosova would need 91 years to reach the 1981 Slovenian levels,” concluded a leading SFRY (Croatian) economist Branko Horvat. The unemployment rate in Kosova was the highest in the country: In 1985, it was 3.33 times higher than the SFRY average. For one available job, 43 unemployed people were available. In Kosova, Albanians made up 74% of the active population but 65% of the work force. The Serbs were 17% of the active population and 26% of the active work force (cited in Jović Citation2008, 190).
28. Gani Koci was one of organizers of the 11 March 1981 student demonstrators in Pristina.
29. During the 1981 demonstrations, officer Abdulla Prapashtica was an investigator of the state security intelligence service. Some arrested students remember him as very violent. While serving as an intelligence services officer, Prapashtica instigated the foundation of a political party with a bombastic name “Partia Komuniste Marksiste Leniniste e Shqiptarëve në Jugosllavi (PKMLSHJ) (Albanian’s Communist Marxist and Leninist Party of SFRY). He hid behind this party to spread (dis)information that this party was the only organizer of the 1981 demonstrations. “Në emër të PKMLSHJ Z. Prapshtica i shkruan shumë ‘letra publike’ sundimtarëve komunistë të ish-Jugosllavisë” (cited in http://infodirekt.tv/index.php/opinione-infodirekt/40051-komunikimi-i-z-prapashtica-me-presidentin-obama).
30. Referencing of the archival materials for the Archive of Pristina is done per the following order: the first initials AP refer to the Archive of Pristina, the LoCPC refers to the name of the fond, the number 1981 refers to the year, the number 81 refers to the session.
31. Referencing of the archival materials for the Archives of Yugoslavia and/or Serbia is done per the following order: the first initials AS and/or AJ, refer to the Archive of Serbia and/or Jugoslavija, the D-2 refers to the number of the fond, the number 30 refers to the box.
32. Štafeta mladosti was a symbolic relay race through Yugoslavia, ending with awarding the štafeta to Tito.
33. Mahmut Bakalli was a chairman of the Regional Committee of the Kosova LoC and fifth president of the Kosova LoC.
34. Xhavit Nimani was a chairman of the Presidency of the Socialist Autonomous Province of Kosova.
35. In a speech to the Provincial Presidency of the Executive Council, Mahmut Bakalli said that, like the 11 March demonstrations, the demonstration of 26 March started with some social elements. However, soon after it began, so did political demands. Stane Dolac considered the 11 March demonstrations a student rebellion against social conditions, but he was mocked by the Serbian newspapers in Pristina. On the other hand, Vllasi claimed that demonstrations were political (these stances can be found in several issues of Rilindja published during March–April 1981).
36. There were protests at the Ramiz Sadiku construction company in Pristina, a shock absorber factory, a part of the Kombinat of Obiliq, and some of the workers of the Trepça Mines, among others. One of the reviewers of this paper, an eyewitness to these events, attested that messengers arrived from Pristina to inform the miners in Trepça that the special police were killing their children on the streets of Pristina! These messages were emotional blackmail aimed at mobilizing the miners to join in the demonstrations. Such detail speaks to a level of organization and planning of the demonstrations and a managed rather than spontaneous series of events.
37. Veli Deva was the chairman of the Provincial Committee in Kosova and member of the SFRY Presidency.
38. Stane Dolanc was an SFRY Communist politician from Slovenia, one of Tito’s closest collaborators and one of the most influential people in SFRY politics in the 1970s and 1980s.
39. Ramiz Alia was the second and the last Communist leader of Albania, and the country’s head of state from 1982 to 1992. He had been designated as successor by Enver Hoxha and took power after Hoxha died.
40. On 10 June, 506 people were listed as arrested by the police: 287 for participating in demonstrations, 38 for being in lines where demonstrations were being held, 31 for organizing demonstrations, 46 for writing the banners and distributing brochures, 104 for publicly appearing in the “enemy” events, and 15 for organizing criminal acts against the state. In addition, the regime identified 137 people engaged in “illegal acts:” 60 high school pupils, 29 students, 12 teachers, 16 professors, four lawyers, two technicians, two workers, one farmer, one politician, one police officer, one instructor, one dactylographer, and one journalist (AP LoC/1981). The SFRY Presidency concluded that 1500 individuals were arrested under suspicion of organizing enemy activities, including 37 Serbs, one Montenegrin, and one Muslim (Bosnians/Gorans), whereas the rest were Albanians (AS D-2/30).
41. In the 112th session of the Presidency of the Kosova Provincial Committee, chaired by Veli Deva, held on 5 September 1981, Sveto Vuković reported for Lipjan and Glogovc; Jovan Bogičević for Podujeva; Predrag Cuckić for Mitrovica; Iljaz Kurteshi for Vushtrri and Leposavić; Sinan Hasani for Gjakova, Kaqanik, and Deçan; Azem Vllasi for Peja and Istog; Xhevdet Hamza for Suhareke, Prizren, and Rahovec; Mustafa Pljakić in Ferizaj and Gjilan; Petar Kostić for Kamenica and Vitia.
42. Ramadan Dobra (6), Murat Musliu (13), Selim Geci (6), Gani Vllahna (6), Merxhan Avdyli (15), Gani Koci (15), Januz Januzi (10), Kadri Kryeziu (10), Bedri Deliu (6), Ali Lajci (15), Hamdi Hajdini (13), Riza Demaju (13), Syle Mujaj (10), Rame Demaja (6), Bajram Kosumi (15), Musli Kosumi (10), Gani Maxhuni (8), Gani Vllahiu (8), Fahri Ymeri (6), Halil Osmani (10), Xun Ceta (13).
43. Academic Rexhep Qosja (born 1936) is a prominent Albanian politician and literary critic, the author of various anthologies and scholarly monographs.