There are prevailing opinions that the national problem, national question is in the center of the disintregation of Yugoslavia. At the same this thesis and some sociological and philosophical consequences as well.

The idea of Yugoslavia rised in the 19th century. In the external-political sense it was the idea against the dominance of the Habsburg dynasty on the Balkans. In the internal-political sense this idea was a political attitude against great-Serbian and great-Croatian national interests.

In that sense the first world war was, for the Yugoslavian people, the war for the Yugoslavia. At the end of the war, Yugoslavia were created as constitutional, democratic monarchy with the Serbian dynasty at the head. Its name during that time was Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenians. Macedonia and Montenegro were treated as part of Serbia. This Kingdom was named Yugoslavia in 1929.

In Yugoslavia, Serbia and Montenegro lost their national states. Today this is an important political question. From the very beginning of Yugoslavia there is a political antagonism between Serbian nationalism and Yugoslavia, between the orthodox tradition and Yugoslavia. On the other side, in Slovenia and Croatia, there were opinions that Yugoslavia was nothing else but an extended Serbia. So, from the very beginning different particular political attitudes followed the idea of Yugoslavia. Serbia was mostly for centralism, and Croatia for federalism. During that time, communist party was under the influence of Commintern and thought that Yugoslavia was an artificial, Versailles state and that different national states should be made out of it. During that time, the influence of the Communist party was bigger in Slovenia and Croatia than in Serbia. After the Soviet revolution in 1917, Russia makes a separate peaceful agreement with Germany. Therefore, the Serbian attitude that created repulsiveness concerning the new Soviet Union. Precedent, imperial Russia was on the Serbian side. Questions about this different communist legacy are again actual.

Between the first and the second world war on the head of the Yugoslavia was the Serbian dynasty. Its main political interest was to level all national differences. National question was solved in such a way that it was erased as a question. We have created Yugoslavia. Now we only have to create Yugoslavians. It was the political ambition of the first Yugoslavia.

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In the meantime fascism appeared in Europe. It is possible to see that there is a Yugoslav approaching to Germany. The pact between two countries was signed in 1940. During that time America declared neutrality, Russia signed a peaceful agreement Germany and France signet capitulation. Yugoslavian rebels decided to resist. Serbian church supported them with an attitude that Serbia is the heavenly (or celestial) kingdom if it is not the earthly (or terrestrial) one. Even today the orthodox church, in the other circumstances, did not abandoned this mythology of the heavenly kingdom. As far as Serbian policy in Bosnia is concerned, namely, Orthodox Church is defending the thesis that the Serbs might loose millions of people, but that their truth is eternal one and at the end it will win somewhere, perhaps in heavens. (of course, another question is how come that the church has such an important role in Yugoslavia now.)

Be that as it may, the communists remained with the people at the beginning of the second world war. Later on, this, so to say the suicidal resistance to Germany, was interpreted as the strategy of the Commintern to destroy Serbia and its prevailing anti-communist attitude.

The second Yugoslavia was created in 1943. as the communist one, during the Second World War. It seemed that communism solved the national question, but using the same leveling of differences as it was done during the first Yugoslavia. This time differences should be erased using the idea of the brotherhood between the people. What is important in establishing the personal and social identity is the fact that people belonged to communist party and not to some particular national group. Communism was a certain guarantee of internationalism. Even now, only this sort of integration was used to defend the idea of Yugoslavia. There were no other possibilities of establishing the social integration.

In our country democracy is not a phrase, but reality. This is what Tito said. For Tito, the creation of Bosnia and Herzegovina was the real example of the solved national question. We are all Bosnia - Tito has spoken. (During that time Macedonia became a federal unit.) A lot of people in Yugoslavia now regret this Titoistic period of peace. Whether it was a real democracy or not - it is not difficult to judge. Lets only hear what the Yugoslav people said. We don't need democracy, we have Tito - this is what people said.

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Using the socialist right to self-determination, and some changes in the Constitution of 1974. specially, Yugoslav republic (Slovenia and Croatia more than the others) started with the idea of the secession from Yugoslavia. Serbia did not accepted different ideas of federal or confederate constitution of Yugoslavia, because all these solutions were not regarded as a proper political solution for the Serbian population out of Serbia. The slogan was "All Serbs in one state". Although Yugoslavia already was a state for all Serbs, this appeared as a new political strategy. Instead of Yugoslavia the Great Serbia was articulated as a political program. It is not clear, how come that the Great Serbia gives such a democratic guarantee even for the Serbs. It is, namely, obvious that one country has not to be great in order to be democratic.

The war started in Slovenia in 1991. It was still a war for communism. Serbian leadership, specially its leader Milosevic, faced the alternative - Yugoslavia or communism - and chose communism. This is why Yugoslav army relatively quickly left Slovenia. (The other reason is also that there is no big Serbian population in Slovenia). Communism in East Europe was already defeated. This is why the strategy in Yugoslavia has also been changed. Instead of communism, the war in Yugoslavia continued as a war for nationalism. If Yugoslavia cannot be communist country or Serbian, then let's start to build a Serbian national state. It is obvious that such a political program is an anachronism in the period of different world integrations. For some generations the whole lifetime is lost in realizing such an anachronism.

The war in Croatia was, allegedly, the war for Serbian people who lived in it. Milo_evic, the devoted follower of Tito, suddenly switched to the Serbian nationalism. Such an easy transition from one political position to quite a different one reveals also the political background of the war in Yugoslavia. It is not the war a specific national interest, but the pure strategy of saving the political power. Beyond the apparent national interest (for which the whole country was destroyed) there is nothing else but the specific structure of power. In that sense we should also regard the latest peace initiative of a Serbian president.

It is now clear to see who started this war and who is still leading it. These are not some foreign powers, or some plots against Yugoslavia. A theory of different plots is just one more strategy to avoid some real causes of the war. There is also a thesis that Germany is trying to renew its old interest on the Balkans. In that light you can also find an interpretation of German's early recognition of Slovenia and Croatia. But it is also true, that until June 1991, namely, until the conference for European cooperation and security, the world was mostly for preservation of Yugoslavia. After that there is a dilemma why to defend Yugoslavia if there is no one even in Yugoslavia to defend it. Then, or if you want, during that second step, there is perhaps a premature recognition of some republics in Yugoslavia, before guarantees for all nationalities in these republics were constitutionally established.

So the Serbs are using the argument that their rights in Bosnia and Herzegovina defined itself as a sovereign, democratic state of equal citizens - Moslems, Serbs, Croats and other nationalities living in Bosnia. After that, in January 1992, the self-proclaimed Serbian parliament in Bosnia declared the independence of the Serbian Republic of Bosnia and Herzegovina.

Serbia as a military power is just a new example for the thesis that there are still late countries in Europe - military powers, namely without the idea of the state. Once, such an example was Germany. Perhaps, Russia will be the next one.

Serbian president Milo_evic, who started this war is now trying to be the peace-maker. In order to save his position, of course. Now it became clear that the war against the whole world can be only the failure. Of course, the peace initiative should be supported. The problem is that it is just a sign of a reproduction of the same structure of power. It that sense this peace initiative will not provoke some political changes in Yugoslavia.

The political changes are only the following once: the third Yugoslavia was established including now only Serbia and Montenegro. For the first time in their history Slovenia and Macedonia established their national states, and Bosnia and Croatia renewed their statehood which they once had in the Middle Age. The borders of each state are previous republic borders from the communist Yugoslavia.

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In the "Philosophy of Right" Hegel talks about the acknowledgment of a man as such. The man is acknowledged as such and not on the ground of his particular national characteristics. This became possible in the frame of modern liberal Europe, which makes the difference particularly between private and public, church and state general interests.

In this sense nationalism is a kind of a premodern consciousness. But in the East European countries this is only one part of determination of nationalism. Namely, in these countries nationalism is also a specific consequence of a communism. Communism didn't make possible the development of a civil society. This was a clear political strategy of communism. Every liberal development of society would put in question the economic and political irrationality of communism. After communism, there is consequently only the natural etnical identity as the frame of a political programme. The consequences are as we see specially in Yugoslavia catastrophic.

Hegel makes a difference between family (as the sphere of individualism), society and state (as spheres of generality). Nationalism would like to make a transfer from the individual, natural sphere to the state without meditation of civil society. Instead of civil society nationalism is using the idea of culture. Rational institutions of society are, in historical sense, the basis of rational social integration. In Yugoslavia for example, this integartion existed on the ideological basis as the idea of the brotherhood between Serbs, Croats and Moslems.

The main perspective in facing the problem of nationalism and developing the idea of a new world order is obviously the development of a civil society. The best philosophy can not help us if we don't have social institutions which guarantee our human rights. But how to develop such a society? In Yugoslavia for example, there are lot of discussions about civil society, but there are no citizens so to say in the sense of social subjects of such a society. Actual embargo against Yugoslavia is also an obstacle in developing the middle class of society. (In the same sense even the Chinese dissidents were against American idea of threatening China with embargo, or trade sanctions if "significant overall progress" wasn't made on human rights. cf. News week, March 28, 1994.)

In the frame of Yugoslavian tradition there is a lack of presuppositions for the development of a modern individualism. There is no Protestantism as the possibility of an individualism in the religious frame and there is no liberalism as the possibility of anindividualism in the social frame. Orthodox tradition and communism were only two different conditions for development of the idea of collectivism.

If we already talk about the importance of a modern individualism we have to mention some other presuppositions./ They could help us to understand the possibility of transcending nationalism. But they also could help us to understand the idea of a new world order not only in the sense of a world market, but in the sense of a world community. I would like to say something about these presuppositions. I would call them ethical presuppositions of social and political order. The discussion of these presumptions is not only an academic one. It helps us to understand the whole problem of the legitimating of a political order.

According to Aristotelianism for example, politics is an integral part of practical philosophy. On this account the human nature can be realized only in the political community. In this Aristotelian sense, on a general level, politics builds on ethics realizing it and ethics itself represents a doctrine on individual virtues. Modern political thought which begins with Machiavelli marks the division between ethics and politics. Machiavelli's reasons for the claim that politics is an autonomous area are of historical character. However, in Hobbes, this claim becomes a matter of principle. First of all, in Hobbes, the subject matter is a social philosophy which does not exist in an Aristotelian context of discussion. In Hobbes, on a level of natural law, this social philosophy points out implicitly to a modern subjectivity. As far as the constitution of political order is concerned, Hobbes tries to articulate the original historically undetermined competence of each individual. The constitution of a political order is based on the instinct of self-preservation as a basic feature of the state of nature. This points out to the primacy of self-preservation over sociability. Rousseau renews the question on legitimate foundations of the social order in the modern era. For if the contract, which for its foundations has the human nature, is the legitimate basis of the modern state, it still remains the open question what legitimates the contract itself. This is origin of Rousseau's "Social Contract". In this way the question of relationship between ethics and politics is not only the discussion on practical philosophy, but the question of legitimate foundation of a modern society in general. It is Rousseau's view that social community has to have a firmer basis than it is described in Hobbes and Lock. The political community must be a warrant not only of the life and property, but of the human freedom as well.

We see that the question of legitimation can not be reduced to some particular level of legitimation could be regarded as enough general level of establishing the idea of a new world order? It could be perhaps the idea of communication. Although we can, as members of different social and national groups occupy different positions, there is something which we all as individuals must assume - and this is the idea of communications. Namely, communication in the sense of Apel and Habermas points out to its ethical presuppositions i. e. to the fact that all participants are recognized as equal partners1.

I would like to underline this idea of communication although it seems that it doesn't have an immediate relevance to our problem. But we can see its relevance even if we regard some concrete political solutions. For example, actual embargo against Yugoslavia shouldn't establish deficit in communication between the world and progressive democratic forces in Yugoslavia. The world should not only react against the ethnical terror but it should also look for some possible partners for the future dialogue. At least, problems in East Europe, including Yugoslavia, could be solved only through the development of their own democratic potentials. With this short interruption I wanted to say that even some concrete political decisions could be deduced from the idea of a communication. In the sense this idea should be incorporated in the institutions of a future world order. On this basis the world could be regarded as the possible world community.

On the one side we should respect religious and cultural differences. It is a part of the modern idea of tolerance. But on the other side we also have to respect some universal values such as the idea of human rights. In that sense we have to act against the nationalism i. e. against the reduction of human rights to some particular level. Where are the borders of respect? Do the universal values on the order side mean the establishment of an impersonal world order? The development of world institutions should not leave to the new "Leviathan", to new authoritarian forms of government, but to the new possibilities of communication between different cultures.

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I think that this discussion about Yugoslavia renews some question from the discussion between Luhmann and Habermas (or between the idea of social technology or functionalism and the idea of a critical social theory) about the status of the modern community. Both of them are dealing with the question about communication. Luhmann understands the social system in the framework of its functionality. On the other side Habermas is trying to renew the idea of communication and understanding against the idea of a life world.

As I said, Luhmann and Habermas are discussing modern society, and Yugoslavia is still premodern one. Still there are some parallels and they are, as I think, speaking in favor of Habermas thesis.

Tito's Yugoslavia functioned in a certain sense. Or better to say, only Tito functioned in such a system. The third Yugoslavia is also functioning using the particular national subject as a political program. In the Kantian sense, the new transcendental, constitutive subject became a national state. This particularity of establishing social sense, or this ideology of sense, resulted with catastrophe. Functionalism is not a reliable criterion in establishing democratic society. In this sense the idea of communication is a project against particular, national state. Through the communication the constitutive role of the Other has been revealed.

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