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The main subject of this paper is analysis how digitalization can contribute in resolving legal concerns which were observed in practice and which are related to the fact that a share in the company is the object of common property of spouses. There are shown the main provisions of family law in Republic of Serbia, in order to approach the meaning of common property of spouses, as well as material and procedural provisions related to the company law in Republic of Serbia, regulations on registration of companies, data and documents which are of importance for the companies and which are the object of registration, Goal is to show that checking of fact is natural person who is achieving the share in the company married while undertaking legal actions in order to achieve that share, as well as automatic, electronic recording and centralized exchange of these data between public notaries and other public authorities in that process, in the future, can greater legal security in Republic of Serbia and in the neighborhood states-Montenegro, Croatia, Slovenia and Bosnia and Herzegovina. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyses the direction and intensity of the impact of economic trends on the profitability of banks in Serbia and Croatia in the period between the years 2006 and 2021. This paper aims to determine which indicators of economic trends have the most substantial impact on the profitability of banks in the selected countries. As key indicators of economic trends, GDP per capita, the GDP growth rate, inflation rate, real interest rate, broad money growth, general government final consumption expenditure, current account balance, gross savings, trade, and unemployment are selected as independent variables. At the same time, bank profitability was measured with bank return on equity, in percentages (ROE), and bank return on assets, in percentages (ROA) – two indicators which represent the dependent variables selected for this research. Descriptive analysis, mean difference, correlation, and univariate and multivariate regression were used in the research. Research results show that changes in real interest rates and unemployment have a significant impact on the profitability of banks in both of the selected countries, while changes in GDP per capita growth have a statistically significant effect only in Serbia, and general government final consumption expenditure has a statistically significant impact only in Croatia. The influence of other indicators of economic trends is not statistically significant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The possibilities and ways of design and implementation of distributed information and communication systems for management of traffic and road infrastructure in road traffic that are used in intelligent transportation systems, are considered and described in the paper. First, such intelligent transportation systems are shortly described. Then, the basic architecture of one distributed information and communication system for intelligent management in road traffic is proposed. The system consists of a central part of the system and several modules or subsystems, responsible for certain individual functionsof control. Most of the paper is dedicated to the description of one practically designed and implemented module, or system, for optimizing travel and travel costs. The design and architecture of the implemented system are described. The system is intended for optimization of the length, time and cost of traveling of users in road traffic. It offers to the user several of the most favourable routes, i.e. traveling routes, between selected travel destinations, with their lengths, expected travel times and expected travel costs, on journeys that cross state borders and use roads with toll payment. It takes into account the duration of congestion at border crossings and toll payment stations, as well as the prices of tolls on the offered traveling routes. More detailed experimental research was performed on the designed and implemented system. Situations when crossing the border between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia, the border between Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, and the border between Serbia and Croatia were observed practically and experimentally. Also, toll payment stations on highways in Republic of Srpska, Serbia and Croatia were observed. Some experimentally obtained results are given in the paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The rapid evolution of wireless communication technologies (such as fifth-generation (5G) cellular networks) in the last years has allowed connecting different objects (from wearable electronics to vehicles) and people through communication networks, and at the same time, has led to widespread deployment of base stations. Along with this growth, questions about the potential adverse effects on human health due to electromagnetic fields (EMFs) from base station antennas have also been raised. In this paper, we focus on the assessment of EMFs in automobiles during short (between cities) and long (between countries) trips on several European roads. Comprehensive measurement campaigns were carried out in several European countries: Austria, Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, Slovenia, and the Republic of Serbia. The results show that the median total electric field is 0.23–0.24 V/m in Bulgaria, Croatia, Hungary, Italy, and the Republic of Serbia. In Austria and Slovenia, the median is 0.28–0.31 V/m. Austria demonstrated the highest value for the total electric field, at 17.4 V/m. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The 2019 European Open Data Directive identifies geospatial data as data that could have a major impact on human activities (high-value data, HVD) and advocates its provision as open data (OD), i.e., without barriers to access and re-use. Although Croatia has implemented OD policies to support the provision of open data, many geospatial data are still not available, or if available, their level of openness ranks Croatia lower than Slovenia and Serbia on some ranking lists. Benchmarking tools have proven to be a powerful tool in identifying barriers in OD. This paper, therefore, benchmarks the level of openness and provision of geospatial HVD in Croatia, Slovenia and Serbia, using the extended and modified Global Open Data Index methodology (GODI Plus). It is expected that this will provide an answer to the status of OD policies and government engagement in OD in Croatia and identify good OD practices among the three countries analyzed. Furthermore, the results will be a baseline benchmark for future HVD analyses. The results reveal low data openness for Croatia and Serbia, high data openness for Slovenia, and a low level of government engagement in all three proposed countries. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents a study of online teaching in higher education during the 2021/2022 school year, during the Covid 19 pandemic. The theoretical foundation of this research is Community of Inquiry (CoI) framework, according to which online teaching is realized through social presence (students’ interaction), teaching presence (student-teacher interaction) and cognitive presence (student-content interaction). This quantitative research was conducted in six countries: Serbia, Croatia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Slovenia, Romania and Russia, and the answers were received from 808 students. At all participating faculties, online teaching was applied during the observed period, and in almost 80% of cases it was realized in full or to a greater extent than in in-person classes. The aim was to determine CoI presences and to identify possible differences among countries. The obtained data was processed with quantitative descriptive analysis and Kruskal–Wallis H test. The highest values of CoI presence were noted in Russia and Romania, then Slovenia and Croatia, and the lowest in Bosnia and Herzegovina and Serbia. In the whole sample, teaching presence has been most represented, followed by social presence, while the cognitive presence has been scored the least. Entire CoI presence was assessed as partially represented, as well as its three elements, the lowest of which is cognitive presence. In order to improve the online teaching process, in this paper technological and pedagogical training of teachers for online teaching, support for students for the use of digital tools for online learning and the provision of IT experts as necessary technical support are recommended. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper discusses the possibility of information and communication links between activities related to maintenance in the construction sector in the Western Balkans. However, the precondition for this connection is the organization of clusters at the national level so that as many companies as possible are involved in regional cooperation. The development of information technologies enables local and regional connections. The common goal is to inform each other for the purpose of business development and competitiveness. In the regional sense, the areas of interest are parts of the Bosnia and Herzegovina, the Republic of Croatia and Republic of Serbia. In practical terms, an information and communication model of regional cooperation with clear objectives is proposed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recently, there has been a significant rise in the production of films on the Jasenovac camp and related Ustasha crimes, taking their share in the mnemonic politics. The paper focuses on the two most recent films, The Diary of Diana B., a docufiction filmed in Croatia, and Dara of Jasenovac, a feature film which was Serbia’s candidate for an Oscar. The memory of traumatic events is remediated in each film differently and used for representing diverse group identities through temporal relation with the difficult past. Comparison between the two films focuses on subject positions and regimes of historicity as categories that make the production of meaning mechanism visible. The main questions that guide the analysis are: how are victims and perpetrators portrayed, who is witnessing traumatic events, and to whom is the trauma attributed? Do they bring something new to the cultural memory of the Holocaust and genocide in the Independent State of Croatia?. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Given the current pandemic coronavirus, the paper analyzes the state’s response to the disease caused by the virus (COVID-19) from the standpoint of two neighbouring countries i.e. the Republic of Croatia and the Republic of Serbia. Special attention was paid to the states’ response to the pandemic from human rights perspective. The research ws conducted into the patterns of their “struggle”, especially as regards the human rights restrictions they had opted for within their constitutional framework. The starting point of the paper was that human rights often are the victims of the crises and that they are easily restricted for a longer periods. In this respect, the author deals with possible answers to the questions about the quality and content of human rights, and how the protection of human rights was ensured in these exceptional circumstances. This legal framework was linked to current statistics on the number of COVID-19 cases. Having analyzed the response of the two states, it could be noted that both states have constitutional provisions governing the state of emergency, allowing them the rule of law in these exceptional circumstances. Both constitutions recognize a list of human rights that may be derogated in state of emergency. However, in Croatia, the state of emergency was not introduced, and the human rights were restricted in accordance with the given epidemiological situation. In Serbia, the struggle against COVID-19 took place in state of emergency and was marked by an extremely restrictive regime of human rights, which was partly in conflict with the constitutional order. The constitutional concept of absolute protection of human rights, in their broadest sense, had proved unsustainable in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper analyzes the right of a database manufacturer which is the exclusive right that authorizes its holder to prohibit or permit another to use a particular database, i.e. the collection of regulated and systematized data, copyright works or other materials that are available electronically or otherwise. However, the database can be a collection in terms of the copyright of the collection, so it also represents the content of the analysis in this paper. The subject of comparative analysis are the provisions of the current regulations in the Republic of Croatia and the Republic of Serbia, and determining their compliance with the Directive 96/9/EC on the legal protection of databases. The analysis used a historical legal and normative legal method. Based on the analysis, the authors point out that the adopted solutions for the protection of databases in the EU greatly influenced the adoption of the corresponding regulations in the Republic of Serbia, concluding that the regulations governing this area in the Republic of Serbia are almost completely aligned with the EU regulations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to examine the possibilities for prevention and resolution of positive conflicts of jurisdiction between the Croatian (EU Member State) and Serbian (third State) courts in succession cases in which the assets of estate are located in both Croatia and Serbia. All issues will be discussed from the perspective of both Croatian (EU) and Serbian private international law. As regards Croatian (EU) private international law, the study begins with the presentation of the relevant jurisdiction rules of EU Succession Regulation (ESR) which provide for the Croatian (Member State) courts to have jurisdiction to rule on the succession as a whole in most cases, irrespective of where the assets of estate are located (the so called principle of unity of succession), and continues with the profound analysis of the rule of Art. 12(1) of ESR, which enables the Croatian (Member State) courts to prevent positive jurisdiction conflicts with Serbian courts by deciding not to rule on the assets located in Serbia. In addition, some remarks will be made on lis pendens rule of Art. 60 of Croatian PIL Act, which aims to prevent the pending of two parallel proceedings involving the same cause of action and between the same parties before the Croatian and Serbian or any other third State court (i.e. to resolve the positive conflicts of jurisdiction between Croatian and third State courts). When it comes to Serbian private international law, the study assesses the jurisdiction rules of the Serbian PIL Act (Art. 71–73), which follows the principle of scission of succession, in order to determine the relevant positive jurisdiction conflicts which need to be resolved by Serbian courts and analyzes the lis pendens rule of Art. 80 of Serbian PIL Act, which represents the main tool for resolving such conflicts. Finally, in the absence of relevant case law on positive jurisdiction conflicts caused by the divergent rules of ESR and the Serbian PIL Act, two hypothetical cases involving such conflicts, created for the purposes of this paper, will be discussed from both Croatian and Serbian point of view. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper is focused on the online media coverage of the organized anti-migrant protests in three transit countries along the Western Balkan migration route: Serbia, Croatia, and Bosnia and Herzegovina (hereafter BH), in the period between the beginning of 2015 and end of 2019. The aim of this small-scale research was to first map and consequently explain the online media coverage of the perceivably anti-migrant protests in the selected area, starting from the beginning of the so-called migrant crisis. The research shows a predominantly negative, alarmist portrayal of the migrants characterized by both overt and covert racist and Orientalizing modes of presentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the authors point out important practical issues arising in the application of international treaties in Private International Law, such as the complex situations that may arise in connection with the entry into force of the treaty, the succession of international treaties, the hierarchy of international treaties, and an analysis of the common rule on the primacy of bilateral treaties. Besides, the need for reviewing existing bilateral treaties Law has been discussed as well, bearing in mind more efficient solutions envisaged in the conventions of the Hague Conference on Private International Law. Finally, the paper also indicates the specific cases where the innovated solutions of the new PIL Act of the Republic of Croatia and the Draft PIL Act of the Republic of Serbia are considerably more favorable than the binding multilateral agreement on determining the content of foreign law. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this article is to analyze the anti-populist and populist elements in the visual language of selected political manifestations. Protests in Serbia from 2017 to 2020 (mass demonstrations and one individual act of resistance) and in Croatia from 2018 to 2020 were chosen as examples. The article draws on visual materials from the demonstrations and their media coverage. The paper tracks different strategies for visualizing populist and anti-populist rhetoric. It presents various types of the visual discourse of populism: the discourse of the masses, the discourse of polarization, the discourse of vulnerability, and the discourse of the gallows. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper discusses the evaluation of regional inequalities in the V4 countries, Serbia and Croatia. The gross birth rate, the unemployment rate, the average monthly gross earnings, the gross domestic product per capita in purchasing power parity and dwellings completed per 1000 inhabitants were selected as a set of evaluation indicators and, to determine the level of regional inequalities the Gini Coefficient and the Coefficient of Variation in two variants were used - in all the counties as well as after excluding the capital cities. The integrated indicator of socio-economic status based on the above-specified indicators revealed the prevailing dichotomy of the prosperous west vs. the problematic east in the majority of the countries, the most significantly in Slovakia. This country together with Hungary recorded (mainly thanks to the significant effect of the capital city) the most significant inequalities while the less significant ones were in the Czech Republic, Serbia and Croatia. The strong effect caused by the capital city was confirmed almost in all the countries except for Poland. The level of the dependence between the socio-economic status of the countries and the level of their inequalities was confirmed only partially. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The centuries-long existence of Croatian lands in different political and geographical frameworks, as well as their bordering position between civilizational and culturally diverse and often opposing political and territorial units, have conditioned the process of very dynamic political, territorial and demographic changes that gradually shaped the borders of the modern Republic of Croatia. The area of the Croatian Danube region with the country's eastern national border to Serbia, has not been exempt from such historical and geographical dynamism. The genesis of the Croatian national border in this area is mostly recent, but its emergence in 1945 as the republic border between Croatia and Serbia within the newly established socialist Yugoslavia was indirectly conditioned by the historical and geographical processes that preceded it. With the independence of the Republic of Croatia and other republics of the former Yugoslavia, a number of open border and territorial disputes created by the change of the republic's borders to national ones occurred. The above mentioned eastern national border of Croatia is among such disputed areas. Its northern segment which is related to the stream of the Danube river became an object of Croatian territorial dispute, firstly with FR Yugoslavia and afterwards with its successor Serbia, mostly due to the opposing geographic and legal interpretations concerning borderline, and the fact that the precise delineation was not conducted during the time of socialist Yugoslavia. The actual border dispute between Croatia and Serbia in the Danube river region is contextualized in the paper through a historical and geographical analysis of the border's genesis. A review of historical and geographical facts, as well as a valorisation of both countries' views on the matter of the disputed border segments are used to reach relevant conclusions regarding the dispute in question. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper discusses status and differences related to poverty, material deprivation and social exclusion based on statistical data from the Study on Income and Living Conditions (SILC) research in Macedonia, Serbia and Croatia. The countries covered in the paper are chosen due to their similar legacy of the social protection system, but also because they have different status with regard to the European Union (EU): a member state (Croatia), a candidate country with ongoing negotiations (Serbia) and a candidate country without negations (Macedonia). Apart from comparing and analyzing similarities and differences in the poverty rate, material deprivation and vulnerable groups in the three countries, the paper also analyzes countries' policy approaches in tackling poverty and social exclusion. In doing so, the correlation with the EU 2020 goals and targets is particularly emphasized. Comparative data from the SILC research shows that the scope of poverty and social exclusion is high in all three countries, however particular differences point to different dimensions of poverty which exist in these countries. While Croatia belongs to the EU countries in which income poverty is higher than the scope of material deprivation, Serbia and Macedonia have a reverse trend and belong to a smaller group of EU countries (Bulgaria, Romania, Latvia and Hungary) in which material deprivation is more pronounced than income poverty. Although policies aimed at tackling poverty and social exclusion refer to the EU 2020 targets, some of the shortcomings are still seen in all three countries: lack of revision of targets, lack of integrated approach between targets, as well as lack of profiling of vulnerable groups that are aimed to be lifted out of poverty. The paper stresses some of the shortcomings of the EU SILC data for poverty analysis in the three countries, and provides further recommendations for evidence based policy choices related to tackling poverty and social exclusion in Macedonia, Serbia and Croatia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, we analyze the concepts of community capacity, the psychological sense of community and social capital. They are examined in terms of their contribution to the social capital, both theoretically, as well as empirically. Results of a comprehensive empirical study, conducted in local communities in the Republic of Croatia and Republic of Serbia, are reported and discussed. Those results demonstrate that, in South-East Europe, community capacity can be linked to the collective action, as well as to the development of social capital in local communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides insights into productivity in dairy processing companies in Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia. The aim is to find out whether EBITDA per employee, as a measure of overall productivity as well as labour and capital productivity and their management positively affect company's profitability . Literature review shows that this issue was relatively neglected, although increase in productivity is regarded as the most important factor in maintaining a competitive advantage in most developed countries. Results obtained show that comprehensive measure of productivity EBITDA per employee has statistically significant positive impact on company's profitability, the same as productivity management components labour cost competitiveness and capital productivity . [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper tests the predictive ability of the Business Excellence Model developed by Croatian researchers Željana Aljinović Barać and Vinko Belak in 2007. The model was tested on Croatian publicly listed companies from 2000 to 2006 and it showed 90% validity. Due to the similarities between Croatian and Serbian economies, we decided to test the predictive ability of this model, taking into consideration Serbian foreign investors, specifically those that used the Greenfield strategy or the M&A strategy when entering the Serbian market. We tested the model on the sample companies and their financial statements published in the period from 2008 to 2012. We tested the predictive value of the model through statistical measurement of its relationship with profitability expressed as return on assets (ROA), return on equity (ROE), and net income. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Paneuropean corridor VII and Danube river as the backbone of this corridor for a small European area, or the country through which the corridor is transiting, but also for the wider European area, which represents the wider catchment area and the potential market for this corridor represents a vital river corridor (in the context of traffic and economic significance). Accordingly, the research problem in this paper is the analysis of exploitation degree of the middle Danube which transits trough Croatian territory, considering the huge potential opportunities. Conditions and opportunities of exploiting the Danube on Croatian territory, in this research have been done on the basis of comparative analysis of relevant traffic indicators, which are: condition of inland waterways network, conditions and capacities of the ships for inland waterways fleet, the intensity and structure of cargo flows in the river transport trough middle Danube corridor and the number of employees as a macroeconomic indicator in the sector. This analysis has been conducted on the basis of indicators which are available for the countries of Croatia and Serbia, as representatives of the states in the central part of Danube corridor. The results of the analysis indicate the need to take adequate measures and activities in order to increase the level of waterways arrangement, equipment modernization, modernization of the ships fleet, and the enhancement of this type of traffic. Thus, the Republic of Croatia and the port of Vukovar as the only Croatian port on the Danube, would prospere in transport and economomy and become competitive in the international market of cargo flows in inland waterways [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dairy farming and dairy processing industry have rapidly changed in recent decades in "old" European Union members, "new" members, as well as in other East European transitional countries. In East European transitional countries, a specific pattern of changes could be noticed. Those changes have usually begun with foreign direct investments, whereupon acquisitions, concentration and consolidation are followed. The process finished with capital investments to meet competition challenges. Thus, the main aim of our paper is to investigate the impact of capital investments on different quantitative and qualitative features of dairy processing companies in Slovenia, Croatia and Serbia. Capital investments per employee significantly increase productivity measured by EBITDA and personnel costs. Also, statistically significant association of capital investments and foreign ownership is identified. On the other hand, capital investments per employee do not significantly affect the profitability of those companies, if they are not accompanied by changes in owners' structure and know-how that foreign owners bring; regardless the country in which company operates. Amount of capital investment per employee are found statistically significant for country in which company operates of Slovenia and Croatia, but not Serbia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to evaluate the relative efficiency of commercial banks in three developing countries in Europe (North Macedonia, Serbia, and Croatia) in the period from 2015 to 2019, and to provide targets for improvement for the inefficient banks by using DEA. The variables are selected under the income-based approach. Based on the output-oriented BCC model, unusual results are obtained for a few commercial banks in each country, that is, they are BCC relative efficient, which is contrary to the real situation. In order to identify outliers that can affect the efficiency results, a super-efficiency procedure is applied so that banks with a super-efficiency score higher than 1.2 (outliers) or for which a feasible solution was not found are considered in detail and removed, and then the output-oriented BCC model is rerun. Based on the obtained results, the Macedonian commercial banking system shows the highest efficiency (91.1%), followed by the Croatian (90.9%) and the Serbian (81.9%) banking system. The estimated targets for improvement of the inefficient commercial banks could help their top bank management in better resource allocation and making fact-based and faster decisions by which they can improve the operation of the banks they lead and contribute to the stability of the financial system. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article analyzes the influence of the Serbian Orthodox Church and the Catholic Church on the current secular democracies in Croatia Republic of Serbia and the Republic of Croatia. Topics covered include the legal relations between the state and church, particularly the privileges and obligations stemming from them, and the events indicating war-like discourses supported indirectly or directly by the churches and with political consequences.

An essay is presented on the identity and interreligious dialogue in the discourse of Islamic communities in Croatia and Serbia on the issue of integration to the European Union (EU) as of August 2015. Also cited are the origins of Muslim communities in the region that trace back to the rule of the Ottoman Turkish empire, the concept of "Europeanness," and the three major developments that have characterized Islam in southeastern Europe as cited by author Xavier Bougarel.