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The current Serbian authorities (aligned with the Serbian Progressive Party) have pushed Serbia towards effective reforms over the past several years and improved its image on the international arena through an intensified diplomatic offensive after 2015. This has led to a situation in which the Serbian state became a political and economic partner in both regional and integration projects. The latter is demonstrated by the arduous but progressive accession process to the European Union. After 2000, international and Serbian public opinion greeting the end of the regime of Slobodan Milošević expected rapid democratisation of the state based on statements by Serbian politicians who had declared a West European course of the state. The short-lived rule of Prime Minister Zoran Đinđić, confirmed this; however, the policy of his successors was no longer so unambiguous. For almost a decade, Serbia oscillated between populism and declared democratisation, without making major changes, expected by both society and the European Union. When after the year 2012 the Serbian Progressive Party came to power (the party was founded as a conservative grouping and had radical roots), it seemed that the Serbian state would be pushed towards a more conservative, anti-European and nationalist direction. However, that did not happen. Opinion about the last six years of the group’s rule is varied. This paper aims to try to answer the question whether during the party’s rule, Serbia has been democratising and whether in this era of nationalist movements and populism, the country has a chance at real democratisation and finishing the pro- cess of accession to the EU?

The article focuses on the issue of Croatia’s ethnic policy towards minorities at the level of administrative and territorial organization. It attempts to answer the question whether and to what extent the ethnic and territorial conflict in the 1990s influenced the processes of transformation of the administrative and territorial organization of the state. The Croatian state, given as an example, at the time of declaring its independence in 1991 had to face the threat of territorial disintegration from the Serb minority living in its territory. The Italian minority was also suspected of such tendencies, but it soon turned out that these suspicions were groundless. The Serbian community could, however, threaten the unification of the state, which initially happened as a result of an armed conflict. After its end, fears did not diminish, especially in the face of the changes in territorial borders that took place until the end of the first decade of the 21st century. The threat could be reduced using one of the tools, which was the local government administration and the shape of its territorial units. The Author analyses this issue basing on the projects of Croatian experts dealing with the issues of administrative and territorial organization of the last three decades and at various stages of Croatian statehood, data on demographic changes and laws regulating the functioning of local and regional local governments as well as regulations concerning the position of national minorities in the state.

Serbian aspirations towards European structures. The situation of national minorities and ethnic minorities in the Autonomous Province of Vojvodina with particular emphasis on the educational system Autonomous Province of Vojvodina (APV) is an area in the northern part of the Repub­lic of Serbia. This region is inhabited by over 26 national and ethnic minorities, making it the most diverse ethnically area throughout Serbia. On the basis of the Constitution and special statutes in APV the following languages have official status: Serbian, Hungarian, Slovak, Croatian, Romanian and Ruthenian. In addition, this area is the most economically developed throughout the country. Vojvodina is an example of a well-functioning multi‑ethnic commu­nities living in one territory, which in some regions of the Balkans remains an open problem. Therefore government in Belgrade tries to keep the European image of this autonomy to such an extent, that cyclically there appears information about the possibility of obtaining of the total independence of this territory and the separation from the Republic of Serbia. Para­doxically, such speculations can lead to the destabilization in other regions of Serbia. They did not obtain such a level of autonomy and mentioned speculations inspire some minorities into actions in order to get the certain independence (for example Boshniaks from Sandjak in western Serbia). The central authorities are aware of this fact and try to keep the control over all regions of the country that often can lead to ethnic conflicts. That raises the following question: to what extend wide autonomy of the Vojvodina is true and in corresponding to the constitutional policy, what fields of the life does this autonomy include.