Fragile Fabric

The Yugoslav Communist Party is once again in the grip of a wide-scale political purge. In a series of laconic announcements last week, the Yugoslav press agency Tanyug reported the "resignations" of top-ranking Serbian and Slovene officials. In fact, they had been dismissed from office by President Josip Broz Tito, who had moved to put down nationalist strife within the supposedly supranationalist party he has led since 1937.

Straying Parties. Still iron-willed at 80, Tito seemed more determined than ever to prevent any division of Yugoslavia into separate states after his death. Such a prospect has always haunted him, and with reason. Five major national groups compose the fragile fabric of Yugoslav unity: the fiercely independent Serbs, Croats, Slovenes, Montenegrins and Macedonians. Twenty years ago Tito granted a measure of autonomy to the Communist parties that rule Yugoslavia's six republics. But such decentralization served to encourage separatist aspirations. As a result, Tito decided to centralize and discipline the straying parties. Since last December, when Tito struck out against the leaders of Yugoslavia's 4.5 million Croats, some 1,500 alleged separatists have been tried for "counterrevolution" or for "stirring up national hatreds." Now he is cracking down on the leadership of the country's 5.2 million Serbs and 1.7 million Slovenes.

Among the first victims of the new purge was one of Yugoslavia's most able advocates of democratization, Marko Nikezic, 51, the chairman of the Serbian Communist Party. Accused of excessive liberalism, the burly, crew-cut Serbian had, in fact, attempted to dampen Serbian national fervor. He reportedly aroused Tito's ire last year by warning him against rising Croat separatism before Tito was ready to acknowledge it. Other prominent Serbs who resigned under pressure were Serbian Central Committee Secretary Latinka Perovic and Foreign Minister Mirko Tepavac. The premier of Slovenia, Stane Kavcic, and a Serbian member of the Presidium, Koca Popovic, resigned voluntarily out of sympathy. Vague charges of "anarcho-liberalism" were leveled at those purged. Still Tito's tough action delivered the message to the Serbs and the Slovenes that they had no more claim to special privilege than the Croats.

Tito's alarm at the party's inability to keep the peace among Yugoslavia's diverse nationalities has been compounded by growing economic disruption, much of it of his own making. The "self-management" system he introduced in 1950, combining a market economy and other features of free enterprise with state ownership of industry, is foundering because of inefficiency and mismanagement. Massive imports of Western technology and consumer goods have not been matched by American or European investment. As a result, Yugoslavia is becoming more dependent on Soviet capital. Eight hundred thousand Yugoslavs have sought jobs in Western Europe, and many virtually bankrupt Yugoslav companies are unable to meet their payrolls. In spite of displays of consumer goods in stores, soaring inflation has put them increasingly out of reach for ordinary workers.

At the same time, corruption is rampant. Some Yugoslav businessmen are buying Mercedes cars and country villas with the proceeds of embezzlement, kickbacks and tax evasion. As a committed Communist, Tito is appalled by the widening gap between rich and poor. In speeches made around the country, he has attacked the new class of "dinar billionaires," whose conspicuous displays of wealth, especially in Serbia, are exacerbating nationalist resentments. But beyond purging rebels within his party, it remains unclear how Tito plans to halt the disintegration he sees menacing the Communist state he founded 27 years ago. Still, there is no doubting the sincerity--and the pathos --of his recent statement that "if anyone cares about the preservation of our revolutionary achievements, it is I. If this were not so, the whole of my life would be proved in vain."

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