Political Transformations: Welfare States in Transition: Montenegro: A Long Drive Down a Tough Road

This paper examines the political context of transition in Montenegro. It seeks to argue that the two decades of power struggles between the Montenegrin political elites have overshadowed the consolidation of political parties. Consequently, social issues were ad hoc parts the political parties’ agendas, while social values took a detour due to the shadow economy created during the wartime years in the former Yugoslavia. In order to elaborate on these issues, the paper is divided in three chronological parts, each of which contextualises social issues within a particular period of socio-political development of Montenegro.

The first part of the paper focuses on the first half of the 1990s. The turbulent years of the Yugoslav disintegration generated ‘transitional traumas’ (e.g. shadow economy) that delayed and seriously impaired the Montenegrin transition. The second part of the paper examines the period from the late 1996 until the referendum on independence. The third part of the paper will focus on the post-independence period, which has generated the need for the political elites to reinvent their agendas in light of the salient drive of Montenegro to enter the EU. Consequently, the most recent period of the political transformation of Montenegro has been marked by the salience of social issues in the political environment.