Vojvodina Autonomist Movement

The Vojvodina Autonomist Movement (Serbian: Војвођански аутономашки покрет, romanized: Vojvođanski autonomaški pokret), or colloquially the Autonomists (Serbian: Аутономаши, romanized: Autonomaši) is a political movement in the Serbian province of Vojvodina that advocates more autonomy for Vojvodina within Serbia.

History

Flag of Vojvodina as proposed by the League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina in the 1990s and still in some limited use today

The idea was introduced during the 1990s and was more popular during the Yugoslav Wars when one part of the local population wasn't satisfied with the regime of Slobodan Milošević. During this time period, Milošević's regime abolished much of the aspects of Vojvodina's autonomy, which the province enjoyed during the time of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

Political parties

There are several political parties or party coalitions that advocate more autonomy for Vojvodina. Most significant of them is the League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina.^[1] Other autonomist party is Vojvodina's Party. Both parties are mostly led and supported by local Vojvodinian Serb population. There are also several political parties of local ethnic minorities, some of which, aside from supporting rights of ethnic minorities, are also supporting the idea of more autonomy for Vojvodina, an example of which is the Pannonian Rusyn minority party Together for Vojvodina.^[2]

Provincial elections Year Party Votes Percentage Seats 2004 Together for Vojvodina 60,389 9.8% 7 Clean Hands of Vojvodina 14,666 2.4% 2 TOTAL: 75,055 12.2% 9 2008 Together for Vojvodina 86,653 8.5% 6 Vojvodina's Party 6,996 0.7% 0 TOTAL: 93,649 9.2% 6 2012 League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina 111,397 11.6% 10 2016 League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina 61,979 6.6% 9 Vojvodina Tolerance 4,943 0.5% 0 TOTAL: 66,922 7.2% 9 2020 Vojvodina Front 41,455 5.3% 6 2023 Vojvodinians 24,625 2.6% 0

Parliamentary elections in Vojvodina Year Party Votes Percentage 2014 NDS–LSV–ZZS–VMDK–ZZV–DLR 72,299[3] 8.1% 2016 Alliance for a Better Serbia 63,338[4] 6.5% 2020 United Democratic Serbia 20,775[5] 2.4% 2022 Together for Vojvodina 21,703[6] 2.1%

Proposals and initiatives

There are various views among autonomist proponents about the desired level of autonomy of Vojvodina. Some advocate for returning to the level of autonomy as it was provided by the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution, while others support the idea of somewhat lesser level of autonomy than that.

One of the proposals included the one pout forward by the League of Social Democrats of Vojvodina, which advocated the transformation of Serbia into a "federal state" with federal units having varying degrees of autonomy.^[7] One of the federal units, according to the proposal, would be the Republic of Vojvodina while others would be Šumadija, Southeastern Serbia, City of Belgrade, Sandžak and Kosovo.^[7][8][9] In recent years, the LSV mostly abandoned the idea of a Republic of Vojvodina, but is still advocating for a higher level of autonomy for the province.

In 2013 as an answer to the proposal of the Third Serbia, Novi Sad-based political organization, to abolish the province of Vojvodina, the Vojvodina's Party performed a campaign that involved the posting of "Republic of Vojvodina" posters in Novi Sad.^[10][11][12]

See also

• Hungarian Regional Autonomy
• Politics of Vojvodina

References

1. Filep, Bela (2016). The politics of good neighbourhood: state, civil society and the enhancement of cultural capital in east central Europe. Taylor & Francis. p. 71. ISBN 978-1-317-02044-8. OCLC 1100696685.
2. Bugajski, Janusz (2020). Political parties of Eastern Europe: a guide to politics in the post-Communist era. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-000-16135-9. OCLC 1195438455.
3. ИЗБОРИ ЗА НАРОДНЕ ПОСЛАНИКЕ НАРОДНЕ СКУПШТИНЕ РЕПУБЛИКЕ СРБИЈЕ МАРТ 2014 (PDF) (in Serbian). April 2014. p. 32. ISBN 978-86-6161-108-7.
4. ИЗБОРИ ЗА НАРОДНЕ ПОСЛАНИКЕ НАРОДНЕ СКУПШТИНЕ РЕПУБЛИКЕ СРБИЈЕ АПРИЛ 2016 (PDF) (in Serbian). May 2016. p. 21. ISBN 978-86-6161-154-4.
5. ИЗБОРИ ЗА НАРОДНЕ ПОСЛАНИКЕ НАРОДНЕ СКУПШТИНЕ РЕПУБЛИКЕ СРБИЈЕ ЈУН 2020 (PDF) (in Serbian). July 2020. p. 21. ISBN 978-86-6161-193-3.
6. ИЗБОРИ ЗА НАРОДНЕ ПОСЛАНИКЕ НАРОДНЕ СКУПШТИНЕ РЕПУБЛИКЕ СРБИЈЕ 3. април 2022. године (PDF) (in Serbian). 2022. p. 37. ISBN 978-86-6161-221-3.
7. Vance, Charles (2006). Managing a global workforce: challenges and opportunities in international human resource management. Armonk, N.Y.: M.E. Sharpe. p. 426. ISBN 978-0-7656-2016-3. OCLC 1020540099.
8. "Separatisti sa novim programom stvaranja još jedne lažne države na teritoriji Srbije". Magazin Tabloid. Retrieved 2022-03-20.
9. Enciklopedija Novog Sada (in Serbian). Novosadski klub "Dobra vest". 1999. pp. 40–41.
10. "Трећа Србија – Treća Srbija – Third Serbia". Archived from the original on 2009-10-13.
11. "Трећа Србија: ДС бринула о култури као о лањском снегу".
12. "NS:Novi plakati Vojvodina republika - B92". 28 January 2013.