Croatia and Federalist Ideas

This paper sheds light on different stages of development of the ideas and practice of federalism and the intriguing diversity of actors in the development of constitutionalism in Croatia during the 19th, 20th, and 21st centuries.Constitutional development shows that federal ideas and practices were not unknown in the Croatian national framework. Croatia, until it achieved the independence and sovereignty of which the 1990 Constitution of the Republic of Croatia is a crucial manifesto, participated in various political organisations with federal characteristics. The Preamble of the Constitution of the Republic of Croatia is a concise reminder that Croatia was a member of many alliances over its turbulent history. The common feature of all those, longer or shorter periods of time in which Croatia participated in pseudo-federal or real federal alliances, is their focus on ‘constitutional moments’. Historical experience also shows thatthe interest of the Croatian nation in federalism weakened whenever the chances of overcoming their own status as a mere political etatist fragment in the wider federal entity increased. With the adoption of the Declaration on the Proclamation of the Sovereign and Independent Republic of Croatia and the Constitutional Decision on Sovereignty and Independence of 25 June 1991, the Republic of Croatia was finally realised as a ‘unitary and indivisible, democratic, and social state’ with the constitutional capacity of entering into different alliances with other states. The result of the accession of the Republic of Croatia to the EU then enabled a different understanding of the federal principle, which is of permanent importance to all constitutional democracies.