Preliminary communication
The Eponymisation of Ideological Change in Croatia 1989-2005
Slaven Ravlić
; Faculty of Law, University of Zagreb, Zagreb, Croatia
Abstract
The article discusses the development of democracy in Croatia through the eponymisation of ideological changes in the period 1989-2005. Eponymisation as a process of development and introduction of eponyms (terms coined after the name of a person) is a signifi cant way of shaping professional terminology and an important institutional mechanism for the acknowledgment of credits and contributions. Eponymisation in politics and political science does not have the same character, pattern and eff ects as in other sciences and activities. It refl ects the ideological and political confl icts and the nature of a political system, and is not only a way of developing professional terminology and an institutional mechanism for the acknowledgment of credits and contributions, but also a process of social labeling. In this sense, the history of eponyms in Croatia can be related to some important moments in Croatian politics and history. The eponyms detitoisation, tudjmanism and detudjmanisation refer to the essential peculiarities of the political and social processes that have shaped Croatian politics and history in the period 1989-2005. The ideological change in Croatia 1989-2005, as a transition from the system of ideological monism to the system of ideological pluralism, was not uniform. It had three basic stages: the fi rst stage, 1989-1991, saw the abandonment of ideological monism and the establishment of a limited ideological pluralism; the second stage, 1992-1999, saw the authoritarian narrowing of ideological pluralism and the imposing of the ideological hegemony of the dominant political party; in the third stage, since 2000, a process of deideologisation of government machinery, expansion of ideological pluralism and ideological modernisation of major political parties has been in progress, but at present the said process is neither complete nor impervious to reverse development. The abovementioned three eponyms prove to be appropriate and are likely to be accepted as designations of the three stages of ideological change, and thus become permanent or complete eponyms.
Keywords
Hrčak ID:
38290
URI
Publication date:
1.6.2006.
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