Serbia

Serbia is an independent state, officially the Republic of Serbia. (The name is pronounced, in RP, 'SURB-i-a', IPA: /ˈsɜ^rb ɪ ə/: in Slavonic languages it is /sř̩bija/. Its own language is Serbian, a variety of Serbo-Croat).

• The Slavic peoples known as the Serbs arrived in the Balkan peninsula during the 7th century, Under Byzantium, they became Orthodox Christians in the 9th century. The Kingdom of Serbia (or Raška, as it was first known) was created in 1217, when Stefan Nemanja (or Nemanjić) united other smaller territories as Grand Prince, later King). (His younger son, Rastko, founded the Serbian Orthodox Church in the year 1219, and became known as Saint Sava after his death.) In 1346, King Stefan Dušan, 'Dušan the Mighty' (1308–1355), King 1331), after victories over Hungarians, Byzantines, and Macedonians had himself crowned Tsar (or Emperor) and autocrat of Serbs and Romans. Serbia was the leading Balkan power until its defeat by the Ottoman Turks at the Battle of Kosovo Polje in 1389. In 1459, it became a province of the Ottoman Empire.
  • One of the ongoing Balkan problems has been the desire of Serbians to establish a Greater Serbia, which would be a recognition of their pre-eminence in the Balkans.
• In 1829, Serbia gained autonomy under Russian protection. In 1867, Milan Obrenovic began a war in support of a rebellion against Turkish rule in Bosnia and Herzegovina. Russia intervened to aid Serbia and, in 1878, Turkey finally granted Serbia independence. Serbia incorporated Vojvodina (~ 'the Duchy') and became part of the Kingdom of the Serbs, Croats, and Slovenes in 1918 (Everett-Heath, 2012). For further details in AWE on Serbia's twentieth century history, see Yugoslavia. (Serbia was one of the six Socialist Republics constituting the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in the constitution of 1946, on the renewed independence of Yugoslavia after the Second World War.) After the death of Tito in 1980 and the consequent fissiparous strains on Yugoslavia, notably the independence of Croatia and Slovenia in 1991 and Bosnia and Herzegovina in 1992, Serbia and Montenegro, the two states with majority Serb populations, declared themselves the new Federal Republic of Yugoslavia in 1992. In 2003 the country became known as Serbia and Montenegro and the name Yugoslavia ceased to be used.

Under Slobodan Milošević (1941–2006), president from 1989 to 1997, Serbia made efforts, including armed military interventions, to prevent the break-up of Yugoslavia. It supported civil war first in Slovenia, then Croatia, and finally (and most persistently) in Bosnia. In 1995 Serbia reluctantly agreed to the Dayton Agreement, in order to achieve a lifting of damaging international sanctions, and to consolidate Serb gains made in the Bosnian Civil War. (Riches and Palmowski, 2020).

Milošević, Slobodan Serbian politician, and of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (1997–2000). A fervent nationalist, he is widely held responsible – as supporter or instigator – for policies of ethnic cleansing in Bosnia Hercegoving (early 1990s) and in Kosovo (1998). (Who's Who in the Twentieth Century)

The country maintains an ethnocentric identity, with over 80% of its population ethnic Serbs, overwhelmingly Christian (Eastern Orthodox) in religion. The largest minority group in the country are Hungarians, who live primarily in Vojvodina.

Serbia struggled to retain the viability of Yugoslavia and found itself internationally isolated as a result of armed conflict with neighbouring Slovenia and Croatia, involvement in the civil war in Bosnia, and the suppression of Albanian nationalism in the Kosovo region. (Kerr & Wright 2015)

Much of the information on this page is taken from Kerr & Wright 2015.