Socialist Yugoslavia as Creditor and Debtor

• In Event: Histories and Cultures of Debt in Eastern Europe

Abstract

Yugoslavia and other countries known as debtors also provided loans to many countries around the world to enable trade and to support decolonization. During the 1980s debt crisis, many of these countries could not pay back loans in conventional ways. I am working on three case studies of these creditor (and debtor) countries: Costa Rica, Tanzania, and Yugoslavia. In this talk on Yugoslavia, I have two aims: 1) What was Yugoslavia like as a creditor? I explore the financial innovations Yugoslav and other non-aligned economists created to cope with the 1980s debt crisis and realize their development futures. 2) Were Yugoslavia and its successor states paid back? What were the consequences of what was paid back and what was not?

Author

• Johanna K. Bockman, George Mason U