Location

• Zagreb Trg Marka Marulića 21, Croatia 10000
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Languages

• Croatian

Name of collection

• HR-HDA-1561. State Security Service of the Republic Internal Affairs Secretariat of the Socialist Republic of Croatia. Internal issues. Djilas Supporters.

Provenance and cultural activities

• In 1953, Milovan Đilas, a highly-placed member of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, published a series of articles in the newspaper Borba on the need for democratization and liberalization of Yugoslav society, which led to his condemnation at Party forums and expulsion from the League of Communist of Yugoslavia (LCY). Yugoslav communist leaders referred to all of those who supported similar views Djilasovci, i.e., Djilas supporters  (Radelić 2010, p. 56).

  Djilas’ actions were well received in Croatia, primarily among intellectuals (Banac 2011, p. 22). Similar ideas on the need for democratization and liberalization were mainly promoted by the editorial board of the weekly Naprijed, the official newspaper of the League of Communists of Croatia (LCC) (Berto Črnja, Milan Despot, Dušan Diminić, Tomo Đurinović, Ljubo Grubor, Stjepan Šeparović, Petar Šuran, Hrvoje Šarinić, Živko Vnuk, Ivan Žic) (Radelić 2010, p. 53; Banac 2011, p. 24; Najbar-Agičić, 2016, p. 126). That group criticised the Central Committee (CC)of the League of the Communist of Croatia due to procedures for elections to the Federal Council of the People's Assembly of the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia (FPRY) and the Republic Council of the Parliament of the People's Republic of Croatia (PRC), in which some candidates who were not supported by the Party also participated. The CC LCC was displeased with the editorial board's attitudes on pluralism and opposition to rigid democratic centralism, so after 29 May 1953 Naprijed ceased being the official bulletin of the LCC, and became a weekly for social, political and cultural issues. At its tenth plenum held on 23 January 1954, the CC LCC underscored Naprijed's connections to Djilas. The weekly Naprijed was banned because of accusations on anti-socialist and anti-Marxist positions and support for Djilas. The ban was implemented by putting pressure on printing press workers, who then refused to print it (Radelić 2010, p. 57-63; Najbar-Agičić, 2016, p. 129-133). For the members of the Naprijed editorial board, previously prominent members of Party, it was the end of their journalistic and political careers (Najbar-Agičić, 2016, p. 134).

  The Croatian State Security Service accorded considerable attention to such cases. In an extensive analysis conducted in February 1954, the Department in Zagreb provided an overview of responses to the Djilas case in public and cultural circles, especially among journalists, staff at the University of Zagreb, and groups which were already considered opposition to the communist regime (i.e., persons under surveillance due to the Cominform split, the clergy, members of former non-communist political parties). But, Naprijed's editorial board, led by Dušan Diminić, and many “of their supporters in other newspaper editorial boards (Vjesnik, Vjesnik u srijedu) were specifically singled out, as they had been “adopted anarchist and anti-Marxist positions even before Djilas and his articles, which just encouraged them to go in that directionˮ (HR-HDA-1561. SDS RSUP SRH, code 010.1/1-1). The Croatian State Security Service also described the influence of Djilas supporters, i.e., connections to certain “lobbiesˮ in other parts of Croatia, especially in Istria (Pula, Buzet, Poreč and Pazin). At that time, such “localismˮ was also a serious political label (Spehnjak and Cipek 2007, p. 272).

  In a report on the “hostile activities of the Djilas group in Zagrebˮ dated 14 January 1957, the State Security Service specified that up to that point it had “identified over 20 members of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia who are under the direct influence of Djilas supporters, who, by such attitudes, spread distrust, demoralization and hopelessness in their communitiesˮ (HR-HDA-1561. SDS RSUP SRH, code 010.1/1-4). According to the Croatian State Security Service's operational data from 23 June 1961, Marijan Stilinović, Dušan Diminić, Ivan Motika, Berto Črnja and Živko Vnuk were mentioned as Djilas supporters in Zagreb. Their connections to the brothers Stevan and Vladimir Dedijer were meticulously described (HR-HDA-1561. SDS RSUP SRH, code 010.1/1-7). Vladimir was the editor-in-chief of Borba at the time of publication of the Djilas articles. After a suspended year and a half sentence, he withdrew from political life and in 1955 emigrated to the United States. From 1950 to 1957, Stevan was director of Nuclear Research Institute in Belgrade and the Rudjer Bošković Institute in Zagreb. Because of his public criticism of the Yugoslav nuclear programme, he was expelled from the Institute, and in 1961 he managed to emigrate to Sweden.

  The main form of activities by the pro-Djilas group in Zagreb according to these Croatian State Security Service materials were hostile verbal propaganda, i.e., damage to the reputation of Yugoslavia and its leaders through criticism of current political events (e. g., Soviet intervention in Hungary in 1956) (HR-HDA-1561. SDS RSUP SRH, code 010.1/1-5). There were also described attempts to launch a magazine for the purpose of “legally publicizing their standpoint,ˮ attempts to publish some of Dušan Diminić's manuscripts in England or the U.S., as well as distribution of copies of Vladimir Dedijer's letter sent to Tito in 1956 protesting the arrest and conviction of Milovan Djilas  to 3 years of harsh imprisonment for “anti-Yugoslav activities.ˮ Also, plans for the promotion of Djilas’ book The New Class were mentioned, as well as the copying and distribution of excerpts from it. Djilas wrote that book in prison, whence it was smuggled to the U.S., where it was first published in the English language in 1957. The import and distribution of the book were prohibited by the Yugoslav authorities, and Djilas was sentenced to an additional 7 years of strict imprisonment.

  All documents created or collected during the many years of surveillance of the group gathered around the weekly Naprijed in Zagreb were originally gathered by the Croatian State Security Service in a special thematic unit, designated by numerical code 010.1. and called “Supporters of anarcho-liberal aspirations - Djilas supporters.ˮ The term “anarcho-liberalism” was used by the regime to indicate unacceptable political ideas and unacceptable operating methods. As a threat to the communist social order, in 1960s it was attributed to the group of professors and students at the University of Belgrade, the group gathered around the journal Praxis in Zagreb, individual professors and students at other universities and members of the student movement. In official documents from that time, the threat to the community from “anarcho-liberals” was not due to their number, but rather in their compactness, persistence in oppositional activities and constant communication with groups and individuals in the West (Klasić 2012, p. 245-246).

  The content of the collection is entirely relevant to cultural opposition topics. It testifies to the political and ideological movements in Communist Yugoslavia/Croatia in the 1950s. It also documents the nature of the communist system of government, which was still based on a monopoly by Communist Party leaders to decide what was and  was not acceptable, i.e., permissible (Najbar-Agičić 2016, p. 136).

  The collection was handed over to the Croatian State Archives in Zagreb on an ex officio basis from the Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia in 2015. All documents which were initially classified were declassified on that occasion. Under the applicable archival rules, the documents became publicly available, in general without any particular restrictions.

Description of content

• The collection includes various reports on operative actions conducted by the Croatian State Security Service against the editorial board of the weekly Naprijed and other Djilas supporters (Djilasovci) in Croatia from the mid-50s to the early 1960s. That group criticised the Central Committee of the League of the Communist of Croatia due to procedures for elections to the Federal Council of the People's Assembly of the Federal People's Republic of Yugoslavia (FPRY) and the Republic Council of the Parliament of the People's Republic of Croatia. The CC LCC was displeased with the editorial board's attitudes on pluralism and opposition to rigid democratic centralism, so after 29 May 1953 Naprijed ceased being the official bulletin of the LCC, and became a weekly for social, political and cultural issues. At its tenth plenum held on 23 January 1954, the CC LCC underscored Naprijed's connections to Djilas. The weekly Naprijed was banned because of accusations on anti-socialist and anti-Marxist positions and support for Djilas. The ban was implemented by putting pressure on printing press workers, who then refused to print it (Radelić 2010, p. 57-63; Najbar-Agičić, 2016, p. 129-133). For the members of the Naprijed editorial board, previously prominent members of Party, it was the end of their journalistic and political careers (Najbar-Agičić, 2016, p. 134).

  The collection also includes transcriptions of approximately twenty Djilas articles published from October 1953 to January 1954 in the Party newspaper Borba on the need for democratization and liberalization of Yugoslav society, which led to Djilas’ condemnation at Party forums and expulsion from the Party.

  All documents created or collected during the many years of surveillance of the group gathered around the weekly Naprijed in Zagreb were originally gathered by the Croatian State Security Service in a special thematic unit, designated by numerical code 010.1. and called “Supporters of anarcho-liberal aspirations - Djilas supporters.ˮ The term “anarcho-liberalism” was used by the regime to indicate unacceptable political ideas and unacceptable operating methods. As a threat to the communist social order, in 1960s it was attributed to the group of professors and students at the University of Belgrade, the group gathered around the journal Praxis in Zagreb, individual professors and students at other universities and members of the student movement. In official documents from that time, the threat to the community from “anarcho-liberals” was not due to their number, but rather in their compactness, persistence in oppositional activities and constant communication with groups and individuals in the West (Klasić 2012, p. 245-246). In total, collection includes approximately 250 pages of documents. This initial structure of collection was retained after the Croatian State Archives assumed possession of the documents.

  The content of the collection is entirely relevant to cultural opposition topics. It testifies to the political and ideological movements in Communist Yugoslavia/Croatia in the 1950s. It also documents the nature of the communist system of government, which was still based on a monopoly by Communist Party leaders to decide what was and  was not acceptable, i.e., permissible (Najbar-Agičić 2016, p. 136).

Content

• grey literature (regular archival documents such as brochures, bulletins, leaflets, reports, intelligence files, records, working papers, meeting minutes): 100-499

Operator(s)

• Croatian State Archives

Owner(s)

• Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia

Stakeholder(s) of the collection

• Bukvić, Nenad

Geographical scope of recent operation

• national

Topics

• party dissidents (outcasts from the party)
• surveillance (various)

Founder(s)

• State Security Service of the Republic Internal Affairs Secretariat of the Socialist Republic of Croatia

Date of founding

• 1954

Place of founding

• Zagreb, Croatia
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Creator(s) of content

• State Security Service of the Republic Internal Affairs Secretariat of the Socialist Republic of Croatia

Collector(s)

• State Security Service of the Republic Internal Affairs Secretariat of the Socialist Republic of Croatia

Supporters

• Ministry of Culture of the Republic of Croatia

Important events in the history of the collection

• Event (general): Declassification of the files on Djilas and Djilas supporters in Croatia, 2015
• Acquisition of the files on Djilas and Djilas supporters in Croatia by the Croatian State Archives, 2015
• Event (general): Digitisation of the collection on Djilas and Djilas supporters in Croatia, 2017

Featured items

• Information of the State Security Service/Zagreb Department on reactions to the Djilas case in Croatia. 19 February 1954. Archival document
• Vladimir Dedijer's open letter to Josip Broz Tito on the arrest of Milovan Djilas. 1956. Archival document

Access type

• completely open to the public

Author(s) of this page

• Bukvić, Nenad

References

Zakon o sigurnosno-obavještajnom sustavu Republike Hrvatske [The Law on security and intelligence system in the Republic of Croatia], Narodne novine RH, no. 79 and 105, 2006.

Banac, Ivo. 2011. “Hrvatski Đilasovciˮ [Djilas supporters in Croatia]. In Desničini susreti 2009. Zbornik radova [Desnica's Encounters 2009. Proceedings], pp. 19-27. Zagreb: Sveučilište u Zagrebu, Filozofski fakultet, Centar za komparativnohistorijske i interkulturne studije, FF-press.

HR-HDA-1561. State Security Service of the Republic Internal Affairs Secretariat of the Socialist Republic of Croatia. Internal issues. Supporters of anarcho-liberal aspirations - Djilas supporters, code 010.1.

Hrvatska enciklopedija online [Croatian Encyclopedia online]. “Dedijer, Stevanˮ. Accessed on September 20, 2018.

Hrvatska enciklopedija online [Croatian Encyclopedia online]. “Dedijer, Vladimirˮ. Accessed on September 20, 2018.

Hrvatska enciklopedija online [Croatian Encyclopedia online].” Đilas, Milovanˮ. Accessed on September 20, 2018.

Klasić, Hrvoje. 2012. Jugoslavija i svijet 1968 [Yugoslavia and world in 1968]. Zagreb: Naklada Ljevak d.o.o.

Najbar-Agičić, Magdalena. 2016. “Od pravovjernosti do disidentstva – preobrazbe Naprijedaˮ [From (Communist) Orthodoxy to Dissidence – Transformation of the weekly Naprijed”]. Medijska istraživanja: znanstveno-stručni časopis za novinarstvo i medije (Zagreb), 22, no. 1: 115-143.

Radelić, Zdenko. 2010. “Đilasovci u Hrvatskoj i hrvatska historiografijaˮ [Djilas supporters in Croatia and Croatian historiography]. In Nada Kisić Kolanović, Zdenko Radelić, Katarina Spehnjak (eds.), Disidenstvo u suvremenoj povijesti [Dissent in contemporary history], pp. 53-74. Zagreb: Hrvatski institut za povijest.

Radelić, Zdenko. 2015. “KPJ i sigurnosno-obavještajni sustav u Hrvatskoj (1941.-1951.)” [The CPY (Communist Party of Yugoslavia) and the security and intelligence system in Croatia (1941-1951)]. Historijski zbornik (Zagreb), 68, no. 1: 73-105.

Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija [Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia]. “Protuobavještajna agencija” [Counterintelligence Agency]. Accessed on September 22, 2017.

Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija [Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia]. „Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija” [„Security-Intelligence Agency”]. Accessed on September 22, 2017.

Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija [Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia]. “Služba za zaštitu ustavnog poretka” [Service for the Protection of the Constitutional Order of Croatia]. Accessed on April 24, 2017.

Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija [Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia]. 2016. “Javno izvješće 2016” [Public report 2016]. Accessed on April 27, 2017.

Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija [Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia]. 2017. “Javno izvješće 2017” [Public report 2017]. Accessed on September 21, 2017.

Sigurnosno-obavještajna agencija [Security and Intelligence Agency of the Republic of Croatia]. 25 September 2015. “SOA predala arhivsko gradivo bivše Službe državne sigurnosti Hrvatskom državnom arhivu” [SIA handed over former State Security Service archival material to the Croatian State Archives]. Accessed on September 27, 2017.

Spehnjak, Katarina and Tihomir Cipek. 2007. “Disidenti, opozicija i otpor – Hrvatska i Jugoslavija 1945.-1990.ˮ [Dissidents, opposition and resistance – Croatia and Yugoslavia, 1945-1990]. Časopis za suvremenu povijest (Zagreb), 39, no. 2: 255-297.

Zakon o izmjenama i dopunama Zakona o unutarnjim poslovima [Amendments to the Internal Affairs ACt], Narodne novine RH, no. 19, 1991.

Zakon o sigurnosno-obavještajnom sustavu Republike Hrvatske [Republic of Croatia Security and Intelligence System Act], Narodne novine RH, no. 79 and 105, 2006.