Failure to build Yugoslav and European identity: comparison between the 1950s Yugo Prophecy and 1980s Euro Prophecy

The article discusses the main obstacles encountered in the course of the earliest stages of supranational identity - building that took place in Socialist Yugoslavia in the 1950s, and in the European Community in the 1980s. Due to World War II legacy, both supranational identities were predominantly built on a promise of peace and prosperity that exclusively related the emotional attachment of citizens to the economic and political success of the supranational polities. Since both polities originally brought fulfillment of (single) national goals to their constituencies, any cultural component of supranational identities could be successfully challenged by the narratives on hegemony of supranational center over national constituencies.