Social Inequalities from Workers’ Perspective in 1960s Socialist Yugoslavia

This paper attempts to answer the question how the working class in Yugoslavia perceived the social inequalities that increased in 1960s Yugoslavia. By analysing letters, petitions and complaints that workers wrote to the highest political authorities in the country and by inspecting the statistics and analyses created by the highest political institutions of the State, the workers? views and reasons for their dissatisfaction are revealed. The main reason for their discontent was the growing socio-economic differences between them and the highest social strata, primary the managerial elite in the enterprises. From the workers? perspective, their unequal position was visible not only through their wages but also through their relations within the enterprises and other aspects of social life like housing.