Croatia is a small country in Southeastern Europe bordering the Adriatic Sea, placed between Bosnia, Slovenia and Herzegovina. Croatia is about the size of the state of West Virginia, and although it is small, it has a complicated past that has made a lasting impact. Until the end of World War I in 1918, the area that makes up Croatia was part of the Austro-Hungarian Empire. That year the Slovenes, Serbs, and Croats formed what would eventually be known as Yugoslavia. Following World War II Yugoslavia consisted of six socialist republics and became a federal independent communist state under Marshal Josip Broz. After his death in 1980 there was a decade of unrest in Yugoslavia, and Croatia declared their independence in 1991. It took several years of civil war before occupying Serb armies were almost entirely cleared from Croatian lands, along with most of Croatia's Serb population. The civil war expanded to involve large parts the former Yugoslavia until it ended in 1999. About 250,000 people died, sometimes, as a consequence of a so-called ethnic cleansing (Büschges, 107).
During this time the country was also faced with issues of corruption and immorality, and is still dealing with some of the issues from this period of unrest. Only a few short weeks ago Ivo Sanader, the former Croatian prime minister from 2003 to 2009, was sentenced to two and a half years in prison and to pay back a bribe after accepting a 3.6 million kuna ($556.156.34) bribe from an Austrian bank during the civil war. He was originally convicted and jailed over this case in 2012 but had the conviction overturned three years ago after the Constitutional Court said he had been denied a fair trial. He is also currently in trial over taking a bribe from Hungarian energy group MOL in 2008 to let it get a high position in Croatia's energy firm INA (Bronic, 1).
The current Croatian government is a parliamentary republic. Under the constitution of 1990, the president is elected to a 5 year term, may seek a second term, and appoints the Prime Minister. Legislative authority is exercised by the Parliament. 152 members are elected to the Parliament from the party lists by popular vote to terms of four years. The leading political organizations after the November 2007 election were the nationalist Croatian Democratic Union and the Social Democratic party.
The period of unrest didn’t end when the war was declared over, and many issues are still slowly being dealt with all over the country. Dinka Corkalo Biruski describes in Lessons Learned from the Former Yugoslavia: The Case of Croatia the city of Vukovar. Vukovar was an active, multi-ethnic community before the war. The Croatian national census of 1991 registered about 44,600 inhabitants. Croats made up the largest group at 47%, followed by Serbs with 32% and Yugoslavs at 9.8%. There were also Hungarians, Ukrainians, and over 20 other groups living in the city before the war. This mixture of people and cultures made this city a true multicultural community, and its inhabitants were proud of it. The first postwar census was in 2001, and it registered only slightly more than 31,600 inhabitants, which meant the population had dropped 30% since 1991. The demographic landscape had changed significantly: 57% of the population were Croats and 34% were Serbs. The census still recorded 19 different ethnic groups, the next largest being the Rusyns (1.8%), the Hungarians (1.2%), and the Ukrainians (less than 1%). However, their numbers were substantially lower than they had been before the war. Interethnic tolerance and respectful coexistence in Croatia in the years before the war had not changed significantly, but there was an increase in intolerance after the war. When political elites started to shape their politics around ethnic issues, and “in the name of the nation,” they started to change the atmosphere in places like Vukovar. The old ideology of “we-ness” ceased to exist and stopped being inclusive, as it had started to be built around differences (Biruski, 8). According to a study conducted by the Pew Research Center between 2015 and 2017, western europeans are more likely than eastern europeans to welcome someone who is muslim or jewish as a member of their family. 57% of Croatians said they would welcome a muslim as a member of their family, while 67% said they would welcome someone who is jewish.
Croatia’s economy suffered during the war from 1991-1995. Between 2000 and 2007, however, their economy began to improve with slow, steady growth, led by a rebound in tourism and credit driven consumer spending. Croatia then experienced another slowdown in the economy in 2008. Economic growth was stable or negative in each year from 2009 and 2014, but has picked up with 2017 ending with an average of 2.8% growth. They face several challenges that include varying regional development, a difficult investment climate, an inefficient judiciary, and loss of educated young professionals seeking higher salaries elsewhere in the EU. Tourism is one of the largest components of the Croatian economy, making up 19.6% of Croatia’s GDP. Croatia is working to become a regional energy hub, and is undertaking plans to open a floating liquefied natural gas regasification terminal by the end of 2019 or early in 2020 to import the LGN for redistribution to the rest of southeastern Europe. Croatia’s economic recovery is still somewhat fragile demonstrated by their largest private company narrowly avoiding collapse in 2017, thanks to capital from an American investor (World FactBook). In addition to liquified natural gas, Croatia exports other natural resources including coal, oil, iron ore, calcium, silica, mica, clays, natural asphalt, and salt. Another two of their largest exports are olive oil and lavender. They also export transport equipment, machinery, textiles, chemicals, fuels, and various food items. Although they export some of these as well, their main imported items are transport and electrical equipment and machinery, chemicals, fuels, lubricants, and various food items.
Education in Croatia starts for children in preschool, which includes those run by both private nursery schools and public institutions run by local authorities. Elementary education is mandatory for children over the age of six and a half years old for a minimum of 8 years. They have a GED equivalent program for adults over the age of 15 who failed to complete their elementary education. Secondary education is optional, and divided into gymnasiums, vocational schools, or art schools. Gymnasiums provide a comprehensive syllabus which lasts 4 years and includes a final examination, the state matura. Programs in vocational and art schools last from one to five years, and usually end with the production of a final assignment, but it is also possible to sit the state matura if pupils have completed four years of secondary education. Since 2010, state matura results have been the basis for entry to higher education institutions. Along with secondary education, there are also programs which prepare people to work in their chosen vocations and adult education programs (Croatia.eu). Elementary and secondary education in state schools is free, and the nations current literacy rate is 99.3%. Higher education is conducted through university and professional studies. Higher education institutions are divided into polytechnics, colleges of applied science, faculties and art academies. Today, 90 public and 32 private higher education institutions are operating in Croatia, with the leading institution of higher education being the University of Zagreb founded in 1669. The largest number of students, 67.5%, are enrolled in university courses in faculties (Croatia.eu).
Social media usage in Croatia is less than in the U.S. and other western european countries, but not entirely non-existent. Most social media usage is done on platforms Facebook and Instagram, with Twitter following behind them. Facebook has around 1.5 million Croatian users, meaning that more than one-third of their population is on Facebook. Instagram is behind, with about 390,000 Croatians actively using the photo sharing app. Instagram is the largest growing social media platform used in Croatia. Between 2015 and 2017 the number of users doubled with women totaling 65 percent of the Croatian users. Although 69 million Americans tweet on a regular basis, research suggests that only around 60,000 Croatians are active Twitter users. The most followed Croatian on twitter is the Juventus footballer Mario Mandžukić with around 927,000 followers (Thomas, 2).