Abstract
According to Linz and Stephan, five interacting areas need to be in place before a consolidated democracy can exist in a state. First, there must be a free and lively civil society. A civil society is the arena of the polity where self-organizing groups, movements and individuals can express and articulate their values and interests relatively autonomous from the state. It can include social movements and civic associations from all strata of society, and can be a crucial vehicle in regime change . The second area is the political society, which is the arena where polity is arranged to contest the legitimate right to exercise control. It must be concerned with the development of appreciation of core institutions such as political parties, election, electoral rules, political leadership, interparty alliances and legislatures . Further, the rule of law is meant to make sure that the necessary degree of autonomy and independence of the civil and political society is kept. It must be respected and upheld, and hold consensus over the constitution and a clear hierarchy of laws, interpreted by an independent judicial system and have the support of a strong legal culture in the civil society . The fourth condition is a functioning state bureaucracy, which is essential in order to exercise basic tasks as and have the effective capacity to command, regulate and extract . Finally, the being of an economic society is crucial. A non-wartime consolidated democracy in a command economy has never existed, nor in a pure market economy. The mediation between state and market must be achieved by a set of socio-politically accepted and crafted norms, institutions and regulations. The aim of this paper is to identify Croatia's position in transition to democracy. It will guide the reader through Croatia's historical development in order to clarify Croatia's path to its present situation, with an emphasis on the five arenas of democracy outlined above. It has a closer look at the developments before the First Yugoslavia, highlighting the development of the Yugoslav idea. Further it investigates both the First and Second Yugoslavia before the attention turns to the fall of Yugoslavia, the type of transition and post-transition developments in Croatia.
