Aleksandar V. Miletić
Milovan Djilas and the French Socialists 1950–1954.
Abstract: Intensive cooperation with the Western Socialists began in the early 1950s as part of the search for different models of Yugoslavia's cooperation with the West. As a top Yugoslav political figure, Milovan Djilas played an important role in these processes. The topic of this paper deals with Djilas's activities in cooperation with the French Socialists, primarily viewed from the position of his role as a Yugoslav political and government official, from the beginning of the mentioned processes until his fall from power.
Key words: Milovan Djilas, French Socialists, Yugoslav Communists, Left
After the 1948 Informbiro Resolution, Yugoslavia came into a very complex and difficult international position. Without an ally in the East, the Yugoslav leadership was forced to seek allies in the West. The Western European socialists afforded a good chance as cooperation partners. In the early 1950s, the Yugoslav communists established cooperation with most Western European socialist and social democratic parties. The first contacts with the French Socialists were made in 1950, and intensive cooperation began in 1951. As chairman of the Committee on Foreign Relations of the Central Committee of the Communist Party of Yugoslavia (CPY), Milovan Djilas played an important role in these activities. Djilas and French socialist Georges Brutelle, paved the way for cooperation and by the end of 1951 the first delegations of the SFIO (Section française de l'Internationale ouvrière -- French Section of the Workers' International) were coming to Yugoslavia. The highlight of the cooperation during this period was the visit of a high-level SFIO delegation to Yugoslavia in the spring of 1952. Milovan Djilas had many meetings with the French socialists during this period. He exchanged opinions and views with them on current issues in the fields of ideology, politics, democracy, and international relations and mademany friends among them. In this sense, he made a significant contribution to Yugoslavia's foreign policy at the time.