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Stane Dolanc (16 November 1925 – 12 December 1999) was a Slovenian communist politician during
SFR Yugoslavia The Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, commonly referred to as SFR Yugoslavia or simply as Yugoslavia, was a country in Central and Southeast Europe. It emerged in 1945, following World War II, and lasted until 1992, with the breakup of Y ...
. Dolanc was one of president
Josip Broz Tito Josip Broz ( sh-Cyrl, Јосип Броз, ; 7 May 1892 – 4 May 1980), commonly known as Tito (; sh-Cyrl, Тито, links=no, ), was a Yugoslav communist revolutionary and statesman, serving in various positions from 1943 until his death ...
's closest collaborators and one of the most influential people in Yugoslav federal politics in the 1970s and 1980s. He was secretary of the Executive Bureau of the Presidency of the Central Committee (CC) of the
League of Communists of Yugoslavia The League of Communists of Yugoslavia, mk, Сојуз на комунистите на Југославија, Sojuz na komunistite na Jugoslavija known until 1952 as the Communist Party of Yugoslavia, sl, Komunistična partija Jugoslavije mk ...
(LCY) from 1971 to 1978, federal Secretary of the Interior from 1982 to 1984 and a member of the
Presidency of Yugoslavia bs, Predsjedništvo SFRJ Slovene: ''Predsedstvo SFRJ'' mk, Председателство на СФРЈ , flag = Standard of a Member of the Presidency of SFR Yugoslavia.svg , flagsize = 125px , flagborder = , flagcaption = Standard of a Me ...
from 1984 to 1989. He was regularly appointed a member of the Federal Council for Protection of the Constitutional Order and was chairing the body in late 1980s. For most of his political career Dolanc defended strong authoritarian rule of the LCY and struggled against nationalism stemming from various parts of the country. He was influential in Yugoslav security structures and it is believed that he inspired a number of politically motivated arrests, especially while he was interior minister.


Early life

Dolanc was born to a worker family in the Slovenian town of
Hrastnik Hrastnik (, German: ''Hrastnigg'') is a town in the Central Sava Valley in central Slovenia. It is the seat of the Municipality of Hrastnik. The area is part of the traditional region of Styria. The entire municipality is now included in the Ce ...
, then part of the
Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes Kingdom commonly refers to: * A monarchy ruled by a king or queen * Kingdom (biology), a category in biological taxonomy Kingdom may also refer to: Arts and media Television * ''Kingdom'' (British TV series), a 2007 British television drama s ...
. After finishing elementary school in his home town, he was sent to the Bežigrad High School in
Ljubljana Ljubljana (also known by other Ljubljana#Name, historical names) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Slovenia. It is the country's cultural, educational, economic, political and administrative center. During antiquity, a Roman city ...
. In April 1941, northern
Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a country in Central Europe. It is bordered by Italy to the west, Austria to the north, Hungary to the northeast, Croatia to the southeast, an ...
was occupied by
Nazi Germany Nazi Germany (lit. "National Socialist State"), ' (lit. "Nazi State") for short; also ' (lit. "National Socialist Germany") (officially known as the German Reich from 1933 until 1943, and the Greater German Reich from 1943 to 1945) was ...
. Dolanc continued his schooling in
Graz Graz (; sl, Gradec) is the capital city of the Austrian state of Styria and second-largest city in Austria after Vienna. As of 1 January 2021, it had a population of 331,562 (294,236 of whom had principal-residence status). In 2018, the popula ...
in
Austria Austria, , bar, Östareich officially the Republic of Austria, is a country in the southern part of Central Europe, lying in the Eastern Alps. It is a federation of nine states, one of which is the capital, Vienna, the most populous c ...
. In 1944, Dolanc joined the
Yugoslav Partisans The Yugoslav Partisans, Serbo-Croatian, Macedonian, Slovene: , or the National Liberation Army, sh-Latn-Cyrl, Narodnooslobodilačka vojska (NOV), Народноослободилачка војска (НОВ); mk, Народноослобо� ...
and continued his military career after the war. He served as a deputy to the prosecutor in Ljubljana
Army An army (from Old French ''armee'', itself derived from the Latin verb ''armāre'', meaning "to arm", and related to the Latin noun ''arma'', meaning "arms" or "weapons"), ground force or land force is a fighting force that fights primarily on ...
corps and finished his involvement in the military in 1960 while being a colonel in
Zagreb Zagreb ( , , , ) is the capital and largest city of Croatia. It is in the northwest of the country, along the Sava river, at the southern slopes of the Medvednica mountain. Zagreb stands near the international border between Croatia and Slove ...
office of the Yugoslav military counter-intelligence service
KOS Kos or Cos (; el, Κως ) is a Greek island, part of the Dodecanese island chain in the southeastern Aegean Sea. Kos is the third largest island of the Dodecanese by area, after Rhodes and Karpathos; it has a population of 36,986 (2021 census) ...
.Svetlana Vasovic Mekina: Stane Dolanc, titoista. Vreme, no. 467, 18 December 1999
During his military career Dolanc received a university diploma and in the 1960s he was a director of the Political Science School in Ljubljana run by the Slovene branch of LCY.


Second person of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia

In 1965 Dolanc became a member of the CC of the League of Communists of Slovenia (LCS),
aimpress.ch, 15 December 1999.
and at the ninth congress of LCY in 1969 he was elected a member of the CC LCY. In 1971, he became secretary of the newly established Executive Bureau of the Party Presidium, i.e. second person of LCY,Slobodan Stankovi�
Slovene Dolanc Resigns? Serb Dragosavac New Secretary of CC Presidium
Radio Free Europe Research, 17 May 1979.
despite the actual number two of Yugoslav politics remained
Edvard Kardelj Edvard Kardelj (; 27 January 1910 – 10 February 1979), also known by the pseudonyms Bevc, Sperans and Krištof, was a Yugoslav politician and economist. He was one of the leading members of the Communist Party of Slovenia before World War II. ...
, a lifelong collaborator of president Tito. Dolanc quickly gained strong influence in the Party. He was one of main organizers of the Karadjordjevo Party Presidium session in December 1971 that resulted in the resignations of the leaders of the
Croatian Spring The Croatian Spring ( hr, Hrvatsko proljeće), or Maspok, was a political conflict that took place from 1967 to 1971 in the Socialist Republic of Croatia, at the time part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. As one of six republic ...
. In November 1972, at a CC LCS plenum, he called for purges of the liberal wing of the Slovene Party branch which eventually did take place. He became famous for a statement he had made at a local communist conference in
Split Split(s) or The Split may refer to: Places * Split, Croatia, the largest coastal city in Croatia * Split Island, Canada, an island in the Hudson Bay * Split Island, Falkland Islands * Split Island, Fiji, better known as Hạfliua Arts, enterta ...
in September 1972: :''"We have to make clear that in this country we communists are in power. For if we were not, it would mean someone else is. And for now this is not so neither will ever be."''Moč in nemoč slovenskega liberalizma
Documentary by Radio-Television of Slovenia, 2009; 61:10-63:50
In the same speech Dolanc stressed that LCY had to be a united organization, announced expulsions of those party members that did not follow the new line and attacked Serb, Croat and Slovene nationalism. Dolanc's Split speech was directly preceded by a letter signed by himself and Tito addressed to local LCY organizations throughout Yugoslavia. The letter urged strengthening party's unity and leading role in the society, and thus made clear Tito's and his collaborators' decision to go on struggling with liberals and nationalists within LCY that eventually resulted in thorough changes within Croatian, Slovene and Serbian Party leaderships. Although the post of the Executive Bureau secretary was designed to change its holder every year, Dolanc kept it for eight years. While holding the office, he was often mentioned as a possible successor to Tito. However, during the 1970s in both LCY and federal state institutions a system of rotating collective leadership evolved that made it hardly possible for any single official to become a new leader after Tito. At the eleventh Congress of LCY in 1978 the Executive Bureau was abolished and although Dolanc was appointed secretary of the CC LCY Presidium, he resigned from this office in May 1979. The resignation is sometimes linked to the death of Edvard Kardelj of February in the same year, who reportedly had been protecting Dolanc. Dolanc remained a member of the CC Presidium and, besides, in June 1979 he was re-appointed a member of the Federal Council for Protection of the Constitutional Order, an agency of the Yugoslav Presidency coordinating internal security institutions. Dolanc continued to play an important role in Yugoslavia's communist political establishment after Tito's death in May 1980.


Minister of the Interior and member of the Presidency of Yugoslavia

In May 1982 Dolanc became the Secretary (Minister) of the Interior in the new Yugoslav government led by
Milka Planinc Milka Planinc ( Malada; ; 21 November 1924 – 7 October 2010) was a Croatian politician active in SFR Yugoslavia. She served as Prime Minister of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia from 1982 to 1986, the first and only woman to hold this ...
. In May 1983 he complained about the increase of nationalism and of hostile activities against the communist regime and accused dissident intellectuals of being one of the moving forces of it.Slobodan Stankovi�
Hostile Activities Increasing, Yugoslav Interior Minister Complains
Radio Free Europe Research, 17 May 1983.
In 1984, two politically motivated cases took place that are both directly ascribed to Dolanc. In Belgrade, 28 participants of a lecture of
Milovan Đilas Milovan Djilas (; , ; 12 June 1911 – 30 April 1995) was a Yugoslav communist politician, theorist and author. He was a key figure in the Partisan movement during World War II, as well as in the post-war government. A self-identified democrat ...
were brought to a police interrogation; one of them was found dead few days later while six others faced a trial, which resulted in light punishments or acquittals. One of the attendees of the lecture
Vojislav Šešelj Vojislav Šešelj ( sr-Cyrl, Војислав Шешељ, ; born 11 October 1954) is a Serbian politician, founder and president of the far-right Serbian Radical Party (SRS); he was convicted of war crimes by the International Criminal Tribunal ...
was arrested once again a few weeks later for stating nationalist ideas in an unpublished essay. Dolanc publicly condemned him in a TV interview and Šešelj was eventually sentenced for a several-year imprisonment. Dolanc has been accused of ordering assassinations of political emigrant activists committed by Yugoslav security service abroad and of personal protection of one of its agents, career criminal known as "
Arkan Željko Ražnatović (, ; 17 April 1952 – 15 January 2000), better known as Arkan (), was a Serbian mobster, politician, sports administrator, paramilitary commander and head of the Serb paramilitary force called the Serb Volunteer Guard duri ...
". Some have linked him to the assassination of Croatian nationalist emigrant
Stjepan Đureković Stjepan Đureković (8 August 1926 – 28 July 1983) was a Croatian political dissident and businessman who was assassinated by the Yugoslavian State Security Administration (UDBA) in West Germany in 1983. He was previously the CEO of the state-o ...
in
West Germany West Germany is the colloquial term used to indicate the Federal Republic of Germany (FRG; german: Bundesrepublik Deutschland , BRD) between its formation on 23 May 1949 and the German reunification through the accession of East Germany on 3 ...
in 1983 while others accuse the then-communist leaders of Croatia of ordering the assassination. From May 1984 to May 1989 Dolanc was the Slovenian member of the
Presidency of Yugoslavia bs, Predsjedništvo SFRJ Slovene: ''Predsedstvo SFRJ'' mk, Председателство на СФРЈ , flag = Standard of a Member of the Presidency of SFR Yugoslavia.svg , flagsize = 125px , flagborder = , flagcaption = Standard of a Me ...
and during the term he was also chairman of the Federal Council for Protection of the Constitutional Order. In 1988–89, he was one of those in the federal leadership unsuccessfully opposing the anti-bureaucratic revolution, which he regarded as an expression of
Serb The Serbs ( sr-Cyr, Срби, Srbi, ) are the most numerous South Slavic ethnic group native to the Balkans in Southeastern Europe, who share a common Serbian ancestry, culture, history and language. The majority of Serbs live in their na ...
hegemonism. At the same time Dolanc was reserved towards the new line of the Slovene communist leadership that was paving the way for political liberalization and for secession of Slovenia. One of his last public interventions was an interview with the liberal opposition magazine ''
Mladina ''Mladina'' (English: Youth) is a Slovenian weekly left-wing political and current affairs magazine. Since the 1920s, when it was first published, it has become a voice of protest against those in power. Today, ''Mladinas weekly issues are di ...
'', published in May 1989, in which he described himself as the "last
Titoist Titoism is a political philosophy most closely associated with Josip Broz Tito during the Cold War. It is characterized by a broad Yugoslav identity, workers' self-management, a political separation from the Soviet Union, and leadership in th ...
". In her memoir,
Jovanka Broz Jovanka Broz (; sr-Cyrl, Јованка Броз, Будисављевић; 7 December 1924 – 20 October 2013) was the First Lady of Yugoslavia as the wife of Yugoslav president Josip Broz Tito. She was a lieutenant colonel in the Yugoslav ...
states that she considers Dolanc to be "one of those who are most to blame for the breakup of the country" and accused him of being a German spy.Oslobodjenje Momoirs of Jovanka Broz
oslobodjenje.ba; accessed 9 December 2016.


Late life

After his term in the Federal Presidency expired, Dolanc retreated from public life and moved to
Gozd Martuljek Gozd Martuljek (; sl, Gozd - Martuljek) is a settlement in the Municipality of Kranjska Gora in the Upper Carniola region of Slovenia Slovenia ( ; sl, Slovenija ), officially the Republic of Slovenia (Slovene: , abbr.: ''RS''), is a count ...
close to
Kranjska Gora Kranjska Gora (; german: Kronau) is a town in northwestern Slovenia, on the Sava Dolinka River in the Upper Carniola region, close to the Austrian and Italian borders. It is the seat of the Municipality of Kranjska Gora. Name Kranjska Gora was ...
. He died in
Ljubljana Ljubljana (also known by other Ljubljana#Name, historical names) is the Capital city, capital and largest city of Slovenia. It is the country's cultural, educational, economic, political and administrative center. During antiquity, a Roman city ...
on 12 December 1999, from a cerebral stroke. He was 74 years old.


References


Sources

*Bojan Balkovec et al., ''Slovenska kronika XX. stoletja'' (Ljubljana: Nova revija, 1997) *Miran Lesjak & Bernard Nežmah, "Poslednji titoist" (interview with Stane Dolanc) in Mladina, n. 18 (19 May 1989) *Božo Repe, ''Rdeča Slovenija: tokovi in obrazi iz obdobja socializma'' (Ljubljana: Sophia, 2003) *Bernard Nežmah, "Stane Dolanc (1926–1999): najtrša pest slovenskih komunistov" in
Mladina ''Mladina'' (English: Youth) is a Slovenian weekly left-wing political and current affairs magazine. Since the 1920s, when it was first published, it has become a voice of protest against those in power. Today, ''Mladinas weekly issues are di ...
, n. 51 (20 December 1999) *Božo Repe, "Vojak partije, veliki gobar iz Martuljka, naš čovik: smrt Staneta Dolanca" in
Delo ''Delo'' (russian: Дело) is a business oriented online media in Ukraine, belonging to ekonomika+ media holding. ''Delo'' was the first daily in Ukraine, publishing its real print circulation (13.000 - 15.000) and trying to introduce Western ...
, y. 41, n. 294 (18 December 1999)


External links


Stane Dolanc, titoista
{{DEFAULTSORT:Dolanc, Stane 1925 births 1999 deaths People from Hrastnik Uppsala University alumni League of Communists of Slovenia politicians Slovenian atheists Officers of the Yugoslav People's Army Central Committee of the League of Communists of Yugoslavia members Presidency of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia members