POLITICAL FOUNDATIONS OF CONSTITUTIONAL STATUS CHANGES REGARDING KOSOVO DURING THE SOCIALIST YUGOSLAVIA

Depending on internal and external political developments, many constitutional changes were made in the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia throughout its history. The evolution of socialist practices, differences of centralist and autonomous approaches towards the republics forming Yugoslavia, and the rise of nationalist movements formed the basis of these constitutional changes. The political effects of these constitutional amendments in Kosovo which later gained republic status and witnessed years of ethnic tensions between Albanians and Serbs, constituted turning points in the political history of Kosovo. Initially considered as part of the Socialist Republic of Serbia with a centralist perspective since 1946, Kosovo's constitutional status began to improve legally and administratively with the federal constitutional amendments of 1968 and 1971. Most especially with the 1974 Yugoslav Constitution, Kosovo attained a position almost equal to the federal republics in terms of authority despite being an autonomous region. But after Tito's death, in the 1980s, the escalation of nationalist discourse and movements in Yugoslavia began to disrupt the functioning of the federal government. The abolishment of Kosovo's autonomy in 1989 should be assessed as a result of this process. From that point onwards, the political unrest in Kosovo gradually escalated into ethnic conflicts, leading to a struggle that eventually culminated in independence, declared in 2008.