Richard D. Wolff

Enshrined even in its constitution was the movement to Worker's Self management in the Yugoslav economy. Yugoslavia was the pioneer in implementing a worker cooperative model at a state level. It was seen as heresy by the Warsaw pact countries at the time, however it created the greatest standard of living in all of eastern Europe, even comparable to many Western nations. It resulted in an enormous developmental transformation for a war-torn country whose populace was comprised of ~80% illiterate rural peasantry prior to Marshal Tito's leadership. It was successful about half the time where statism did not influence the economy and misallocate resources. Is this an example that can be used by Marxists to study how a worker coop model can be implemented at a national level? But also, how to avoid the State and the Party impacting the economy negatively due to their own self interests? Regardless, Marshal Tito is revered by the majority of people today in the former Yugoslavia and testament to his greatness was the fact that his funeral was the most widely attended in history, bringing leaders at the time from both east and west together to pay their respects. His policies may have been too far ahead of their time but also the key was execution on the ground and implementing it without the risk of corrupt practices by company directors. How can this be avoided at a state level, especially if it has proven to have worked where implemented correctly?