Union Struggle and Rearmament in Croatia

Union Struggle and Rearmament in Croatia

Let us resume the narrative of events in Croatia, following the publication of the last article, published in The International Communist #5. In general, the situation remained stable. There is a low level of proletarian activity and an increasingly aggressive nationalist movement in the dominant political current.

The Education Workers’ Movement

First, we must discuss the progress and conclusion of the education workers’ movement, which began in the fall of 2024. This movement involved workers from elementary schools, high schools, and public universities in Croatia and initially issued five demands:

1. A 10% increase in the base salary of all education workers.
2. Increase in salary coefficients for education workers. That is, bringing them into line with those of other similar positions in the public sector. (Salaries are calculated as base salary x coefficient + bonus determined by length of service).
3. Introduction of a bonus for the education sector until the issue of coefficients is resolved.
4. Exemption from workplace assessment for teaching staff.
5. One-year moratorium on the implementation of the proposed reform of vocational school curricula.

Requests 1-3 were economic in nature and were the main motivation for joining the movement. Croatia is has one of the highest inflation rates in the Eurozone, with an average increase in food prices of 45% compared to 2021 and a 47% increase in housing prices since 2022. Rental prices have followed the same trend. It was understandable to demand wage increases in such circumstances, but, as expected, the government and capitalists are not interested in alleviating the increasingly dire economic situation of workers.

The two final requests were not of an economic nature. The government has promoted workplace assessment as a way to encourage excellence among teaching staff, while also penalizing those who don’t meet the required standards. Of course, any kind of assessment conducted by the school administration or inspectors appointed by the ministry would inevitably be used against “troublemakers,” agitators in the workplace, etc. Education workers’ unions have thus decided to fight against the implementation of workplace assessment.

Another project favored by the government is the reform of vocational school curricula. Welcomed by the Croatian Employers’ Association (HUP) as a positive step towards a more market-oriented education system, the reform aims to limit the study of “general culture” subjects (such as history, biology, geography, etc) in vocational schools, instead focusing students’ efforts on “practical” subjects, i.e. those that better prepare them for a life of wage slavery. The implementation of this reform would above all lead to increased job insecurity for a considerable number of teachers.

Discussions about possible union action began during the 2023-24 academic year, and by September 2024, it became clear that a strike was looming. The entire education workers’ movement was mainly organized by three unions: the Independent Trade Union of Secondary School Employees (NSZSŠH), the Preporod trade union, and the Independent Trade Union of Research and Higher Education Employees (NSZVO). Two of the aforementioned unions are strictly sector-specific. The NSZSŠH brings together high school workers, while the NSZVO organizes workers at Croatian universities and research institutes. The Preporod union, on the other hand, includes members from both elementary and high schools.

However, the break in the struggle by the Croatian Teachers’ Union (SHU), which is the dominant union among elementary school employees, dealt a severe blow to the movement, as it meant that collective action in elementary schools was undertaken only by a limited number of workers, mostly members and supporters of the Preporod union. On the other hand, it has long been known that the SHU is nothing more than a collaborationist union, always ready to compromise with the government. It is no coincidence that the Ministry of Education recently transferred some valuable properties to SHU.

After months of fruitless negotiations with the government, the three unions involved have decided to call a “warning strike” for March 19, 2025. Classes were not held in most high schools and many elementary schools throughout Croatia. Although participation may appear excellent, the statistics may have concealed the real situation on the ground. Preporod announced that the strike had been declared in 512 of the 545 schools where the union was active, plus another 117 schools and other educational institutions. It should be noted that “declaring a strike” does not necessarily mean that all—or even most—of the workers at a given school will participate. In fact, in many cases only a minority of workers—usually those most active in the union—take part. In some cases, the strike was “declared” by a single person, while all of their colleagues continued to work. Furthermore, many elementary schools only have SHU union sections, which means that hundreds of schools did not join the strike at all.

Nevertheless, the “warning strike” on March 19 showed that there was a significant number of workers willing to continue the struggle. After fruitless and exhausting negotiations with the government, the three unions decided to call a “regional circular strike.” Croatia has been divided into five geographical regions, and schools in each region have called a one-day strike on a date between April 1 and April 11. Schools in Dalmatia were the first to strike, on April 1, while those in central Croatia were the last, on April 11. The number of schools that declared a strike during this period was roughly the same as during the “warning strike” on March 19, but the number of participants decreased considerably. For example, auxiliary staff (cleaners, janitors, secretaries, etc) mostly remained at work.

It seems that the main reason for this lack of participation was that, given their low pay (often less than €1,000 per month), it was difficult for auxiliary staff to give up a day’s salary. However, this is a very weak argument and says a lot about class consciousness. Workers do not take up the fight when they are sufficiently well off, but when economic difficulties force them to do so.

After the “circular strike,” Preporod, NSZSŠH, and NSZVO announced a protest demonstration for April 25. The demonstration was supposed to take place in Zagreb’s main square, and the unions intended to mobilize their members from all over Croatia. Since April 25 was a Friday, union members should have been entitled to a day off work guaranteed by law for “union activities.” However, the government ordered school principals to not grant such requests, demonstrating once again how much the rights guaranteed by bourgeois law are worth.

In any case, the protest on April 25 was ultimately postponed—as ridiculous as it may seem—due to the death of Pope Francis on April 21. The unions have decided to postpone the protest “in memory of the late pope.” This is yet another example of the pervasive influence of the Catholic Church in Croatian society. The postponement of the protest contributed further to the demoralization of the workers.

The long-awaited event finally took place on May 9th in Zagreb. Turnout was lower than expected, as many workers were prevented from exercising their right to take a day off for union activities. Turnout outside Zagreb was particularly low, and only small groups of activists arrived from the rest of the country. The protest itself featured a mix of speeches ranging from openly anti-capitalist statements to moments of pathetic nationalism. Union leaders promised the crowd that the fight would continue and announced the possibility of a general strike by education workers, similar to the massive (and somewhat successful) strike of 2019.

As the end of the school year approached, however, it became clear that the momentum had been lost. The Preporod union organized a referendum on May 27th and 28th, asking its members if they were willing to strike during the last weeks of elementary school classes and during high school final exams. The results were rather disappointing.
Only 34% of elementary school employees said they were willing to strike. The vote in favor of the strike was successful in high schools, but only by a narrow margin.

Following these results, the unions decided to announce another strike in mid-June, this time only in high schools. In the end, however, even this minor action wasn’t implemented. The education workers’ movement of 2024-25 thus completely dissolved without achieving any concrete results. Salaries remained unchanged and the curriculum reform—which the government had practically promised to suspend at the end of 2024—was implemented. The only partial success has been a moratorium on workplace assessments, but it is impossible to say how long this will last for.

There are several reasons for the failure of the education workers’ movement. Firstly, the fact that the largest union in the education sector, the SHU, decided to break ranks with the union and side with the government. Although many SHU members left the union following this apparent betrayal (and many joined the more militant Preporod instead), it remained the largest and most influential union in many elementary schools, especially outside of large urban centers.

Another important cause of the failure was the difficult to understand delaying tactic adopted by the three unions. It took several months to organize a “warning strike,” even though it was clear from the outset that the government would not voluntarily accept any of the main demands (this, of course, came as no shock to Marxists!). After the success of the “warning strike” in March, the unions decided not to go “all in,” but instead to proceed with a “rolling strike” in April. Instead of paralyzing the entire education system, this strike did not affect the Ministry of Education’s plans for the 2024-25 academic year in the slightest. Although time was running out—it makes no sense to organize a strike during the summer holidays, after all—the three unions did not call a general strike, but organized a protest, which they themselves ruined by postponing it due to reactionary Catholic influences. In the end, the momentum for resistance had been exhausted, and the government felt free to declare victory. However, even lost battles can serve as lessons for the future!

Additional Activities among Preschool Educators

It wasn’t just schools and universities that saw organized union actions in the first half of 2025. Even the nursery school workers have joined, forming their own movement. This still seems to be alive. After a series of strikes in nurseries during the summer of 2024 (which we have already written about), nursery school workers have decided to go on the offensive. On April 12th, a protest organized by the professional association of kindergarten educators SIDRO and the Croatian Union of Education, Media, and Culture (SOMK) was held in Zagreb. Several hundred nursery school workers from various parts of the country took part in the protest, which was intended to serve as a springboard for further action. The initiative of the nursery school teachers led to another protest on May 15, with a one-hour strike in nurseries across Croatia.

The fact that the main organizer of the protest was apparently a professional association (similar to an NGO) and not a trade union could prove problematic in the long run, and the Party has already commented on the issue in a leaflet distributed during the protest (already published in the party press).

The main problems facing Croatian nursery school operators today are low wages, overcrowded nurseries, and poor teaching equipment. While school staff receive their salaries from the Ministry of Education directly, employees of public kindergartens in Croatia receive their salaries from local authorities. This has led to huge wage disparities between the richest and poorest municipalities in the country. The government recently attempted to alleviate this problem by formally equalizing the salaries of preschool educators with those of elementary school teachers, which meant that local authorities would have to grant pay rises when necessary. Of course, this has often remained a dead letter, and many preschool educators continue to be underpaid.

The initiative by pre-school teachers (led by SIDRO and SOMK) calls for the Ministry of Education to pay employees’ salaries, as this is the only way to obtain the long-awaited pay rises. Additional state funding for nurseries was also requested in order to reduce overcrowding.

Unlike other workers in Croatian schools, pre-school teachers seem to be continuing their activities without interruption. The SOMK has announced the possibility of a strike in kindergartens in the town of Đurđevac, near the Hungarian border. We wish the workers good luck and hope to see more direct action of this kind throughout Croatia.

Unfortunately, the movement of preschool educators has remained separate from the movement of school workers, even though both essentially belong to the same sector, not to mention the same class. This type of sub-sectoral fragmentation of the trade union movement in Croatia is a disease that dates back to the late 1980s and the destruction of the old industry unions. The unification of all workers in the education sector seems a necessary step towards the creation of a class-based union, and this goal will certainly be supported by Party members employed in the education system.

The Food and Beverage Industry

The food and beverage industry is the most important sector in Croatia today, which is now largely deindustrialized. It currently accounts for 18% of manufacturing GDP and 3.3% of total employment. It also accounts for 13.4% of manufacturing exports. In recent years, it has seen growth in production and employment, while other sectors have stagnated.

Since 2015, wages in the food industry have been consistently 2% lower than the national average, and despite increased labor productivity, there has been no corresponding growth in wages. Meanwhile, average wages in the beverage industry are 2% higher than the national average wage (but this is a much smaller sector than the food industry). Despite the sector’s considerable growth, wages have remained stagnant and have been severely affected by the inflation that has affected European economies in recent years.

The Fortanova Group was founded in 2019 after the collapse of the former mega-corporation Agrokor, which was then rescued by the Croatian state due to its strategic value. This value is represented by €5 billion in turnover and approximately 50,000 employees in Croatia. Fortanova holds key positions in small retail trade, agriculture, and food production in the states of the former Yugoslavia and Hungary. Owned by a consortium of European and Russian capital, the Russian part was subject to sanctions after the war in Ukraine, and in 2024 was completely removed from ownership. Currently, the majority owner of the company is Open Pass, owned by Croatian arch-capitalist Pavle Vujnovac, who also owns PPD, which trades in Russian gas, and the retail company Pevex. Vujnovac was also one of the main financiers of the far-right Croatian party Patriotic Movement (Domovinski pokret), which entered government after the last elections with the right-wing HDZ party. This party promotes anti-worker, austerity, and anti-immigration policies.

The Strikes

In May, there were strikes at three different companies: the meat producer PIK Vrbovac, the beverage producer Jamnica, and Zvijezda, best known for its mayonnaise. The strikes were led by the PPDIV, a union representing workers in agriculture, the food industry, tobacco, and water supply. It currently organizes around 20,000 workers. It is an important union affiliated with the main trade union center, the SSSH. The union has often shown pro-government tendencies, particularly in 2016, when it did not support a wildcat strike at the Koka poultry plant in Varaždin. It subsequently initiated legal proceedings against a worker who had published a critical text on the matter and against the website that had published it.

After collective bargaining negotiations failed, a strike was called, with over 80% of union members from the three companies participating, who voted in favor of striking to obtain the collective agreement. After the strike was announced, Fortenova Group CEO Fabris Peruško attempted to attend the workers’ meeting to try to calm tensions, but to no avail. The strike began on May 27. At the same time, the union reported further pressure from management on the most active union members and attempts by the company to persuade workers to sign individual agreements and break the struggle.

PIK Vrbovac has 920 members and Zvijezda has 138. Of these, approximately 570 participated in the strike. In the early days there were even more, including foreign workers, but they were scared off by the managers. Before the strike, PIK produced around 80 tons of meat, but during the strike only 10.

On June 23, the strikes at PIK and Zvijezda officially ended with the signing of the new collective agreement. This is the longest struggle in the food sector since the wars of the 1990s.

In Jamnica, things turned out differently. On the day the strike was supposed to begin, the strike committee members decided to call it off, despite the fact that it had been voted for by over 80% of unionized workers. That illegitimate strike committee decided that labor relations would be governed by the Pravilnik o radu, a separate regulatory body. After being rightly expelled from the union, the aforementioned members proceeded to form their own union. At present, it is unclear what will happen with the strike or how many members have left the original union.

Preparations for War: Nationalist Parades and Compulsory Military Service

In line with the global trend toward rearmament and militarization, the Croatian government has decided to reintroduce compulsory military service, which was abolished in 2008. At the beginning of June, far-right Defense Minister Ivan Anušić presented the new law on military service, with the first compulsory enlistments expected to begin in 2026.

Since the Croatian state does not currently have the resources necessary to enlist entire male cohorts (women are still exempt from military service), military service will initially be limited to approximately 4,000 recruits per year. However, all males between the ages of 18 and 30 will be subject to compulsory military service. Although conscripts will be given the opportunity to serve in a non-military role, full military service is promoted with the promise of subsequent preferential employment in the public sector. This is a prospect welcomed by many, especially in economically disadvantaged areas of Croatia.

At the same time, Croatia is leading the arms race in the Western Balkans region. Following the purchase of 12 French Rafale fighter jets for nearly €1 billion in 2021, the Ministry of Defense has already ordered 50 German Leopard tanks, which are expected to arrive by the end of 2026. Significant investments in combat drones have also been announced, with the possibility of local production, research, and development, much to the enthusiasm of the Croatian bourgeoisie.

In 2025, Croatia finally achieved NATO’s target of allocating 2% of GDP to defense, and the conservative-nationalist Croatian government immediately welcomed the US proposal to increase this percentage to 5%. Croatian Social Democratic President Zoran Milanović expressed moderate criticism of the increase in military spending, but declared his support for compulsory military service, in line with his new “sovereignist” rhetoric.

The ideological apparatus of the bourgeois state has also worked tirelessly to promote militarization. On August 5, Croatia’s “Victory Day,” a large military parade celebrated the 30th anniversary of “Operation Storm.” This was the decisive military operation of the Croatian War of Independence, followed by the mass expulsion of 150,000 members of the Serbian ethnic minority.

Finally, nearly 500,000 people attended the concert of neo-fascist singer Marko Perković Thompson in Zagreb on June 5, 2025. The concert was, in essence, a political rally organized by the clerical-nationalist wing of the Croatian bourgeoisie. Perković has publicly called on Europe to “return to its Christian roots so that it can regain its strength.” Add to this the militaristic and nationalistic themes of his songs and his clear support for the right-wing political and clerical establishment, and it became clear that Perković will have an important role to play in the future initiatives of the Croatian bourgeoisie.