On Croatian Nation-Building in Istria (1900-1940)

In Istria, between 1870 and 1914, the Croatian movement worked closely with the Slovenian national movement creating a political power opposing Italian culture, which resulted in a provisional truce and after this an inconclusive coup in fundamental requests such as the right to the equal usage of Croatian and Slovenian languages in public offices which actually did nothing to improve relationships between these two opposing sides. In 1914 Istria seemed nationally divided between the Croatian-Slovenian block and Italians regardless of the presence of social/social-democratic parties and Christian-social parties and numerous legitimists of the Emperor. Political rivalry till 1914, within the communities, the local Diet and elections for the Viennese Parliament, showed that the Croatian nation in Istria had existed and had asserted itself. Taking into consideration this page of regional history, and the events after 1918, and then those in 1922 and 1925 one could not have the sense that these events passed without a traumatic impact on the Croats in Istria, who were excluded from political participation, their rights finally being reduced down to only their elementary identity and national expression. The imprisonment within fascism and the negation of their rights to nationality was followed by the battle for national liberation that started in 1942 and was defined in September 1943. This was a new Croatian rebirth, which joined Istria to Croatia and Slovenia and then to Yugoslavia.