Yugoslav 'market socialism' provided for worker participation in a decentralized economy, availibility of Western-style consumer goods (and development of Western-style consumerism among more affluent social groups and economic regions; i.e., Slovenia & Croatia, the first to 'secede'), room for small private business and agriculture, and market-oriented price and wages systems...
costs of above included mass unemployment (up to 15% in 1980s, figure would have been higher except for migration of 'guest workers' to West Germany, Sweden, & Switzerland), chronic inflation, and foreign debt...unskilled working class and poor regions bore brunt of joblessness, exacerbating already existing inequalities among social strata and ethnic groups...
Yugoslavia's post-WW2 transformation bypassed Kosovo as Kosovo policymakers stressed traditional textile manufacture, agriculture, and handicrafts (while receiving subsidies from federal levies assessed to other regions)...extended families of 20-40 people continued to live within walled compounds, blood vengeance, arranged marriages, and polygamy remained common, Kosovar Albanian women continued to live secluded in the home, subordinate to male authority, and with little or no access to education...this was socialism
supporters of 'socialist' decentralization and marketization must consider both the role that the former played in reviving nationalist tensions and the high price paid for the latter in terms of large-scale unemployment... Michael Hoover