The demographer who recalculated Yugoslavia’s wartime losses
Comparing censuses with expected population growth, he recalculated Yugoslavia's wartime toll at about 1,027,000, shaking the official figure of 1.7 million that had underpinned the 1946 reparations claim.
Vladimir Žerjavić was a Croatian economist and demographer who became known for studying Yugoslavia’s population and wartime losses after a career in economic-development consulting. Comparing censuses with expected population trends, he sought to distinguish actual deaths from broader demographic loss and estimated about 1.027 million wartime deaths in Yugoslavia in 1989. His figures prompted renewed scrutiny of established narratives about victims of the Yugoslav Partisans and other forces, as well as postwar reprisals, while critics disputed aspects of his data and method.
Career timeline
- 1912Born in Križ
- 1930sGraduated in economics at Zagreb and worked in the private sector
- 1945–1958Worked in Yugoslav industry, petroleum research, and economic institutions
- 1958–1982Adviser on industrial development abroad
- 1964–1982Industrial-development adviser and population analyst for the UN Economic Commission for Africa
- 1989Published research on Yugoslavia’s demographic losses in World War II
- 1990sContinued writing on estimates of wartime and postwar victims
The Swiss historian whose archival research overturned the received Yugoslav narrative of the Tito-Stalin split
Perović showed from newly opened East-bloc archives that Tito's Balkan territorial ambitions, particularly over Albania, triggered the 1948 split, and that the 'Yugoslav path to socialism' was a post hoc myth.
A Swiss historian and political scientist, he is Professor of Eastern European History at the University of Zurich and director of the Center for Eastern European Studies (CEES). His 2007 Journal of Cold War Studies article, 'The Tito-Stalin Split: A Reassessment in Light of New Evidence,' overturned the official Yugoslav narrative by using newly opened East-bloc archives to argue that Tito's Balkan territorial ambitions, particularly the push to absorb Albania, rather than a distinct Yugoslav path to socialism, drove the 1948 split with Moscow. He has also produced significant work on the North Caucasus under Russian rule and on Soviet energy diplomacy, and founded and edits several online scholarly digests including the Caucasus Analytical Digest, extending East European studies to a broader public.
Career timeline
- 1991–1997Studied history, political science, and Russian literature at the University of Zurich
- 2001PhD from the University of Zurich; dissertation on Russian regionalism
- 1997–2005Head of the Russia/Eurasia program, Center for Security Studies, ETH Zurich
- 2008–2011Academic Associate, Department of History, University of Basel
- 2011–presentProfessor of Eastern European History, University of Zurich
- 2014Habilitation at the University of Zurich; North Caucasus under Russian rule
- 2017Founded and directed the Center for Eastern European Studies (CEES), University of Zurich
1912–2001
○ Natural causes
