Author: Zlatko Teodosievski After the 2nd World War, the
Republic of Macedonia became part of the Yugoslav Federation;
therefore, its cultural policy was subject to the state ideology
of building up a socialist culture. Over the past sixty years,
cultural policy went through three main development stages:
After 1945, the role of the government in culture was vastly
extended. New institutions were established, programmes were set
up to train qualified staff to run these institutions and the
culture and the arts were popularised. In the past, Macedonian
culture hardly had an opportunity to flourish as its own
national culture. It is therefore understandable that there was
a certain amount of national and romantic spirit throughout this
period. Following a long period of strict centralism, Macedonia
entered, like other Yugoslav Republics, a period of self-
management in the mid 1970s which offered certain opportunities
to develop democratic elements, similar to that of other
European countries. Municipal cultural