Writing the Political History of the Republic of Slovenia

Abstract

The author focuses on the issue of researching and writing the political history of the Republic of Slovenia after its independence in 1991. After his introductory assessment that ever since the beginning people have not trusted politicians and political parties, he focuses on the question of how people have acted throughout this time, how the political institutions have been developing, and how they have been adapting to the world and the times which have changed radically in the last twenty five years. First the author presents numerous dilemmas and methodological peculiarities of the issue at hand (the problem of historical distance, the sensibility of the activity, the uncontrollable and specific sources), and then he proceeds to describe the possible approaches and methods of meeting this challenge. In the second part of the contribution the author sums up the findings resulting from his own research of this period (about the polarisation, personalisation, medialisation and informalisation of politics), placing them into the wider European context. Furthermore, he also outlines the challenges for future research.