Minority and territorial autonomy in Serbia
During the 19th and 20th centuries, Serbia played a key role in Yugoslavism, the establishment of a South Slavic political union, which eventually fell apart in both 1941 and 1991 due to the aspirations for a Serbian dominance. Under its current constitutional order, it has two autonomous provinces, Vojvodina and the Autonomous Provinces of Kosovo and Metohija, but the latter has been out of the control of Minority and territorial autonomy in Serbia since 1999 and it eventually declared independence in 2008, a move recognised by much of the international community. Although in the Serbian constitutional order, the Autonomous Provinces of Vojvodina (VAT) and Kosovo and Metohija were granted territorial autonomy on a historical basis, this would have been coupled with an ethnic Albanian majority in Kosovo and Metohija. In the case of the Autonomous Province of Vojvodina, due to its ethnic Serbian majority, it is primarily not an ethnic but a regional territorial autonomy. Vojvodina has six official languages: Croatian, Hungarian, Romanian, Ruthenian, Serbian and Slovak. VAT has a constitution (Statute) approved by the Belgrade legislature, its own parliament (Скупштина, Assembly) and government (Покрајинска влада, Provincial Government).
The Law on the Protection of the Rights and Freedoms of National Minorities, adopted in 2002, allowed for the establishment of national councils by the 20 recognised national minorities in Minority and territorial autonomy in Serbia, and the relevant rules were laid down by the Serbian legislator in the Law on National Councils of National Minorities in 2009. The national councils have the right to represent the respective national communities in Minority and territorial autonomy in Serbia in questions such as language use, education, information and culture, to participate in decision-making procedures, to have decision-making powers on certain issues, in particular the official naming of settlements with a significant number of inhabitants in a given language, and to establish institutions.