HISTORICAL CONTEXT AND CHARACTERISTICS OF COLONIZATION IN NORTH BACKA REGION, SERBIA AFTER FIRST WORLD WAR

Abstract

On the territory of today’s Serbia, in 1918, Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was created. Territory includes today North Backa region in northern part of Serbia was a part of Austria – Hungarian Empire. After Paris Peace Conference this region became a part of the new Kingdom. From 1921 until the end of the decade mostly Serbian population migrated from other parts of Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes to researched area. Tens of thousands of people migrated from today Croatia (regions Dalmatia and Lika)., Bosnia and Herzegovina and Montenegro. A total of 92 settlements were built by colonists in today Vojvodina region, 18 of them in North Backa Migrations had the character of planned colonization with all challenges and problems.  Immigrants were people from mountainous (Dinaric) regions the west of Balkan peninsula. Their habits and way of life were different from domicile population. This paper will investigate historical context and characteristics of this colonization, how difficult was to colonists to adapt on the new environment and what the situation is today with these colonist settlements.