Depression And Apathy

During August of this year, the ``Argument'' agency for political and sociological research undertook an extensive investigation of the social, economic and health conditions of Yugoslav citizens over the age of sixty. The research encompassed 3421 households (over 11,000 people) throughout Serbia and Montenegro. ``The results would surely show conditions to be even more catastrophical if we had focused only upon socalled elderly households,'' says Dr. Stjepan Gredelj from ``Argument.'' The agency instead interviewed ``scattered'' subjects, consisting of a crosssection of the society (by age, education, and economic and professional status) in which people in their later years live.

The average Yugoslav household lives in a twoandahalf room apartment or house. Threefourths of heads of household are pensioners or farmers. An average of 139 DEM a month are spent on provisions, which is twenty DEM more than the average salary or pension. The difference is made up by aid that is sent by relatives abroad (received by every sixth household) or by income from the ``grey economy'' (in which as many as onethird of households are involved).

It appears that the elderly are very stoic: eighty percent are generally satisfied with the care they receive at state hospitals. The same percentage of those interviewed do not have the impression that state social services have gotten worse since the beginning of the war. A small number (3.7%) actually claim that the quality of state services has gotten better. Something is wrong with this, since even federal and republican ministers, from whose mouths we have gotten used to hearing laments about the horrible consequences that the ``undeserved and unjustified sanctions'' have had upon their departments, do not share such a favorable opinion of domestic health services. Also, very few of the elderly see the war as an important problem in their life or think that things would change at all with a change in the regime. The explanation for this paradox can perhaps be found in the low level of people's expectations regarding the quality of state caregiving; in other words, people have gotten used to not expecting any type of help from the government and its institutions, regardless of current circumstances or the nature of the regime. They have good reasons for such an attitude: when the question ``Who helped you most in the most difficult months of last year?'' was asked, it was found that the largest ``benefactor'' isno one, followed by family, friends and neighbors. The government and humanitarian organizations, both domestic and foreign, are almost absent from the list.

It is also interesting how the results of the research differ, sometimes drastically, based upon differences in background. The most drastic differences are not tied to ethnicity, but are based upon village city distinctions: the responses of those interviewed in Pristina and Belgrade are similar, as are the responses of people from the village of Zahac (Pec municipality, 100 percent Albanian) and the village of Velika Hoca (Orahovac municipality, 97 percent Serb), both in Kosovo. The differences between Belgrade and Velika Hoca are analogous to the differences between Pristina and Zahac, which demonstrates that homogenization based upon ethnicity, at least when we are talking about the ``apolitical'' question of ``how are you living?,'' has not become as strong as is sometimes thought.

When asked ``What will you do next year?,'' the largest number of villagers answered ``the same,'' while the largest number of citydwellers answered ``nothing.'' There are similarities though: a firm percentage of both (about three percent) declares that during 1995 they expectdeath. Regional differences are sometimes also drastic: people in Vojvodina (northern, formerly autonomous province in Serbia) and Sumadija (region in central Serbia) mostly complain of heart problems, while those in eastern Serbia complain of stomach diseases.

It is noted that, unlike the Serbs, who openly complain of familial problems, Muslims in the Sandzak region (southwestern Serbia and northeastern Montenegro) do not acknowledge that such problems even exist (100 percent claim that they do not); Albanians acknowledge that they exist, but decline to discuss them; Unlike the Serbs, who complain that they are not sufficiently loved by their families, the Montenegrins mainly have the impression that their relatives resent them because they take up living space. Almost ten percent of those interviewed answered: ``They wish I would leave the house.''

Responses which give the most despairing picture of the position of the elderly are those that are related to their interaction with their surroundings: regardless of cultural or regional differences, our older fellow citizens generally shun any form of social activity, even those involving groups of the elderly (pensioners' clubs, etc.). In both the villages and the cities, an average of seventy percent are not members of any such group, nor are they interested in joining one. Around twenty percent drink alcohol every day, and fifteen percent profess that they drink more than they did earlier. Even worse, more than half of those interviewed (54 percent) are in a state of acute or chronic depression. The worst thing is that the majority does not want to or cannot state why they feel that way: when given possible answers, they gave a wide spectrum of reasons, and not one dominated (poverty, sickness and old age combined do not make up a majority of the mentioned causes of depression). When asked what could be done to improve their lives, the largest number does not know how to answer (37 percent) or answers that nothing can be done (14 percent). Despite the considerable efforts by the government to convince them that the sanctions are responsible for everything, only three percent think that things would be easier for them if the sanctions were lifted.

The people from ``Argument'' say that they observed a similar acceptance of fate when researching the disposition of other social groups, such as parents of children under five years of age. ``People are apathetic and therefore show typical conformism and a latent loyalty to the existing order of things,'' says Dr. Gredelj. ``They see themselves as a burden to the state and their family and fear that things will be even worse if they openly reveal their dissatisfaction.'' Dr. Gredelj thinks that all of the system's institutions have failed: ``We have witnessed an implosion of the social structure, which is being gradually reduced to a type of ``natural community.'' We are witnessing a return to the ``native heath'' as the most important social category.''