Journey of No Return

The brain drain was a problem that tormented even the former Yugoslavia because the people that left were mainly from the fields of science that could have been used for some kind of further development. The war has simply brought about the modification of the long valid formula - "instead of exporting know-how, we export people with know-how" to "we force them out of the country". Because among the thousands of young people who have left the country due to the war there is an exceptionally high number of those who had no intention of leaving before because they wanted to offer their talents and knowledge to the environment that schooled them at enormous cost.

"We force them out of the country" was just what some of the recent efforts on the part of the Serbian Parliament looked like regarding the judgement of "deserters" who'd gone abroad ("they have no place with us"), as well as the declaration of the Serbian Minister of Defence, General Lieutenant Colonel Marko Negovanovic, that "there can be no talk of amnesty" for such as these. After these words of condemnation there is little room for illusion. Tens of thousands of people in their most creative years will remain outside the country, while tens of thousands of those who refused to take part in a war which Serbia never "declared", will waste away in jails.

The scale of this most recent brain-drain which was initiated by the war, can only be guessed as there are no official figures. Most of those that have left are still on "unfinished business trips" or unpaid leave. However, a lot can be learned from the stories of people from Belgrade's leading project offices or engineering firms. One such firm, whose production of industrial computers satisfies the strictest European criteria, in a short space of time lost about 20 employees. At a glance, that would not appear to be too much for a company employing 200 people. But, if we take into account that we are talking about people between the ages of 25 and 35 who are anywhere in the world responsible for the production of such computers, and if we remember the American statistics of a few years ago that the schooling of this kind of expert (from birth to degree) costs his family and the state around 300,000 dollars, so that later on, in his most creative years, he can make a few million dollars, the waste is such that few, not even richer countries than this could bear it. As another example, worked out on a somewhat different principle, the schooling of one medical doctor (and they leave whenever they can) costs 38,000 dollars for his university education, which will bring to the host country around 600,000 dollars, considered to be the product of a doctor in the course of his working life.

Most of those who left in haste, fleeing from the absurdity of war, to begin with stopped off in one of the west European cities from where they are today preparing for their departure overseas. In the meantime, many have started to work illegally in order to survive. In spite of the very strict legal regulations on emigration politics, there is little likelihood that these governments will send them back to our ministries of defence and justice. "No-one in his right mind," commented a western diplomat recently, "would send away such experts who are willing to work under, for us, extremely favorable conditions".

That the present wave of departure of highly educated people is out of all official control is confirmed by the Deputy Director of the Institute for International Politics and Commerce, Dr. Vlada Grecic, who has been involved in this problem for years. "It is hard," he says, "to say anything more exact, but some estimates show that in a very short time around 200,000 people will have left Yugoslavia. It is known, for instance, that from May last year around 75,000 people sought refuge in Germany and that besides this number many remain unregistered. In Belgrade one can hear of the thousands who have left for the South african Republic. These figures naturally must not be interpreted as definite proof of the "brain drain", because not all of those who have left are highly qualified and educated people. But the fact remains that the latest wave will carry off many whose knowledge is indispensable to this country and whose loss is irreplaceable".

From the data that Dr. Grecic has collected from the official immigration offices of certain countries, it can be seen that in the period from 1984 to 1989, 11,506 Yugoslavs went to the USA, 1,329 of them with university degrees. The actual number is quite a bit higher because many with temporary residence (mostly on the basis of some kind of education), have later "adapted" their status and stayed over there. In the period from 1974 to 1986 15,223 people left Yugoslavia for Canada, of which 857 were scientists, engineers and mathematicians and 215 doctors. According to some estimates, more than 300 graduates of Belgrade University are living in Toronto alone. "Analyses show," says Dr. Grecic for VREME, "that the number of immigrants to overseas countries has decreased, but that the number of highly educated has constantly increased. The number of experts from Serbia has always been the highest".

Those who leave nowadays (particularly those who leave with the label "traitor"), and are around 30 years old, most probably will never come back. In a few years' time their children will begin school, and then, as a rule, it is late to return. In the foreseeable future it is unlikely that the economic and political situation in these parts will change, and eradication of the present national mental disease, which makes an absurdity of any project of the future, cannot be expected. Those who leave, further reducing the present front of criticism, also won't come back because they know that a few professional magazines sent from abroad by some friend or relative will in future be their only contact with the outside world. That which in the rest of the world doesn't cost more that a newspaper subscription - participation in some computer data bank - will still be out of reach and too expensive. Following the great lifesaving projects - "the Silicon Valley of Zvezdara" and the multipurpose helicopter - they would work on projects of the future - express railway lines or "the first Serbian river submarine", maybe even on the first Serbian orange. And they would still be excited by the news of donations of books, such as the Law Faculty in Belgrade received a few days ago so that professors and students can make contact with some of world trends. Their children would not see a computer in school for years yet, but instead would learn all about the old and new war victories of their heavenly nation and collect posters of our new leaders and national heroes with "kalashnikov" and Heckler-rifle.

One cannot blame those who leave, quietly and mostly at personal risk, without much regret, no matter how unpatriotic it may sound.