Muslims (nationality) - History

History

The Austro-Hungarian Empire officially introduced the term Bosniaks for Slavic Muslims who lived in Bosnia; prior to it, it was used to describe a resident of Bosnia regardless of nationality or religion. Their official census varied over the years in how it grouped communities, whether by ethnicity, language or religion. After World War I, the Kingdom of Serbs, Croats and Slovenes was formed and it recognized only those three ethnicities in its censuses.

After World War II, the Constitution of Yugoslavia recognized narodi (nations—native peoples which were explicitly named in the Constitution, giving them special privileges) and narodnosti (nationalities, with status comparable to that of minorities). The first post-war censuses allowed people to register as the aforementioned ethnicities as well.

In a debate that went on during the 1960s, many Bosniak communist intellectuals argued that Muslims of Bosnia and Herzegovina are in fact a native Slavic people that should be recognized as a nation. But the name Muslims was sometimes rejected - to quote Bosniak politician and president Hamdija Pozderac:

They don't allow Bosnianhood but they offered Muslimhood. We shall accept their offer, although the name is wrong, but with it will start the process. —In discussion with Josip Broz Tito in 1971 about constitutional changes which recognized Muslims, later Bosniaks

As a compromise, the Constitution was amended in 1968 to list Muslims by nationality recognizing a nation, but not the Bosniak name. The Yugoslav "Muslim by nationality" policy was considered by Bosniaks to be neglecting and opposing their Bosnian identity because the term tried to describe Bosniaks as a religious group not an ethnic one.

Sometimes other terms, such as Muslim with capital M were used (that is, "musliman" was a practicing Muslim while "Musliman" was a member of this nation; Serbian and Croatian use capital letters for names of peoples but small for names of adherents).

After the 1990s, most of these people, around two million, mostly located in Bosnia and Herzegovina and the region of Sandžak, declare as ethnic Bosniaks (Bošnjaci, sing. Bošnjak).

On the other hand, some still use the old name Muslimani (Muslims), especially outside Bosnia and Herzegovina.

The election law of Bosnia and Herzegovina as well as the Constitution of Bosnia and Herzegovina, recognizes the results from 1991 population census as results referring to Bosniaks.