The Social Structure of the Croatian Parliament in Five Mandates

In this paper we analyzed the social attributes and political experience of the members of the Croatian Parliament in five mandates. We established that the multiparty parliament, during the 18 years of its existence, was dominated by men, averagely between 47 and 49 years of age, Croats, Catholics, highly educated, predominantly in the social sciences and humanities, and politicians with significant managerial and political experience acquired primarily during their work in political parties. Furthermore, we found a relatively large fluctuation of parliamentarians, resulting in a lower level of parliamentary experience and a relatively short parliamentary career. Based on these indicators, it can be stated that in Croatia a socially homogenous parliamentary elite was formed, one with a potentially lower level of political competence, and that patterns of political recruitment, coherent in tendency with those in the developed democratic countries, were established