REGIONAL REPORT : Broken Promises Rattle the Balkans : Trying to build democracies with dictators’ bricks has proved an exercise in futility.

Balkan countries in which Communists cloaked themselves in reformist clothing to win multi-party elections are now mired in political turmoil brought on by a regionwide epidemic of second thoughts.

Albanians this week forced out their Communist government, which had been in office for only a month, providing the latest sign of confusion among those trying to build democracy with dictators’ bricks.

Bulgaria’s renamed Communists were forced out six months ago, after sweeping the first free elections there in half a century last June.

Bulgarian politicians are still quarreling over when and how to restage elections.

Embattled Romanian authorities this week conceded that a new vote should be held in the fall to test whether they retain enough public support to wrest the nation from perpetual crisis.

In the Yugoslav republic of Serbia, seemingly spellbound by nationalism, the ruling party’s power base is also eroding. Anti-Communist movements offer a haven for those disaffected by economic catastrophe, while holding tight to the policy of ethnic confrontation splitting the Yugoslav federation.

While each conflict has its unique aspects, a pattern has emerged that shows their common roots.

None of the nations has any history of democracy. Subjugation and royal dictatorship were the prewar standards, making communism only the most recent in a succession of oppressive forces.

The Balkan states suffered five centuries of Turkish occupation. The Ottoman Empire seized independent states in the Middle Ages and brutally transformed them into a battleground for clashes with Europe.

The relative stability imposed during 45 years of communism offers some explanation for Balkan allegiance to an ideology that was wholly rejected elsewhere in Eastern Europe.

Renamed and reformed Communists also promised a slower and less painful transition to market economies. After ousting the worst of the Balkan dictators--Romanian despot Nicolae Ceausescu and hard-liner Todor Zhivkov of Bulgaria--self-styled reformers were able to take over and cast themselves as social democrats devoted to the people.

On the other hand, nostalgia for exiled monarchies and reawakened religious faith inflict many with doubts about Communist doctrine, explaining the past year’s political seesawing.

The conflicting priorities of urban and rural voters have split Balkan societies, with industrial workers attracted to democratic change while the peasantry clings to Communist traditions.

Another factor undermining the erstwhile victors has been the electorate’s growing sense of having been duped into restoring the same forces overthrown by their revolutions.

Bulgaria’s Communist Party changed its name to Socialist but expelled few from the old Zhivkov regime. The National Salvation Front that assumed Romania’s leadership after that country’s bloody 1989 revolution was primarily composed of surviving Ceausescu footmen.

In Serbia and Montenegro, two of Yugoslavia’s most backward republics, Communist hard-liners also harnessed the powerful forces of nationalism to widely outpoll democratic opponents.

But victories based on fear and intimidation have uniformly proved hollow.

From the Black Sea to the Adriatic, the neo-Communist governments have collapsed or been gravely wounded since winning elections:

Romania

The National Salvation Front, which won a two-thirds majority in May, 1990, elections, quickly reverted to Stalinist practices. Less than a month after victory, President Ion Iliescu summoned vigilante hordes to bludgeon anti-government demonstrators.

Brute force proved a costly weapon, as Western governments immediately withdrew aid and foreign investors continue to avoid Romania even though the violence has mostly subsided.

Support for the front waned severely after Prime Minister Petre Roman embarked on a stepped-up drive for a market economy, despite election promises of a gradual transition to a new system.

Inflation expected to reach 200% by the end of the year and mounting unemployment and poverty have swelled the ranks of anti-government demonstrators.

Finance Minister Eugen Dijmarescu, a leading reformer and Roman ally, surprised opposition forces this week by announcing new elections this fall instead of mid-1992.

Opposition leaders accuse the front of seeking only to ensure its own survival.

“The (front) wants early elections because there is a cold and hungry winter ahead and almost a year of economic hardship until their term is up,” said Ionel Sandulescu, the deputy leader of the Liberal Party.

Bulgaria

After their June, 1990, victory, the Socialists were battered by incessant strikes and protests of disappointed opposition supporters in the capital, Sofia. Worn down by five months of disruption, Prime Minister Andrei Lukanov and his Cabinet resigned in late November. A nonpartisan coalition has since attempted to maintain peace and relative order.

Government subsidies have been removed from most goods and services, tripling prices for necessities. While those measures forced by virtual bankruptcy cut deeply into Bulgarian living standards, wrangling between Socialists and opposition members of Parliament belonging to the 16-party Union of Democratic Forces has held up crucial reform legislation.

One of the most bitter debates delaying legislative activity is over when to hold new elections, with the Socialists insisting on completion of the reform laws and a new constitution and the opposition demanding elections first.

Albania

Last on the democratic bandwagon, poor, repressed Albania proved the swiftest to suffer a breakdown.

Tirana, the grim and dilapidated capital, was joined by only a handful of industrial cities in supporting Western-oriented candidates of the opposition Democratic Party in elections held March 31. Hard-line Communists won two-thirds of the 250-seat Parliament and named a one-party Cabinet a month later.

As predicted by the opposition, the economic hardships quickly shattered Albanians’ illusions that the old leadership could set things right. Anger over low wages, 19th-Century working conditions, poor supplies and repression of opponents drew hundreds of thousands into a 20-day general strike that toppled the government Tuesday.

A nonpartisan “government of national reconciliation,” similar to the ineffectual coalition now governing Bulgaria, is to rule until new elections can be held.

Yugoslavia

With the federation on the verge of civil war, the political stability of Communist leadership in two republics has taken second stage to an explosive ethnic conflict.

But it was the welding of nationalism to the Communist monolith that allowed the ruling party to triumph in December elections in Serbia and Montenegro, setting out a worst-case scenario for relations with the other four republics where anti-Communist now rule.

Serbia’s Communist strongman, President Slobodan Milosevic, rose to power by subjugating ethnic Albanians in the province of Kosovo and threatening to do battle with rival Croatia if it pulls out of Yugoslavia. Meanwhile, anti-Communist foes have gained strength by pointing out the victors’ failure to make good on promises.

Despite what appears to be an erosion of support for the Serbian Communists, their likely successors espouse even more radical and destabilizing views on ethnic issues, holding out little hope for a peaceful resolution.

A New Revolution in the Balkans

Helped by voters’ lack of democratic experience and fears of too-rapid change, Communists disguised as reformers won office in the Balkans when democracy swept through the old East Bloc after 1989. These neo-Communist regimes are all now in trouble. 1. Romania’s ruling Front reverted to Stalinist practices. Economic woes forced the regime to call new elections for later this year. 2. Bulgaria’s renamed Communists quit government after five months. Debate over when to hold new elections is stalling much-needed reform and other legislation in Parliament. 3. Albania was the last to hold elections, but continuing economic woes quickly forced the winning Connunist hard-liners to step down. A coalition governs until new elections are held. 4. Yugoslavia’s republics of Serbia and Montenegro elected Communist leaders who campaigned on a platform of ethnic nationalism. The resulting tensions could explode into civil war.