The preconditions for the formation of private forest owners' interest associations in the Western Balkan Region

The private forest owners in Bosnia and Herzegovina, Croatia, Macedonia and Serbia are to a large extent not organised in interest organisations although their forests make up between 10% (Macedonia) and 52% (Serbia) of the total forest area. Private forest owners' interests are mainly in the hands of the public forest administration. This situation is not in accordance with democratic political systems. The paper investigates the preconditions for change by scrutinizing prevailing interest group theories by random surveys of private forest owners and in-depth interviews of forest policy decision-makers. As a result of the empirical research it has been found that, in spite of the large number of private forest owners, there are good chances for the formation of private forest owners' interest associations in all four countries, mainly because of the high critical mass of engaged private forest owners and the support of the majority of forest policy decision-makers.