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There are three constitutionally recognized national/ethnic minorities in Slovenia: the Italians, the Hungarians and the Roma. In addition, there are other ethnic groups that could perhaps be considered as "autochthonous" national minorities in line with Slovenia's understanding of this concept. Among them is a small community of "Serbs" – the successors of the Uskoks living in Bela krajina, a border region of Slovenia. In this article we present results of a field research that focused on the following question: Can the "Serb" community in Bela krajina be considered a national minority? On the basis of the objective facts, it could be said that the "Serbs" in four Bela krajina villages are a potential national minority, but with regard to their modest social vitality and the fact that they do not express their desire for minority status, the realization of special minority protection is questionable.

'The main purpose of this report is to evaluate the cultural policies introduced in the Slovenian National Action Plan (NAP) on Social Inclusion (2004-2006) in terms of their impact on promoting social inclusion of ethnic minorities. Cultural policies are here understood in a broad sense of the word - encompassing all policies that pay regard to any aspect of culture, be it culture in the sense of creative artistic activities (theatres, music, etc.) or in the sense of specific cultural/ ethnic identity of the target groups. In the report we focused on policies which are aimed at promoting the social inclusion of the Roma and the 'new ethnic minorities'. These are the only ethnic minorities that the Slovenian NAP/ inclusion 2004-2006 pays attention to - Roma are considered as one of the groups most at risk of social exclusion in Slovenia. On the other hand the NAP 2004-2006 does not deal with the new ethnic minorities as with vulnerable groups (groups with highest risk of poverty and social exclusion); they are, however, included in the part of NAP 2004-2006, which deals with access to culture. We chose to evaluate three policies: education policy for the Roma, employment policy for the Roma, and the policy to promote access to culture for minority ethnic groups (among them we focused on the Roma and the 'new ethnic minorities'). The first chapters of the report bring some general information on the ethnic structure of the Republic of Slovenia, on the legal protection of ethnic minorities in Slovenia, and on socioeconomic development of the country. Some aspects of the social exclusion of the Roma and the new ethnic minorities in Slovenia are presented in the fourth chapter, focusing especially on the attitudes of the majority population towards these ethnic groups. In the fifth chapter we briefly presented how the key challenges to social inclusion are defined in the Slovenian NAP/ inclusion (2004-2006), what are the NAP's main objectives and which are the groups targeted by its policies. Following the description of the NAP some demographic data on the Roma and the new ethnic minorities are presented as well as relevant information on their legal status in Slovenia. All this should provide the reader with background information to better understand the policies that are evaluated in Chapter VII.' (excerpt)