Enduring Challenges to Democratic Capacity-Building

Serbia

Serbia’s democratic backsliding was further revealed in local elections that took place on March 29 across 10 municipalities. While the victory of Vučić’s ruling SNS coalition was not surprising considering its historical domination in rural areas, thousands of opposition activists attempted to observe and mitigate any potential SNS manipulation. The presence of such opposition demonstrated heightened distrust of the Vučić government and highlights slipping support for SNS that reflects broader nationwide antigovernment sentiments.

The atmosphere surrounding the elections was tense. SNS spent approximately 35.2 million dinars ($345,000) on campaigning to ensure victory in elections that drew fewer than 250,000 voters. In contrast, opposition parties spent the equivalent of a little under $10,000. This disproportionately high SNS spending demonstrates the party’s stress over rising discontent as it uses precautionary campaign spending to ensure continued perceptions of public legitimacy. 

The presence of a record number of observers compounded concerns about the elections’ legitimacy, as the presence of large groups of people at polling sites risks intimidating voters. Additionally, a pro-government nongovernmental organization recruited four U.S. groups to monitor elections: the Young Republican National Federation, the International Organization for the Family, Republicans for National Renewal, and the America First Policy Institute, all aligned with U.S. President Donald Trump’s political agenda. The groups operated under the Centre for Social Stability, which frames itself as an NGO but is made of SNS members and was praised by Vučić as containing “true Serbian patriots.” In healthy democracies, election monitoring is meant to build trust in results and promote transparency. Involvement of SNS officials in the monitoring selections suggests attempts to intimidate voters.  Further concerns include accusations of violence and intimidation tactics, alongside reported assaults on journalists attempting to report on elections, raising questions about election transparency.

At the same time, Vučić seeks to maintain international legitimacy through continued cooperation with Russia. Following an extended sanctions waiver from the United States, which will allow Serbia’s majority Russian-owned energy company NIS to continue importing oil, Vučić secured a three-month extension on Serbia’s natural gas contract with Russia. As the United States continues to allow sanctions waivers for Serbia, Belgrade will maintain its energy dependency on Russian oil, which offers facile, albeit short-term, energy acquisition opportunities, even as Vučić claims that his country is seeking energy diversification. This tactile connectivity allows Russia to sustain its influence in Serbia and the broader Balkan region. The result of sustained cooperation with Moscow, an irredentist actor in its own right, could help give political legitimacy to Vučić’s continued claims over Kosovo. 

Reacting to Kosovar Prime Minister Albin Kurti’s meeting with French President Emanuel Macron, Vučić claimed on March 25 that Kurti’s goal was to demand that Serbia be constrained to never use weapons against Albanians and that NATO leave the land security zone so that the Kosovo Security Force can occupy the northern ethnically Serb-dominated region of the country, information Vučić claims he acquired through his “people” in Kurti’s inner circle He added that these propositions would be “a direct attack on peace, a direct attack on our population, on all of Serbia.” Important to note, these statements came days before the local elections took place, signifying a further attempt to rally public support behind a perceived national security threat. 

While NATO and Kurti have not issued responses, Vučić's baseless claims regarding Kurti’s “demands” are an attempt to diminish Kosovo’s international legitimacy through positioning it as absurd and ignorant of international customs of organizations like NATO.  Such escalatory rhetoric may also serve to draw an arbitrary red line that could be invoked as a means of escalating the security situation on the shared border between Serbia and Kosovo should Kosovo react or deepen coordination with other regional actors, notably its military alliance with Albania and Croatia that Vučić has repeatedly referred to as aggression toward Serbia.