To the Bitter End? In Serbian Elections, Student Movement Seeks to Topple Strongman

The Student Movement

On November 1, 2024, a concrete canopy outside the train station of the northern Serbian city Novi Sad collapsed, ultimately leading to the deaths of 16 passersby. Almost immediately, the incident triggered civil unrest. The train station had been freshly reopened after a renovation conducted by Chinese contractors, and many blamed corruption and shoddy workmanship. Endemic corruption has long been a feature of Serbian political culture in the eyes of its citizens. The relationship between the government and the construction industry in particular has long played a uniquely significant role in the state’s constellation of corruption, with both groups frequently sidestepping laws and regulations for expediency and self-enrichment.

In the immediate aftermath of the tragedy, tensions roared between angry protesters, likely pro-regime provocateurs, and police at the Novi Sad city hall. Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić and his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) have long responded to protests by ignoring them or pretending to meet their demands, thereby embarrassing them publicly by undermining their platforms. Since the collapse, he has attempted to placate the dissidents with high-level firings and halfhearted prosecutions, but to no avail. Angry residents of one crisis-stricken city grew into a national student-led movement. Interestingly, this campaign has been run from democratically orchestrated student plena with no core leadership, deciding their moves and demands by vote and avoiding the appearance of a single, suppressible leader.

Mass protests spread, surpassing popular mobilization levels not seen in Serbia since the Bulldozer Revolution, the first of the so-called peaceful, opposition-uniting color revolutions that toppled autocrats in the early 2000s. The movement featured major rallies (such as one in Belgrade that drew as many as 325,000), university student strikes, rights petitions delivered by bicycle to the European court in Strasbourg, and the likely use of sonic weapons by the government on protesters (illegal under Serbian law). Its lack of leaders, and fear of alienating its national, pan-ideological support base, hindered  the movement from bringing its weight into the political sphere in clear support of an alternative.

Eventually, students formed a list of candidates of their own and called for early parliamentary elections. Vučić signaled this summer that he would invite these elections, upon announcing that he would resign from the theoretically ceremonial presidency from which he has in practice led Serbia since 2017. Instead, he has sought to return to the office of prime minister, the country’s legitimate power center, which he held from 2014 to 2017. Ultimately, in the October 25 elections, the two-year-old student movement will test whether it has the strength to overcome the entrenched illiberal regime Vučić and his allies have built since vanquishing the weak center-left in 2012.

Fall and Rise of a One-Man Show

On October 5, 2000, a peaceful mass-movement reached its height, with protesters of all political stripes storming the Serbian National Assembly (parliament). This movement and its final climactic act successfully pressed Slobodan Milošević, the authoritarian nationalist leader through the Yugoslav wars, into finally accepting his defeat in the September 24 election. It marked the beginning of the Serbian transition to democracy — or so it seemed. Milošević handed off the presidency of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (Serbia and Montenegro) to Vojislav Koštunica, the hardline conservative winner of an all-opposition primary, backed by the student movement “Otpor” (Resistance). 

At the end of 2000, the same movement won the parliamentary election and liberal Zoran Ðinđić became prime minister in January. Civil society, which had contributed to the opposition, grew stronger, and the government grew more transparent and Western-aligned. Meanwhile, Milošević was extradited to the Hague to stand trial, removing him from the political scene once and for all. And then, in 2003, Ðinđić was gunned down on the streets of Belgrade. 

The collapse of the movement that toppled Milošević was expedited, and tensions and divided government ruled the landscape until 2008, when center-left Boris Tadić won the presidency. But Tadić proved unable to appease Western demands for reform, liberalization, and diplomacy with newly declared independent Kosovo, and unable to placate the Serbian domestic audience irritated by economic problems and firmly opposed to Kosovar independence. By 2012, the far-right-turned-centrist ex-Milošević ally Vučić became deputy prime minister and began calling the shots after his center-right Serbian Progressive Party won presidential and parliamentary elections.. Since then, he has upstaged allies and rivals alike to dominate the political scene, developed political and economic realities dependent on him alone, and consolidated control over most of the media. He has governed, in theory, from the pro-Europe center-right, but has frequently courted radicals and has avoided making most of the concessions on rule-of-law reform, Kosovo, and Russia sanctions necessary for his country to move toward EU accession.

What Happens Now, and What Should Happen Next

The Student List faces an uphill battle against SNS. Even if this election is free — and past allegations of stolen elections such as the 2023 Belgrade election raise doubts that it will be — Vučić’s control of the media and entrenched support would make it a tough one. The politically disparate nature of the opposition certainly does it no favor. Victory may be possible, but it would prove a daunting task, and governing successfully in a way that would deny SNS a quick return to power could prove even more challenging.

When the votes are counted and the dust is settled, regardless of the result, the West must find a new approach to Belgrade. For years, the Vučić regime has secured friendly statements and tacit campaign help from Western leaders against weaker rivals in exchange for false promises of reform and halfhearted diplomatic efforts toward former province Kosovo. In effect, much like the old satirical Soviet adage, the EU-Serbia relationship has mirrored the idea that “we pretend to work, and they pretend to pay us.” The result has been a rising rejection of Europe and its ideals, and the erosion of Western influence writ large from a region Washington already pays half the attention it deserves.

Irrespective of whether Aleksandar Vučić returns to the premiership or loses power, the EU owes Serbia, and all candidate states, a more serious reflection on Serbia’s lack of substantive progress on issues from the rule of law to Russia and Kosovo. 

As the EU moves closer to admitting Balkan states Montenegro and Albania, seeking to prove it still has the capacity to grow and change, it should not act under illusion. Joined by Washington, Brussels should demand serious progress from Serbia, or reconsider its EU candidacy, regardless of who is in charge on October 26.

Staff Editor: Alison Xiao

Managing Editor: Natalia Dussán