The thing about freedom

One, two, three – free! Students on the way to an election campaign event. The number “3” was the symbol of the student list (“students win”)

One, two, three – free! Students on the way to an election campaign event. The number “3” was the symbol of the student list (“students win”)

Aleksandar Vučić, disempowered by students after twelve years of rule, explained the election victory of their Studentska lista (SL) as follows: "A revolution with the direct support of various European countries and the American deep state." Of course, this conspiracy narrative doesn't really fit the story: When thousands of Serbs protested against a lack of transparency and corruption in 2016, EU Enlargement Commissioner Johannes Hahn praised the "excellent and trusting cooperation." Vučić's government. When tens of thousands protested against the brutalization of politics and the media in 2023 after two shootings (Jungle World 25/2023), EU Commission President Ursula von der Leyen congratulated the Serbian leadership on, of all things, the reforms in media freedom. In 2024, Chancellor Olaf Scholz secured the German auto industry access to lithium from the Serbian Jadar Valley (Jungle World 35/2024). Protests by environmentalists had previously led to the project to extract the raw material being temporarily stopped. Even after a year of violence and repression against the student movement, the EU Commission remained in discussions with Vučić and was able to do little more than appeal for respect for freedom of assembly.

The student list doesn't say a word about the authoritarian politics of the Serbian nationalist party SNSD in Republika Srpska, which is in no way inferior to the Vučić regime in terms of corruption.

Vučić's domestic political propaganda against the EU contributed to the fact that support for EU accession fell from 56 percent to just under a third during his term in office. The EU also has itself to blame for the fact that the promise of accession in Serbia cannot win an election because of its lack of support for democratic forces for years.

The SL program emphasizes the strategic and economic partnership with the EU, which recently accounted for around 60 percent of Serbia's foreign trade. Many of their demands on justice and fundamental rights coincide with the EU's accession requirements. However, there was not enough in the program to commit to joining.

While the SL takes a side more clearly than Vučić in the Israel-Palestine conflict and derives its anti-Israel stance from the Serbian experience as a "victim of genocide and ethnic cleansing," it seems to want to continue Vučić's policy with regard to Russia and Ukraine. He boasted that his foreign policy was between the EU and the USA on the one hand and Russia and China on the other. The SL program maintains Serbia's military neutrality and is committed to the territorial integrity of all sovereign states, including Ukraine, but excludes sanctions against Russia.

One reason for rejecting sanctions is Serbia's energy dependence: the country obtains 90 percent of its natural gas cheaply from Russia. The SL wants to reduce this dependency. With regard to the Kosovo issue, however, it maintains its ties with Russia and wants to continue to secure its support in the UN Security Council for Serbia's "territorial integrity."

In recent years, polls have shown that up to 90 percent of Serbs rejected recognition of Kosovo, which the constitution declares to be an “integral part of Serbian territory.” The SL also promises that a government supported by it will "consistently resist" Kosovo's independence. Members of the Vučić government are threatened with criminal prosecution if it turns out that they have made “unconstitutional agreements to the detriment of Serbia” with regard to Kosovo.

The student movement's demand for the so-called international community to "respect applicable law" with regard to Kosovo goes in the same direction. The SL refers to UN Resolution 1 244 of 1999, which recognizes the territorial integrity of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, of which Serbia is the legal successor. However, the fact that the International Court of Justice concluded in 2010 in a legal opinion initiated by Serbia that Kosovo's declaration of independence did not violate Resolution 1 244 remains unmentioned. Such a purposive reference to international law suggests that the legal justification of Serbia's claim to Kosovo merely disguises the political claim.

The SL proclaims: "The citizens of Serbia must have control over their entire national territory - that is the fundamental prerequisite for freedom." While in domestic policy issues it combines "freedom" with democratic participation, social security and protection against state arbitrariness, its concept of freedom is reversed in Kosovo. Here the freedom of Serbian citizens is linked to the rule over Kosovo - the freedom of Kosovars is not mentioned.

The SL also shows a similarly eclectic understanding of law and freedom with regard to the Republika Srpska (RS), the Serb-dominated part of Bosnia and Herzegovina. It announces that it wants to protect its constitutional status and veto rights over national institutions. She does not criticize the RS leadership's constitutional violations, such as the attempt to prevent the work of national justice and security institutions in the territory of Republika Srpska.

They want to expand cooperation with Republika Srpska and don't say a word about the authoritarian politics of the Serbian nationalist party SNSD, which is in no way inferior to the Vučić regime in terms of corruption, disregard for media freedom and basic democratic rights and also regularly stirs up fears of war with the threat of a secession of Republika Srpska from the state as a whole. The student list's policy towards the RS leadership will show how closely it takes fundamental rights in foreign policy.

The students demanded that the Vučić government comply with applicable law, but in terms of foreign policy they interpret what is applicable law very selectively. They only refer to international law when it can be used against Kosovo's independence and ignore the constitutional violations by Republika Srpska. While they pursue a progressive program domestically, their position on Kosovo serves nationalist sentiments.

Despite all the positive things that the students have achieved and are undertaking in domestic policy, the impulse to overlook some things in foreign policy for reasons of opportunity is understandable. But the students came with the promise of honesty. You should take them at their word, even with questions that can make you uncomfortable in Serbia.