Politics

Brazil has fallen, who will be next? Authoritarian populism is rattling the Western World, whose liberalism had hitherto appeared unassailable. Michael Zürn, one of the directors of the Berlin Social Science Center, held a lecture in Belgrade on the reasons behind the success of the new Right. Here is an interview with him for NIN Weekly, published on November 8 2018, by Marko Lovric.

An analysis of this year's presidential and local election in Montenegro and the resulting state of its public and political life.  

The simplest explanation for the outcome of the vote held on 11 June would be to use the title of a popular feature film from former Yugoslavia: Već viđeno (“Déjà vu”). After this latest snap election, the situation is so complicated that there is already an opinion prevailing that no solution can be found and that these results can with certainty lead only to a new snap parliamentary election.

Almost every museum in Cape Town which in some way covers the period of apartheid includes among its exhibits a wooden bench with a variant of the sign “Whites Only” on it. This is no surprise, because these benches are a very vivid reminder of the brutal racial segregation which lasted in South Africa up to the mid-1990s. However, I was somewhat amazed that, in Cape Town today, there are almost no public benches, so that, if you want to sit down somewhere and have a rest in the city centre, you have to buy a coffee, a juice or a sandwich.

In just under two months, Serbia will have a new President and a new Prime minister. What was the electoral process like and what will the switch at the helm mean for the state of democracy in Serbia?

Montenegro has exited its latest regular election cycle in a state of emergency of sorts, with many questions that will continue to divide its society.

The IMF delegation's mid-June visit to Serbia has briefly suppressed the country's traditional problems, bringing to the forefront an additional one, namely the reform of the public sector.  

For the second time, Serbian Prime Minister Vučić has reconfirmed his mandate by means of new elections. The EU interprets the election victory as a pro-European signal. What does his Progressive Party really stand for?

Vetëvendosje election victory in Prisinta, changed the balance of powers in Kosovo. The delegation headed by the mayor of Pristina Spend Ahmeti has recently visited Berlin.

 In light of the stagnant economy, fiscal problems are coming to the forefront. They consist of high state expenditure which is partially financed by indebtedness, but also of irrational utilization of loans taken, which are being used as a means for buying the social peace, instead for investments – for example, in infrastructure.

At the panel discussion "Media (un) freedom in South Eastern Europe" on July 9, 2015 journalists from Bulgaria, Bosnia, Kosovo, Macedonia, Montenegro and Serbia reported on the highly critical situation of the media system in their countries.

Will Serbia continue to justify internal authoritarianism by its steps towards the stabilization of the Balkans, or will Serbia even switch to conflict? President Nikolić seems to be in favor of conflict:

Countries applying for accession to the European Union also have to deal with the Union‘s Common Foreign and Security Policy, and eventually adopt it. This currently implies taking up a position on the annexation of Crimea which occurred contrary to international law, and on the war in eastern Ukraine, which is a difficult task for the Serbian Government.

Analysis of Serbian domestic and foreign policies with regard to relations with Russia, the European Union and countries in the region.