The I F P A  K O K K A L I S S E R I E S on

SOUTHEAST EUROPEAN POLIC Y

Volume 2

New Approaches to Balkan Studies

Series Editors
Dimitris Keridis
Charles M. Perry
N E W A PPROAC H E S T O BA L K A N S T U DI E S

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New Approaches to Balkan Studies

Volume Edited by
Dimitris Keridis, Ellen Elias-Bursac,
and Nicholas Yatromanolakis

A Publication by

e Institute for Foreign Policy Analysis, Inc.

In Association with e Fletcher School of Law and Diplomacy, Tus University
e Kokkalis Program on Southeastern and East Central Europe,
John F. Kennedy School of Government, Harvard University
and e Kokkalis Foundation of Athens, Greece

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N E W A PPROAC H E S T O BA L K A N S T U DI E S

iv
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 

Foreword ix
Larry Wolff
Preface xv
Ellen Elias-Bursac
Introduction xvii
Nicholas Yatromanolakis

I. PERCEPTIONS AND IDENTITIES 

Chapter  
Byzantinism: The Imaginary and Real Heritage of Byzantium
in Southeastern Europe
Dimiter G. Angelov
Chapter  
The Past as a Symbolic Capital in the Present: Practicing Politics of
‘Dance Tradition’ in the Florina Region, Northwest Greek Macedonia
Ioannis Manos

II. DEMOCRACY, NATIONALISM, AND CONFLICT 

Chapter  
Understanding Greek-Ottoman Conflict: Statist Irredentism, Belligerent
Democratization or a Synthesis?
George Gavrilis
Chapter  
In Defense of the Nation: Iuliu Maniu, the National Peasant Party,
and the Communist Takeover of Romania
Daniel M. Pennell
Chapter  
Ethnic Tensions and the Leadership Vacuum within the
Yugoslav Government, -
Laurie West Van Hook
Chapter  
Delayed Transition and the Multiple Legitimacy Crisis of Post- Yugoslavia
Florian Bieber

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N E W A PPROAC H E S T O BA L K A N S T U DI E S
Chapter  
Transition and Disruption: The Yugoslav Case in Comparative Perspective
Omer Fisher
Chapter  
Three Outcomes of Ethnic Conflict: The Cases of Bulgaria, Macedonia, and
Yugoslavia, -
Maria Koinova

III. POLITICS & SOCIET Y: PRACTICES & OUTCOMES 

Chapter  
Uslugi: The Role of Political Favors and Connections in Post-Communist
Bulgaria
Nadege Ragaru
Chapter  
The Role of the International Organizations on Women’s Civil Organization
in Post-Communist Bulgaria
Kristen Ghodsee
Chapter  
The Choices that Minorities Make: Strategies of Negotiation with the
Majority in Post-War Bosnia-Herzegovina
Paula Pickering
Chapter  
Understanding Greek Immigration Policy
Katerina Linos
Chapter  
Islam and Politics in the Post-Communist Balkans, -
Xavier Bougarel
Conclusion 
Dimitris Keridis
Contributors 

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Delayed Transition and the Multiple

Legitimacy Crisis of Post-1992 Yugoslavia

Florian Bieber

Our common state is worn out, it served its term and the worst
we can say is that we lived for decades in the unfortunate illusion
and that it was no life to speak of. Finally, these people will meet
again as soon as they stop examining their navels and start look-
ing around them. The meeting will be more pleasant if they find a
way to forget Yugoslavia quickly. If the European integration goes
according to plan, there will be a place for all of us. If it fails, Europe
will share our fate and we will not be sorry in this case either. We
will be avant-garde.
Stojan Cerović, Vreme (Belgrade),  January 

The Serbian questions cannot be solved while ignoring all other

national questions. Every one of these questions ceases to be dem-
ocratic, as soon as a violent resolution is attempted. The path of
violence does not only lead over foreign territory, but also over the
corpses of people of different nationality.
Latinka Perović, Frankfurter Allgemeine Zeitung,  November 

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I I . D E M O C R A C Y, N AT I O N A L I S M , A N D C O N F L I C T
As of  October , all countries in Eastern Europe, with one exception, have
undergone a change of power through elections at least once since . Yugo-
slavia was the only country in the region that did not experience a change of
government in the s, considering that the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS)
– the direct descendant of the League of Communists of Serbia – dominated
its political life until the fall of Miloševi in autumn .
The authoritarian nature of the regime and its ruthless use of nationalism
to mobilize popular support have been offered as explanations for the ten-year
delay in the political transition. However, as this paper will argue, this delay
has instead been the result of a combination of three other important factors:
the creation of a third Yugoslavia, a provisional yet lasting institutional con-
struct; the perpetuation of social, economic, and political crises; and, finally,
the dynamics of the political opposition. This is not to argue that national-
ism has played no role in delaying democratization. However, nationalism as
such has been instrumental in bringing about a change of power in Croatia
and other post-communist countries. It is the role that nationalism played in
interacting with the elements to be analyzed here that helped the regime to
preserve its political power.
This paper will not discuss the policies of the Socialist Party and their effec-
tiveness. It is enough to say that, on this topic, Ognjen Pribićević has argued
that six factors aided the preservation of power of the SPS (a, -):
. Its authoritarian political culture
. Its pragmatic adaptation of policies to new circumstances: in -, it
was pro-Yugoslav and Marxist; in - it advocated a strong Serbia in
a strong Yugoslavia; in - it was extremely nationalist; in - it
claimed moderation and presented itself as the “peace” party; and from
 onward it has been patriotic, defying outside interference
. Its use of the nomenklatura to preserve total control over the state
. Its control over the media
. Its gerrymandering and the existence of beneficial election laws
. Its promotion of a more positive view of communist heritage than in other
post-communist countries
The focus of this paper rests on other elements that helped the regime sur-
vive throughout the s and that remain problematic even since the change
of power. After examining the creation of the third Yugoslavia and its impli-

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cations for delaying political change, the paper will turn to the role crises have
played in hindering democratic transition. In addition, it will explore the role
of the political opposition in the failure to formulate a coherent political alter-
native before mid-. In conclusion, the paper examines some of the rea-
sons that these hurdles of democratic transition were eventually overcome in
the fall of .

The Third Yugoslavia: The Country Nobody Wanted

John Lampe entitled his recent history of Yugoslavia Twice there was a Coun-
try (), yet since  there has been a third country carrying once more
the name of “Yugoslavia.” It did not receive international recognition until late
, and it continues to labor under internal institutional inconsistencies and
dysfunction. Consisting of Serbia and Montenegro, its construction – though
provisional – has lasted over nine years already. The country’s future, however,
remains highly questionable. Since the change of power in Montenegro and the
NATO administration of Kosovo, the reach of Yugoslav institutions extends
not much beyond the Republic of Serbia. Even the electoral victory of Vojislav
Koštunica did not fundamentally alter the narrow scope of the Yugoslav gov-
ernment. But even earlier, this third Yugoslavia was an oddity among the states
emerging from the end of the Cold War in Eastern Europe and from the col-
lapse of the old Yugoslavia. Its name is a triple misnomer: first, as the name
implies, Yugoslavia sought to unite the South Slav population in Southeastern
Europe. The new Yugoslavia does not include the majority of Croats and Mus-
lims (later Bosniaks), and it includes virtually no Slovenes or Macedonians and
only a few Bulgarians. Second, in the new Yugoslavia only two-thirds of the pop-
ulation belongs to the two dominant nations – Serbs and Montenegrins – and
the remaining one third of the population comprises large minorities, which
could hardly be described as South Slavs and include over  million Albanians
and some , Hungarians. Although the name suggests a construction dif-
ferent from that of a classic nation-state, the position of minorities in the third
Yugoslavia hardly differs from those in classic nation-states. Third, this Yugo-
slavia, despite attempts to emerge as the successor and the continuation of the
previous state, has carried with it very little from the previous Yugoslavia in
terms of territory, political tradition, or approaches to the national question,
with the possible exception of one-party rule. Half a year before the creation of

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I I . D E M O C R A C Y, N AT I O N A L I S M , A N D C O N F L I C T
the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) in , Stojan Cerović remarked in
Vreme on  January  that “... few [people] in Serbia believe that something
remotely fitting the name of Yugoslavia can be preserved, ... [and the attempt to
preserve it] has more to do with the probate proceedings concerning legal and
material inheritance, than with any real allegiance to the idea of Yugoslavia.”
Accordingly, opinion polls carried out in  showed that less than two-thirds
of the population accepted the new Yugoslavia. Vera Marković has attributed
this popular discontent with the FRY to the reluctance of the regime to hold a
referendum on the creation of Yugoslavia, unlike in Montenegro where such a
vote did take place (, ). Rather, one could assume the reverse relation-
ship: the regime was insecure about its popular support and thus refrained
from holding a referendum so as to avoid a possible defeat in a referendum.
The new Yugoslavia likewise never enjoyed the full support of the political elite,
especially among the opposition and national minorities. While the democratic
opposition accused the regime of ignoring democratic procedures, the Serbian
Radical Party (SRS) and other nationalist parties and movements objected to
the state on the grounds that it did not reflect the need to create a centralized
(greater) Serbian state. The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia has remained a tran-
sitory construction ever since.
The prime reason offered for the constitution of the third Yugoslavia was
the legal argument that Yugoslavia was not in the process of disintegration, as
established by the legal expert for the European Community, Robert Badinter,
but was decimated by secession, making the entity that remained the rightful
successor to the original state. In addition, the fact that the creation of FRY
occurred nearly simultaneously with the beginning of the war in Bosnia has
given rise to the explanation that the new country was mostly a smokescreen
to dispel accusations of active involvement of Serbia and Montenegro in the
war.
The third Yugoslavia was created not only for foreign consumption; it also
served a significant function internally, stabilizing the political elite that came
to power in the late s and centered around Slobodan Milošević. While the
Socialist Party of Serbia won strong representation in the Serbian parliament
in , the protests of  March  demonstrated a growing and potentially
threatening opposition to the regime. The Federal Republic of Yugoslavia was
created and maintained very much as an alternative framework within which
the SPS and its partners could extend control over the state. Its creation by

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the remnants of the remnants’ of the federal Chamber of the SFRY [Socialist
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia] Assembly” (Antonić , ) – the unelected
members from Montenegro and Serbia of an assembly whose term expired and
whose other members left during  – attested to the predominance of the
Socialist Party and its unwillingness to play by democratic rules. This ques-
tionable process by which the institutional framework of the third Yugosla-
via was created undermined the basic legitimacy of the new state. Its strong
links to the Socialist regime through institution building and nomenklatura
rendered the Federal Republic a vulnerable construction, challenged from a
variety of directions.
Despite the pro-Yugoslav rhetoric of the Yugoslav United Left (JUL), the
neo-communist party of Mira Marokvic, it was not in an attempt to re-create
a larger Yugoslavia that the regime pursued the creation of the Federal Repub-
lic. In fact, the Yugoslav idea came to an end at roughly the same time as the
new, third Yugoslavia was created. Latinka Perović, historian and secretary of
the Central Committee of the Serbian League of Communists during its lib-
eral phase in the early s, considered Yugoslavism after the end of Yugo-
slavia as a dangerous illusion. In the  November  issue of Frankfurter
Allgemeine Zeitung she wrote, “After all that has happened, the idea of Yugo-
slav renewal can only appear as a result of political immaturity in the heads of
the partners here, who imagine that one can easily forget the realty of murder
and destruction.”
The first election for the federal parliament in May  was boycotted by
the opposition, with the result that the new parliament was a close replica of
the previous, pre-democratic one. The subsequent elections in December 
and November  confirmed the predominance of the SPS and its (changing)
allies. More importantly, the rare meetings of the parliament provide evidence
of the impotence of parliamentary democracy in the light of authoritarian rule
(Antonić (, -). By controlling two parallel institutional systems, the fed-
eral and the state, the Socialist Party could shift power from one to the other,
in the event that the opposition won the elections for either. This arrangement
also allowed Slobodan Milošević to maintain the façade of legitimacy when
he exchanged the Serbian presidency for the Yugoslav presidency in . The
Federal Republic of Yugoslavia can be thus seen as an alternative basis for the
preservation of the regime’s power. As Robert Hayden remarked, “[t]he Con-
stitution of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia... must be viewed primarily as a

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vehicle for maintaining the personal power of Slobodan Milošević rather than
a serious constitutional document” (, ). Accordingly, the election of the
reformist offspring of the Montenegrin Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS)
under the leadership of Milo Djukanović in  created a threat to this struc-
ture, since half of the members of one of the two houses of the federal parlia-
ment, the Chamber of the Republics, are nominated by the parliament of each
constituent republic. The federal institutions proved incapable of addressing the
double challenge to the federal system: the questioning of Slobodan Milošević’s
authority in Yugoslavia and the de facto predominance of Serbia in the joint
institutions. The result has been federal institutions (executive and parliamen-
tary) that no longer enjoy the support of one of their constituent members. As
a matter of fact, FRY had de facto ceased to exist by early . The legally dubi-
ous nature of the constitutional changes in July  in preparation for the elec-
tions further undermined the legitimacy of the Yugoslav state.

Alternative Plan: Yugoslavia or Serbia?

Despite the criticism from all sides of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia since
its creation – from national minorities, large parts of the Montenegrin politi-
cal elite, and the democratic and nationalist opposition to the regime – few
viable alternative plans remain. A notable element of most alternative plans
has been their reduction to the particular interest of the group seeking to
change the state structure. For example, most plans proposed by the Albanian
political elites in Kosovo were mainly focused on achieving a status for Kosovo
between far-reaching autonomy and independence (see Troebst ). Simi-
larly, plans for change from Montenegro focused first on increasing the status
of the republic within the federation and later on independence. Even the Ser-
bian political opposition limits its plans for reform mostly to Serbia; Yugosla-
via is conspicuously absent from party programs. Altogether, the plans of one
group were often found to be in greater conflict with other alternative plans
than with the status quo.
For a number of opposition parties, the territorial question plays an impor-
tant role and concerns Yugoslavia less than the Serb nation. In its post-Dayton
party program, the Serbian Renewal Movement (Srpski Pokret Obnove, or
SPO) declares demonstratively that it leaves “the renewal of Yugoslavia... to
dreamers and future generations.” While rejecting any attempt to recreate Yugo-
slavia, its program insists on “just borders” with Croatia, the impossibility of

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 Delayed Transition and the Legitimacy Crisis in Post-1992 Yugoslavia
drawing borders with Muslims (“We cannot draw borders with the Moslems,
because our roots are intertwined and because we live together in Bosnia and
Herzegovina, Raška, Montenegro and Macedonia.”), and close relations with
Bosnia and Herzegovina, Montenegro, and Macedonia without defining them
in any detail (SPO ). The alternative vision of the Serbian Renewal Move-
ment draws on anticommunist conceptions and foresees the reestablishment of
a constitutional monarchy headed by Crown Prince Aleksandar Karadjordjević.
The territory to be occupied by this new state remains undefined and is open
to the interpretations of the party’s leader.
The Democratic Party (Demokratska Stranka, or DS), on the other hand,
acknowledges the existence of the third Yugoslavia in its program and refrains
from objecting to the state per se. However, it insists on “the right of the Serb
people to self-determination in the former Yugoslav republics in the same
manner in which this right was exercised by the Slovenes, Croats, Macedo-
nians and Moslems” (DS ). The practical implications remain limited to a
plea for integration in practically all fields between Yugoslavia and the Repub-
lika Srpska. The Democratic Party, like most of the other opposition parties
with the exception of the Serbian Radical Party, insists on the peaceful means
of achieving the inclusion of Serb territories in the state, according to interna-
tional rules (DS ). Representing the majority of the democratic opposition,
the Democratic Party supports decentralization of the new country.
The Democratic Party of Serbia (Demokratska Stranka Srbije, or DSS) under
the leadership of Vojislav Koštunica, also pleaded for the regionalization of
Serbia as a solution for the Kosovo crisis before it escalated in . This pro-
posed decentralization, however, stopped short of a federal arrangement involv-
ing Kosovo and would have been unacceptable to the Albanian community
(DSS ). The DSS clearly tried to break with the Yugoslav state and insisted
that any new state to be created by a constitutional assembly should “include
the Serb national name”(DSS ).
After the electoral success of the DS and DSS as part of the Democratic Oppo-
sition of Serbia (Demokratska Opozicija Srbije, or DOS), the parties did not for-
mulate a coherent platform on the re-creation of Yugoslavia or the establishment
of a new institutional structure. DOS launched the idea of a Union of Serbia
and Montenegro soon after the electoral victory (Reuters  Oct. ), but in
the subsequent months, the new authorities insisted on the reform of existing
state structures instead of the creation of a new political entity. Despite the

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insistence of the vast majority of Serbian political actors that Kosovo remain
as part of Yugoslavia, neither the Milošević government nor the new authori-
ties presented a coherent plan for how Kosovo could be effectively reintegrated
into a Yugoslav state.
One of the more colorful alternative plans from the Albanian community
was the one proposed by the Kosovo Albanian politician Adem Demaçi to
create a state called “Balkania.” He launched this project in March  while
president of the Parliamentary Party of Kosova (Bota Sot  April ). The
plan foresaw a confederation created out of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
Such a newly constituted state would have encompassed Montenegro, Serbia,
Kosovo, and possibly Vojvodina and Sandžak as constituent units. Demaçi also
expressed the possibility of Macedonia joining this new confederation (FreeB
Vesti  April ). This proposal has to be seen mostly in the context of Kosovo:
it attempts to maintain the demand for full independence of Kosovo and at
the same time seeks to open a back door by which the Yugoslav government
could accept such an arrangement through some degree of joint institutions.
All constituent parts would have the right to secede and maintain independent
membership in international organizations (Vreme  May ).
The plan did not fare very well and was not even mentioned in the final
communiqué of the meeting of representatives from the Serbian opposition
and Kosovo Albanian leaders – including Demaçi – in New York a few weeks
later, in April  (PER a, b). The Balkania proposal illustrates some
of the challenges regarding the conception of an alternative state construction.
The name itself reveals the awkwardness of alternative names for Yugoslavia,
and the combination of a confederation and independent sub-units demon-
strates the gap in positions of the Kosovo Albanian political spectrum and the
Serbian opposition, not to mention the government. The war in  rendered
Balkania an even more utopian idea than back when the plan was launched.
Sonja Biserko, head of the Serbian Helsinki Committee, has described Serbia
“as a state [that] is still in the making. The territorial question still predomi-
nates the political life” (, ). It would be too simplistic to attribute to
nationalism alone the dominance of the territorial question and subsequently
the issue of who is a citizen of the state. The creation of the clearly transitory
third Yugoslavia in  did not remove the disputes over territory of any
future (Serbian) state from the political agenda, but rather insured their con-
tinuing presence. The lack of any consensus on the size and thus the nature of

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the state has significantly delayed other political decisions and played a detri-
mental role in preventing a close cooperation among the opposition and with
national minorities across the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

Perpetuating Crises
An additional feature of Slobodan Milošević’s regime was the perpetuation of
numerous crises. The s were marked by continuous economic, social, and
political crises. In a Danas (Belgrade) piece published on  November ,
Slobodan Samardžić from the Institute of European Studies described Yugo-
slavia appropriately as a “... federation [that] has emerged from a crisis, it has
operated in a crisis, and it is a crisis that marks its disintegration.” While these
crises have been to some degree the result of international response to the dis-
solution of Yugoslavia (in the form of sanctions, for instance), the regime took
advantage of the crises and used them to preserve its power. The crises and
instability have introduced two important trends into everyday political life
in Serbia: insecurity and the elimination of alternatives.
Insecurity has penetrated all spheres of public life in Serbia. Continuing
inflation, culminating in the hyperinflation of –, wiped out the middle
class, destroyed savings, and reduced economic life to subsistence levels. At
the same time, pyramid schemes and smuggling criminalized the economy,
not only enriching the ruling nomenklatura, but also increasing the feeling of
insecurity among the population. The regime carefully positioned itself as a
moderate force, with the alternatives being portrayed as either too radical and
threatening (Serbian Radical Party) or treacherous (Civil Alliance and Demo-
cratic Party). This perception of insecurity was frequently reinforced by the
policies of the opposition (see below) and the establishment of ill-defined and
unpopular institutions. Such insecurity and fear were visible throughout the
Milošević era. In a survey carried out half a year after the end of the Kosovo
war,  percent of the respondents feared a further decline in the quality of
life;  percent feared inflation;  percent feared not finding a job;  percent
feared sickness and lack of sufficient health care; and  percent were appre-
hensive about a new war. The proliferation of fear is visible if one considers
that  percent feared hunger and over half of those surveyed lived in fear of
becoming refugees.

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The ongoing state of crisis not only perpetuated a feeling of insecurity, but
also allowed the regime to eliminate and marginalize possible alternatives to
its rule in all spheres of life (Gordy ). The de facto state of war during the
conflict in Croatia and Bosnia allowed the regime to draft potential or active
opponents to the government’s policy. In addition, the crises justified calls for
unity, which presented opposition to the government as treachery and betrayal
of the country. Srbobran Branković has summarized the atmosphere as such
that “[t]o accuse someone of ‘shattering the unity of the Serb people’ became
one of the worst insults a politician could utter in the new-old value system”
(, ). This rendered the position for the opposition extremely difficult,
often forcing them to try to appear more patriotic than the government. In
the sphere of the media, the crises prevented the development of an indepen-
dent media able to reach the entire population of Serbia. Limitations due to the
crises ranged from paper “shortages” for independent newspapers to repressive
legal measures (Gordy , -). In the light of the escalating conflict in
Kosovo the Serbian parliament passed an extremely restrictive media law in
October , prohibiting the redistribution of foreign news reports (ANEM
, -). The law resulted in the closure of the most important indepen-
dent media outlets, such as the independent daily Naša Borba, or their mar-
ginalization through the imposition of extremely high fines. Later, during the
war in Kosovo, the remaining independent media were either shut down or
forced to adopt a less confrontational line towards the regime. The wars on
the periphery of the country thus effectively strengthened the control of the
regime in the core areas.
On the political level, numerous elections exhausted the electorate rather than
inducing energy for democratic change. In the eleven years of the Milošević era
twelve elections and referenda took place (Goati ):
• Serbian presidential elections without participation of the opposition,
November 
• Referendum on the order of constitution and multiparty elections, July

• Serbian parliamentary and presidential elections, December 
• Yugoslav parliamentary elections, May 
• Yugoslav parliamentary elections, local elections, and Serbian parliamen-
tary and presidential elections, December 

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• Serbian parliamentary elections, December 
• Yugoslav parliamentary elections and local election, November 
• Serbian parliamentary and presidential elections, September 
• Serbian presidential elections (second round, invalid), October 
• Serbian presidential elections (in two rounds), December 
• Referendum against foreign intervention in Kosovo, April 
• Yugoslav parliamentary and presidential elections, September 
None of the elections, except for the last election, effected a change of power,
but Serbia nevertheless saw a high degree of rotation in political offices, with
nearly ten different Serbian and Yugoslav prime ministers and five presidents.
The frequent elections helped to discredit the political process, as did the lack of
power of the Serbian and Yugoslav Parliaments, and consequently reduced the
willingness of large segments of the population to participate in elections.
The two significant challenges to the regime arose in late  and in the
fall of , with the latter being ultimately successful. Both times Serbia had
emerged from a war the previous year, Bosnia and Croatia in  and Kosovo
in , in which Serbia was the loser. At the same time both phases marked a
(modest) improvement in the previously state-of-war economy. In  most
sanctions had been lifted and political developments in Southeastern Europe
seemed to point towards normalization. The position of Serbia and Yugoslavia
seemed more promising in the first year after the war than at any time since the
dissolution of Yugoslavia began six years earlier. It was precisely at this point
that the failures of the regime could no longer be disguised by the state of war
and sanctions – leading to demonstrations lasting throughout the winter of
-. The failure of the protests could be largely attributed to the oppo-
sition and its failure to capitalize effectively on popular discontent with the
regime. The success of the opposition in the fall of  was largely a result of
learning from the failures of the winter -.

The Role of the Opposition in Delaying Transition

Just as the s saw numerous personnel changes in the government and the
regime and multiple programmatic shifts, the opposition experienced disorder
and constant change as well. The political opposition in the s was marked
by two trends: a high degree of personal continuity, and structural fragmenta-

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tion and discontinuities. Most of today’s leading opposition politicians began
their political careers during the early phase of multiparty democracy and have
worked together in various parties and coalitions (such as DEPOS in -,
Zajedno in -, and Savez za Promene in -). Similarly, all parties
have undergone numerous splits, leading to a proliferation of parties in the
opposition. The Democratic Party, now headed by Zoran Djindjić, for example,
suffered the departure of the Vojislav Koštunica and the creation of his Demo-
cratic Party of Serbia, the departure of Kosta Čavoški and the creation of the
(unsuccessful) Liberal Party, and the departure of Dragoljub Mićunović and
the emergence of the Democratic Center. This high degree of fragmentation,
mostly based on conflicts of personality rather than on any political substance,
stands in stark contrast to an often-invoked call for unity among the political
parties. This has been aptly described by Srbobran Branković: “The national-
ist opposition also insisted on ‘unity,’ pointing out that what distinguished the
Serb nation from others was its sabornost [spirit of unity or community]. This
traditional feature is represented as a key difference between Serb political cul-
ture and newfangled western notions, including multiparty systems” (, ).
Some have argued that it was not only the classical institutions of power pres-
ervation (army, media, and so on) that upheld the Yugoslav regime, but also the
opposition. Dušan Pavlović has described the opposition as the “fourth pillar”
on which the government rested (Vreme  September ).
Before the first elections that took place in December , the opposi-
tion, then led by Vuk Drašković – who ran in simultaneous presidential elec-
tions against Milošević – was convinced that the elections would follow the
same pattern as in the surrounding countries, discarding communism. The
overwhelming victory of the Socialist Party (. percent to . percent of
the next-strongest party, the Serbian Renewal Movement) threw the opposi-
tion into disarray from which it took nearly a decade to recover. Unlike other
countries in transition, Serbia never established a roundtable or similar insti-
tutions of power sharing between government and opposition. Furthermore,
the constitution and the electoral laws were drawn up by the communist Par-
liament without consultations with the opposition. By riding on the populist
anti-bureaucratic wave of the late s, Milošević had successfully convinced
a large segment of the electorate that the political transition had already taken
place with his ascent to power. Another change in favor of the opposition was
thus no longer required. Consequently, the opposition failed to take a consis-

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tent line after this defeat. During various periods it alternated between rejec-
tion of the institutions and cooperation with the regime. Since , both the
Renewal Movement and the Democratic Party have used demonstrations and
alternative parliaments to question the legitimacy of the Serbian and Yugoslav
parliament and government. However, the parties participated in some elec-
tions, while boycotting others, failing to take a clear line on its relationship to
the political framework dominated by the Socialist Party.
In this light, the high degree of fragmentation of the opposition should not
come as a surprise. Similarly, the grand opposition coalitions that toppled the
Communist Party in Central and Eastern Europe fell apart, often shortly after
their electoral victory (Civic Forum/Public against Violence in Czechoslova-
kia, Solidarity in Poland, for example). In Serbia it wasn’t until the summer
of  that such a broad coalition succeeded. It failed before because of the
absence of a minimal consensus over the future of the state, with the territorial
dimension sidelining the democratic one. In addition, some opposition parties
either expected electoral success without a broad coalition or had been granted
a privileged status by the regime. However, even the relatively broad coalitions,
such as DEPOS and Zajedno, could not be sustained beyond the elections. Elec-
tions in Serbia under the Milošević regime reflected in only a limited way the
strength and influence of parties among the population, because of electoral
engineering, fraud, and boycotts. The elimination of marginal political parties
that occurred in other Central and East European countries never took place in
Serbia. As a result, many small opposition parties remain potentially relevant,
as their possible strength was never truly tested. The delayed transition has
furthermore prevented the broad change of opposition party leadership that
occurred in post-communist countries. During this change, opposition intel-
lectuals were often replaced with more experienced technocrats, frequently
members of the old nomenklatura. As a result, the Serbian opposition leader-
ship has remained unchanged in the past decade, and despite its long presence
in political life, it had hardly any experience with political power before it took
office in October . For example, if one excludes Zoran Djindjić’s stint as
mayor of Belgrade for less than half year and Vuk Drašković’s brief term as
(powerless) deputy prime minister of Yugoslavia, neither have had any expe-
rience in office at all.
The opposition’s electoral success in  was the result of a process of
increased cooperation among the parties belonging to the opposition, the for-

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mulation of a political alternative, and the mobilization of civil society. While
this process started with the joint declaration of the opposition in January 
(Betaweek (Belgrade)  January ), this development did not promise polit-
ical change before the summer of . Among the reasons for the success of
the opposition one can distinguish between the development of the Milošević
regime and the ruling parties and the course taken by the opposition. The regime
itself became more authoritarian in the year following the Kosovo war, increas-
ing the polarization of Serbian society. The assassination attempts against Vuk
Drašković and the disappearance of Ivan Stambolić left little room for a rap-
prochement between the regime and some opposition parties. In addition,
the regime’s rhetoric took an increasingly hysterical tone. The regime regu-
larly “revealed” conspiracies and accused the opposition, minorities, and above
all Otpor of conspiring against Serbian interests. Simultaneously the regime
claimed, in numerous ceremonies, to be rebuilding the country after the Kosovo
war, while little significant reconstruction took place; this fact did not go unno-
ticed in the population.
More significant than the change of the regime’s behavior was the opposition’s
success at capitalizing on the popular dissatisfaction with the regime that pre-
ceded the Kosovo war. Civil society organizations, in particular Otpor, succeeded
in mobilizing broad segments of Serbian youth, which had become inactive in
politics after the failure of Zajedno in . Students, frustrated with the oppo-
sition’s infighting in  and the failure of the student protests, adopted a dif-
ferent strategy by not holding large street protests, but by mocking the regime
through small, well-planned performances. These acts revealed some of the
fundamental weaknesses of the regime and of authoritarian regimes in gen-
eral. By not possessing a hierarchical organizational structure, Otpor evaded
both repression by the regime and co-optation by the opposition, rendering it
the force most harshly suppressed by the regime throughout its rule. Frequent
arrests of Otpor members and those who simply wore their T-shirts in early
 helped the movement reach wider segments of the population through-
out Serbia. By July , according to interviews with leading Otpor mem-
bers Slobodan Homen and Milja Jovanović, it could count on some , to
, activists,  local branches, and  regional centers. Through its work,
Otpor has consistently tried not only to place the regime on the defensive, but
also to force the opposition parties to refuse to cooperate in any way with the
regime (Otpor ; Republika ).

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The relative unity of the opposition, in conjunction with a coherent political
and economic platform authored by the think tank Gplus (), an orga-
nization of economists and social scientists, was helped by the absence of Vuk
Drašković’s SPO from the Democratic Opposition of Serbia. The erratic and
authoritarian behavior of Drašković had been an important factor in the col-
lapse of previous coalitions. In addition, the choice of Vojislav Koštunica as a
presidential candidate offered the regime less room for criticism than the choice
of either Djindjić or Drašković would have done. Furthermore, Koštunica pos-
sessed credibility both in terms of his distance from the regime and in his firm-
ness on the “national question,” which other opposition leaders lacked.
The electoral success of DOS, followed shortly by the victory on the streets of
Belgrade, was a clear departure from the opposition’s earlier record of infight-
ing and the pre-eminence of the national question over other political con-
cerns.

Conclusions
The legacy of the Milošević regime places a difficult burden on the new gov-
ernments of Yugoslavia and Serbia. All the territorial questions that Milošević
opened in the late s and s remain unresolved. Not least of the burdens
is the construction of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia, which created a tem-
porary state structure geared to preserving the power of the regime and failed
to establish coherent institutions or clear territorial delimitation. Both Monte-
negro and Kosovo remain outside Yugoslav control after a change of govern-
ment. Internally, the status of Vojvodina and of minorities in Serbia still has not
been addressed. In addition, the relationship between Serbia and the Republika
Srpska is unclear, especially considering the support offered to extreme nation-
alists by segments of the new authorities in Serbia and Yugoslavia.
In constructing a permanent state structure, the governments of Yugosla-
via and Serbia are faced with the option of concentrating on building a Ser-
bian nation-state in the territory that remains under the government’s political
control (Serbia without Kosovo) or with the creation of a loose political and
economic union with Montenegro (and possibly with Kosovo). The politics
of uncertainty, as promoted by the Milošević regime, are left as a legacy to the
new ruling coalition and pose the biggest threat for its disintegration. The lack
of a coherent vision as to what form the state should take and within which

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borders Serbia should exist is not only a legacy of the Milošević era, but also
of the internal divisions of the Serbian national movement of the s and
s (Pavković ).

N  C S

 Only the new government renounced the claim of the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia
to be the only legal successor to the old Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.
 As Yugoslav opinion polls tend to under-represent members of national minorities,
especially Albanians from Kosovo, the rate is probably significantly lower (Marković
, ).
 On the creation of FRY see Thomas (, -).
 For further details on procedural and constitutional problems of the Yugoslav institu-
tional setup, see Guzina (, -).
 In the aftermath of Koštunica’s electoral victory in September , some commenta-
tors suggested that Milošević might attempt to preserve power by resuming a political
function in Serbia (as Serbian prime minister); the popular protests on  October pre-
vented any continuation of Milošević in power.
 Koštunica, as president of the DSS, emphasized the need for a new constitutional
arrangement of Yugoslavia shortly before becoming president and “defender” of the
same constitution. See Koštunica .
 The reform of the Federal Republic was for the first time an electoral issue for the fed-
eral election in ; see Slavujević (, -).
 Montenegro, for example, has vehemently opposed the demand for a status of republic
for Kosovo, for fear of being further marginalized in a Yugoslav state.
 The role of the Serbian Radical Party is not examined here. As a coalition party of the
Socialist Party (- and since ) it has largely supported the regime and acted
as its nationalist alter ego. It has presented the most concrete yet unrealistic territorial
conceptions of a future Serbian state. See Cohen  and Thomas (, -).
 A platform for change was produced by a number of advisors to Koštunica (Reuters
 January ), based on a proposal written by the Institute for Liberal Studies in
summer  (Mijatović, Popović, and Samardžić ).
 In May  Deputy Prime Minister Nebojša Čović proposed the creation of two
“ethnic” entities in Kosovo with differing degrees of autonomy. This call for recogni-
tion of the de facto partition of Kosovo did, however, lack the support of the Serbian
government, the Albanian community, and the international organizations active in
Kosovo; nor was it part of a coherent plan (FreeB Vesti  May ).

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 The plan has not resurfaced since. Demaçi later shortly became the spokesman of the
Kosovo Liberation Army (UÇK) and was increasingly marginal in the political spec-
trum after rejecting the Rambouillet accords.
 In the wake of the Kosovo war, stronger calls for a renewed autonomy in Vojvodina
emerged (PER ).
 This dynamic became visible with the Socialist Party increasing its share of the vote in
the December  election, at the height of hyperinflation and virtually complete eco-
nomic collapse (Pribićević b, -).
 Matić asserts that in view of these fears, “normal” fears, such as the fear of flying,
became rare: “They have their more immediate fears which resulted from the misfor-
tunes they have lived with for a whole decade” (Matić ; Bjekić ).
 The trigger of the protests was the crude attempt by the government to falsify electoral
defeat in local elections. On the protest and the values of the protesters see Lazić .
 For an overview of the main developments of parties in Serbia see Vukomanović (,
-) and Pribićević (c).
 Goati (, ) seeks to distinguish between relevant and irrelevant parties by dif-
ferentiating between groups that could secure more than  percent of the electorate
and those whose support is lower. As fair elections never took place before Decem-
ber  and as many parties participated in coalitions, this measurement is difficult
to sustain. Furthermore, some parties have been able to exert considerable influence
through their programmatic strength (for example, the Civic Alliance). There also can
be little doubt that the regime deliberately set up parties as a way to fragment the polit-
ical spectrum in Serbia. Furthermore, it successfully managed to split the opposition
coalitions in order to co-opt some of their members to support the government (New
Democracy Party in ) or to participate in elections (Serbian Renewal Movement in
).
 Few analysts and scholars, including this author, would have predicted the opposition’s
success in the spring of . Most remained highly critical of the opposition’s appar-
ent disunity and lack of strategy. In the version of this paper presented at the Kokka-
lis workshop in February , I wrote, “Most of the opposition’s energy is currently
devoted to garnering a degree of unity which would allow it to engage in a joint strat-
egy against the regime and prevent the desertion of parts of the opposition to the gov-
ernment. What the strategy itself could be remains uncertain.” The failure to mobilize
massive public support after the closure of Studio B in May  seemed to confirm
this point of view.
This applied in particular to JUL. The party of Mira Marković gained influence despite
a broad dislike for the party, even among members of the SPS. In the summer of 
the International Crisis Group (ICG) claimed it had over two hundred thousand mem-
bers. Most members had joined the party to increase their economic prospects or were
“encouraged to do so as employees of state-owned enterprises” (ICG ). In the

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Serbian elections in December , the support for JUL was less than . percent
(FreeB Vesti  December ).
 The Yugoslav minister for information, Goran Matić, was particularly notorious for
the conspiracies he regularly “revealed.” The plots included, among others, mercenaries
attempting to assassinate Milošević and foreign agencies smuggling forged money into
the country to destabilize the Yugoslav dinar.
 Otpor, for example, distributed medals to Belgrade citizens after the regime began to
honor “heroes” of the Kosovo war. For further examples see http://www.otpor.net and
http://www.otpor.com.
 The use of the clenched fist as a symbol consciously evokes fascist/communist symbol-
ism, reminiscent of the Slovene band Laibach and the Neue Slovenische Kunst (New
Slovene Art) movement, which used similar techniques in the early s in Slovenia.
See Thompson (, -).
 On the reasons for the success of the opposition, see also Gordy .

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