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Filip Balunović is a PhD candidate at the Department of Political Science and Sociology, Scuola Normale Superiore. His research interests include political economy, social movements, Marxism, political philosophy and political theory. Balunović is the executive editor of the Serbian edition of Le Monde Diplomatique and author of the book Freedom Notebooks (Mediteran, 2014) (Serbian, Beleske sa slobode).

For issue #38 of The Internationalist, Balunović examines how amidst the post-socialist transition, the former Yugoslavian region is witnessing a rising left-wing movement with varying success.

In accordance with unofficial definitions of the post-socialist transition, such as the ‘eternal beginning’ or the ‘process that does not have an end’, it looked, until recently, like the condition of the successor countries of former Yugoslavia will forever stay paradigmatic for the concept of ‘developing states’. Pretty much, the deadlock has come about due to the absence of progressive political actors, who could take care of the interests of people, instead of the interest of elites and capital. In the last decade, however, the region in question was affected by the wave of left-wing protests and non-institutional struggles that addressed issues such as education, ecology, social and economic inequalities and work. After more than ten years of ‘street contestation’, the poor institutions in countries like Serbia, Croatia or Bosnia and Herzegovina, are about to get enriched by actors who had spent years trying to make them work in the public interest. This time, these actors are either inside the system or are much more effective at forcing institutions to act more responsibly.

Let us start with the most successful story – the capital of Croatia, Zagreb. This city was among the pioneers in the student resistance to the commodification of high education in the second half of the 2000s. The struggle of the student movement that occupied the Faculty of Philosophy has been widely heard and resonated, both practically and intellectually, with the rest of the region. Many activists from Serbia and Bosnia got inspired and encouraged by the persistent and quite radical attitude of Zagreb’s youth who made a big come back of the left ideas possible. Free education for all, social justice and support to the workers’ struggles became constitutive elements of the new social force that was becoming louder than before. Along with this struggle, there was a development of green activism that insisted on ecological issues and municipalism. Soon, these two lines of social contestation could join their forces, which made the coalition called ‘Možemo’ (We can) possible. In the last couple of years, this group worked through the parliament of Zagreb and showed that the true left is much more than what the mainstream social democrats have been offering in the past decades. Eventually, the coalition gave birth to the new leader, Tomislav Tomašević, who managed to win the local elections in 2021 and become the mayor of the Croatian capital. In the meanwhile, the coalition entered the national parliament where it became, more or less, the only left opposition to neoliberal and nationalist domination of the ruling Croatian Democratic Union (HDZ). 

Serbia is, on the other hand, in many respects similar, but also tangibly different case than Croatia. Of course, problems that bother every transition country – such as neglecting public interest and the predatory rule of domestic and foreign capital, are shared. The political landscape is, nonetheless, different – especially when talking about the position of the social and political left. Unlike Croatia, but also other former-Yugoslav republics, Serbian left has been additionally discredited because Milosević’s nationalist Socialist Party was presenting itself as ‘leftist’ in the 1990s. This ideological twist significantly affected the chances of the progressive left to make a breakthrough and become a relevant political force. Despite these unfavorable circumstances, the social movements agitating for public interest and empowering the marginalized and economically deprived, managed to gain more public attention and visibility. Groups such as ‘Ne da(vi)mo Beograd’ (Don’t let Belgrade D(r)own), ecological movement, political platform ‘Solidarnost’ and others joined their forces and, after more than a decade of social struggles – entered the national parliament in 2022 elections and, at the same time, became the largest opposition in the municipal parliament of Belgrade. The same old nationalist and neoliberal political elite somehow managed to win power once again, but this time it will be challenged institutionally from the left, as well. Considering the unenviable situation in terms of political landscape and political culture in Serbia overall, this situation is better than ever in the past 30 years. 

In terms of structural constrains and misfortunate state design, Bosnia and Herzegovina is the most hostile environment for the left, among the three biggest countries in the region of former Yugoslavia. Its ethnic key which perpetuates divisions based on identity, jeopardizes progressive left politics, in advance. Nevertheless, some sparks of popular resistance appeared in 2014, when the protests of people for social justice and basic human dignity shook the political elites. Shortly after, the status quo got stabilized again. The last contesting initiative came from the social movement organized around the issue of protecting rivers from mini hydro power plants (MHE). Even though the group has not grown strong enough to compete at the elections, they managed to put pressure on the decision-makers and strongly agitate for the law that would prohibit building MHE on the territory of Federation of BiH, one of the two entities in the country. Finally, this initiative got passed. The other entity of Republika Srpska, did not see a similar tendency – either in 2014 or recently. The only wave of serious contestation of the regime of Milorad Dodik was the movement ‘Justice for David’, after a young David Dragicevic was brutally killed. In spite or precisely because of serious indications that the highest echelons of the government and the police stand behind this murder, the killers were never brought to justice. This movement however, never had a clear left perspective. It survived until today, even though it was systematically attacked from the highest political positions. 

Among other countries of former Yugoslavia, the situation looks promising for the left-wing actors only in Slovenia, where the left party ‘Levica’ made a coalition with the centrists and, for the first time after years spent in the national parliament, came to power. North Macedonia is (still) suffering from identity issues and after changing name under the pressure of Greece, it faced another disappointment of not getting the candidate status for membership to the EU. Problems regarding the issue of language (Bulgarians claiming that Macedonian is actually Bulgarian) make things more unfavorable for the left which, oftentimes, turns nationalistic due to the unresolved identity matters. Kosovo, on the other hand, has its own specific, post-war context, which gave birth to the movement ‘Self-determination’. With a number of left-leaning and a number of more nationalist members, on the one hand, and the dominant leader Albin Kurti whose political messages gravitated towards radical left or extreme right - depending on the occasion and political opportunities and/or limitations, this movement ended up more nationalist than progressive. While the left-wing membership left the movement, whereby some of them are now part of the civil sector, the reactive leader became the prime minister. Instead of focusing on social inequalities and deeply impoverished society, he is putting much effort on identity issues and ‘cold war’ against Serbia. The left is not doing any better in Montenegro either. The same problem with identity and conflict over the position of the Serbian Orthodox church and boiling Serbian and Montenegrin nationalisms, make any left perspective almost impossible. The prime minister, ethnic Albanian centrist Dritan Abazovic, brought less improvement and more disappointment. The most serious opposition to the criminalized governance of the several decades-long rule of Milo Djukanovic was the Serbian nationalist option and in that context, Abazovic and his political movement URA are probably the least bad option for Montenegro at the moment. In the meanwhile, the candidate of the political movement “Europe Now” managed to defeat Djukanovic in the 2023 presidential elections and remove the former Montenegrian president from power after more than three decades. 

Finally, the perspectives of the region of former Yugoslavia, in terms of the possibility to see a more radically emancipatory left, are varying. In the two EU member states, Croatia and Slovenia, we saw the emancipatory left in local and national governments. In Serbia, we saw the wide “green-red” movement in the institutions, both locally and nationally. In Bosnia, institutions remained unreachable for the more progressive actors, mainly due to ethnic politics that is still shaping the country’s political landscape. Some social actors, nonetheless, made tangible achievements in terms of pressuring institutions to act in public, rather than private interest. Other countries, like Montenegro, Kosovo or North Macedonia, remained stuck in the transitional status quo, still waiting to give birth to relevant left political actors.   

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