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The Associated Press
@apnews.com

The long-serving strongman leader of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, has conceded defeat in an election that pitted him and his right-wing party against a diverse student-led opposition movement that spent two years protesting his government.

bit.lySerbia’s strongman leader Vucic concedes defeat to student-led movement in seismic political shiftThe long-serving strongman leader of Serbia, Aleksandar Vucic, has conceded defeat in an election that pitted him and his right-wing party against a diverse student-led opposition movement that spent two years protesting his government.

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Chut
@ferret.ing

The corruption is part of the advertising, if someone is powerful enough to do it in clear view that means they are a powerful leader, and these supporters want that far more than they care about some other stranger being mistreated

Insipid Twaddle
@insipidtwaddle.bsky.social

Corruption is the secret sauce as an aspiring autocrat, as looting the treasury buys you the friends in high places that you need to consolidate your control. It's just that anti-corruption also tends to be the secret sauce in getting enough public outrage to overcome all your advantages.

Blake Brown
@antiquequaalude.bsky.social

Yeah I suppose you're right. Didn't really put that together in my head but yeah it's a mechanism of how they maintain their power more than just a choice they do off to the side of everything else

TheKert
@thekert1.bsky.social

The International Democracy Union is a big part of that. An international organization of right wing parties that works to align their policies across different countries.

Blake Brown
@antiquequaalude.bsky.social

Russia knows these figures tear their own country's down and are easy to corrupt with business deals so they'll act in Russia's interest. Russia would be happy to rule over a world lit on fire.

Alon (they/them)
@alonlevy.bsky.social

It's downstream of what Debin Ma described for Qing China. Absolutism -> the autocrat's agents have no security of property from the autocrat -> the autocrat has to tolerate off-books corruption to allow the agents money the autocrat can't easily grab -> lower formal taxation -> low state capacity.

Blake Brown
@antiquequaalude.bsky.social

It makes me mad that this is so obvious, yet educated bureaucrats will go along with it by just making them beneficiaries of that corruption when it's clearly going to destroy their country. This certainly gives credibility to the argument that we should pay politicians more

andycordy.bsky.social
@andycordy.bsky.social

Serbia is a deeply conservative satellite state to the Kremlin. If anyone thinks a country like this can flip into a western style democracy just like that is crazy. The fall of the Berlin wall happened because the Kremlin was weak. Now it's not. It's very angry.

Beat Pulsar
@beatpulsar.bsky.social

The Student List won about 52% to his party's 32%, ending 14 years of Vucic. Two years of protests that started over the Novi Sad canopy collapse actually beat a strongman at the ballot box.

🔞🎨Pommy「Pomegranate Eclipse」
@pomeclipse.itch.io

... what does strongman mean in Serbian politics? I'm just imagining a circle surrounding them as a scrawny teenager sits down with a dude with a Robotnik mustache and red/white striped leotard and giant biceps and beats him in arm-wrestling

Medoyid_ua
@rusni-pizda.bsky.social

Two years of student protests, then a ballot box. Moscow just lost its most reliable Balkan foothold, and the EU enlargement door in Belgrade swings open. Vucic banked Kremlin gas and talking points for a decade; the bill landed.

nonrev
@nonrev321.bsky.social

The US youth today are too fragmented, too focused on their own chosen cause to give more than token and verbal attention to others or anything larger Can you imagine any nation wide youth movement in the US spending 2 years focused on and targeting anything?

penguins18.bsky.social
@penguins18.bsky.social

"Student led" is a bit deceptive. The opposition coalition took its inspiration from student protests over corruption, but the actual opposition list candidates are not students and their leader (and new PM) is a 50 something centrist cardiologist.

Barry Tucker
@btucker.bsky.social

The students nominated the candidates on their list. Most, if not all, of the candidates are not professional politicians. In this sense, the students led. It could be a watershed victory.

Sophia 🏳️‍⚧️🏴
@recursiveservitor.bsky.social

That's your take-away? They did more than vote. The problem in USA is that the opposition is almost entirely controlled by the Democratic Party, which has a significant conservative wing. Any attempt to change this state of affairs is framed as letting repubs win.

Donna 🐸
@dro1.bsky.social

Four elections on four continents within 10 days could profoundly reshape global politics, propelling the world further along its current authoritarian trajectory or marking a limited comeback for democratic norms/ Brazil, Israel, Serbia and the US are holding elections within the space of 10 days