Serbia's Student List Victory Reflects a Democratic, Expert-Driven, Leaderless Reorientation of Serbian Politics
Source: Nina Djukanović. "Serbia’s Students Changed How Serbians Think About Politics." October 29, 2026. jacobin.com
The Gist
The author argues that Serbia's student-led list won not just because people were fed up with Vučić, but because the movement showed a different way of doing politics: decisions made collectively, no single strongman, and experts rather than party loyalists running institutions. She says this has changed how many Serbians think about politics, but the real challenge is governing without simply replacing one clique with another.
Conclusion
The Student List's electoral victory reflects a deep, already-occurring shift in how Serbians understand politics, toward direct democracy, collective leadership, and trust in expertise and institutions. The real test now is whether the movement's forces can collaborate to free Serbia's institutions from cliquish control rather than merely replacing one ruling faction with another.
Premises
- The Student List won an absolute majority (52.65% vs. 39.2% for Vučić's SNS) on a record 69% turnout, despite a history of electoral manipulation, and Vučić conceded, ending fourteen years of SNS rule.
- The movement built power through direct-democratic plenums and citizen assemblies (zbors), and chose its program and 250 candidates through collective deliberation rather than party leaders, so it was 'leaderless' and rejected personality cults.
- The movement rejected working with opposition parties and anyone with prior political experience, demanding a completely new beginning rather than recycling the existing political class.
- Its program prioritizes abolishing political patronage and appointing proven experts over party loyalists, and over half of its candidates hold doctorates, in contrast to the erosion of trust in expertise elsewhere in the West.
- The campaign focused on anti-corruption, democracy and rebuilding institutions, which the author credits for the victory, and the win was not a straightforward turn toward the EU or the West, given the EU's backing of lithium mining over local objections.
Assumptions
- The election result reflects voters' endorsement of the movement's democratic and institutional values, not just anti-Vučić sentiment or other motives.
- The movement's internal direct-democratic practices can be scaled up to governing national institutions.
- Technocratic expertise (e.g., doctorates) is compatible with, and supports, democratic accountability and anti-patronage goals.
- The movement's various internal forces will be able to collaborate rather than fracture.
- A shift in political culture is detectable from a single election result and the movement's organizational form.