engleski

Democratization in the Balkans: The Limits of Elite Driven Reform

This essay attempts to shed light on the fact that, more than two decades after regime change, most Balkan countries remain either hybrid regimes or tentative democracies. It focuses primarily on the ways in which political party system dynamics influence democratization trajectories in these countries. The essay first explores the argument about party system competitiveness as a key driver of the process, but in doing so, reveals its limited explanatory potential. Instead, it is suggested that the crucial relation in a democracy is not the horizontal marketplace of the election, but the vertical relation of accountability between parties and voters. Given that the dominant strategy of voter-party linkage in this region is clientelism, the second part of the essay argues that the client-patron relation of accountability undermines rule of law and protection of civil liberties as fundamental pillars of democracy. The effects of the resulting power morphology are particularly pronounced in the Balkans, primarily due to factors of strong nationalist mobilization and disputed statehood processes. As a result, it is argued that further democratic advances depend on the growing social contention and mobilization as sources of pressure from below, which are currently jeopardized by rising levels of inequality and poverty in this region.

democratization ; party system dynamics ; clientelism ; democratic accountability ; Balkans

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