Aleksandar Vucic’s election defeat could ease Serbia’s quarrels with Bosnia, Kosovo and Montenegro and revive the stalled European Union accession prospects of the whole Western Balkans, think-tanks say.
The Student List, a movement that grew out of two years of protests following a railway station canopy collapse in Novi Sad in November 2024 that killed 16 people, won 52.54% of the vote on October 25, against 39.29% for Vucic’s United Serbia list. Turnout was around 69%, the highest in more than 30 years. The movement is set to secure around 140 of the 250 parliamentary seats, ending 14 years of rule by Vucic’s Serbian Progressive Party (SNS). Vucic conceded on election night.
The result extends well beyond Serbia’s borders. Serbia accounts for half of the Western Balkans’ GDP and population, according to Bruegel. Under Vucic, Belgrade supported Bosnian Serb leader Milorad Dodik, backed Kosovo’s Serbs and helped anchor an illiberal network stretching from Banja Luka to Skopje alongside Hungary’s Viktor Orban.
With Orban defeated in April and Vucic in October, both pillars of that network have fallen within six months. Regional capitals are now assessing what might replace them.
Four think tanks – Chatham House, the Council on Foreign Relations (CFR), Bruegel and the Carnegie Endowment for International Peace – examined the implications in the days after the vote. They agree that the opening is significant, but that the new government faces substantial obstacles.
“The most direct implications of a political renewal in Belgrade will be for the Balkan neighbourhood,” Gregoire Roos, director of the Europe and Russia and Eurasia programmes at Chatham House, wrote in “After Orbán, Vučić falls: can Serbia’s students herald a new dawn for the Balkans?”, published on October 27.
Dodik loses his patron
Bosnia could be the first country to feel the effects of the change. “In Bosnia we can foresee a withdrawal of the political support Vučić provided to the nationalist Milorad Dodik, former president of Republika Srpska,” Roos wrote.
Even a modest shift in relations between Belgrade and Dodik could help stabilise Bosnia’s political situation, according to Jasmin Mujanovic, a Bosnian-American political scientist writing on the Sarajevo news portal !Odgovor on October 26.
“For Sarajevo, even a modest chill in relations between Dodik and Belgrade may be enough of an opportunity to stabilize the political situation in Bosnia and Herzegovina,” Mujanovic wrote.
The Student List has so far given little indication of such a shift. Its foreign policy programme promises to defend Republika Srpska’s constitutional powers, including its veto in Bosnia’s joint institutions, and to review the international High Representative’s use of powers to impose laws.
Dodik, who is barred from public office following a court conviction but still leads his SNSD party, congratulated the winners. “The voice of the people is the voice of God,” he wrote on X, Reuters reported.
Bosnia’s October 4 general election drew official turnout of less than 45%, compared with around 70% in Serbia and nearly 80% in Hungary in April. The vote returned the SNSD and Croat nationalist HDZ BiH, parties that have dominated Bosnian politics for more than two decades, Mujanovic noted.
Kosovo talks back on the table
Kosovo remains the most difficult issue, and the Student List has shown little willingness to change its position.
“Kosovo would be another obstacle: the Student List firmly rejects its independence, while Brussels requires Belgrade to normalise relations with Pristina,” Roos wrote.
A change of government could nevertheless reopen the EU-led dialogue, according to Charles Kupchan, a senior fellow at CFR who visited Belgrade before the election.
“Although it is unclear if the new government will try to move forward on relations with Kosovo, the change of government opens up the possibility of rekindling the normalization dialogue between Belgrade and Pristina,” Kupchan told CFR editor Ivana Saric in an October 27 interview.
Ilija Srdanovic, the cardiologist who headed the Student List, has said continuing the dialogue is part of the movement’s programme, although previously agreed protocols could be reviewed for compliance with Serbia’s constitution.
He has not said whether the new government would negotiate directly with Kosovo Prime Minister Albin Kurti or extradite Milan Radoicic, the Kosovo Serb politician wanted by Pristina over the 2023 armed attack in Banjska. The EU had already offered to host a meeting before the election.
Recognition of Kosovo’s independence need not be the immediate objective, Mujanovic argued.
“For Pristina, recognition of Kosovo’s sovereignty is not necessary if the new Serbian government can simply cease obstructing that country’s Serb community from integrating into Kosovo’s institutional order,” he wrote.
Economic cooperation could provide an initial opening. “A major regional challenge for Serbia will be to reshape its relations with Kosovo. An initial step could be to revitalise strained economic and trade ties between the two under the CEFTA framework,” Nina Vujanovic, a research fellow at Bruegel, wrote in an October 27 analysis.
Belgrade could find it easier to make concessions on Russia than on Kosovo, according to Maksim Samorukov, a fellow at the Carnegie Russia Eurasia Center.
“Faced with the need to meet the EU halfway at least on some foreign policy issues, Belgrade may well decide that it is politically safer to downgrade ties with Russia instead of conceding on Kosovo,” he wrote in an October 30 article for Carnegie Politika.
A new chapter?
Relations with Montenegro could also improve, according to Roos. Podgorica moved quickly to welcome the result.
“I am certain that this election result will open a new chapter in relations between Montenegro and Serbia,” President Jakov Milatovic wrote on X, according to N1 on October 26.
Prime Minister Milojko Spajic said citizens of both countries “deserve relations measured by concrete results of cooperation” rather than diplomatic disagreements.
Mujanovic was more cautious, describing Vucic-era efforts to “re-colonize Montenegro, politically if not explicitly”.
“Podgorica would likely be happiest with a Serbia that will forget entirely about its existence,” he wrote. The Student List’s programme nevertheless calls for a deal on dual citizenship for Serbs in Montenegro.
Montenegro also offers a possible model for Serbia’s EU integration, Samorukov argued. Fears that the end of Milo Djukanovic’s long rule would revive Serbian nationalism and Russian influence had proved misplaced.
“In reality, democratization has turned the country into a frontrunner of EU integration that may join the body as early as in the next couple of years,” he wrote.
Podgorica could sign its accession treaty in summer 2027 and become the EU’s 28th member in 2028, Enlargement Commissioner Marta Kos has said. Montenegro has ended visa-free travel with Russia, prompting Moscow to introduce visas for Montenegrin citizens from November 1.
Moscow loses its regional hub
Russia is among the biggest potential losers from Vucic’s defeat, Samorukov said.
“The departure of Vučić offers the EU an opportunity to curb Russian influence not only in Serbia, but in the whole of the Western Balkans,” he wrote.
“The Kremlin heavily relied on Vučić’s political infrastructure, as their agenda coincided on many points. Without Vučić, Russia’s influence in the Western Balkans can no longer count upon the state resources of the largest country in the region,” Samorukov added.
Chatham House was more cautious. The Student List has ruled out sanctions on Moscow, pledged to maintain military neutrality and rejected Nato membership. Its representative Jovo Bakic said after the election that Serbia’s policy towards Russia would not change.
“For the Kremlin, the result comes as another setback after Orbán. The circle of pro-Russians amongst European leaders is growing increasingly thin,” Roos wrote, identifying Slovakia’s Robert Fico as the last remaining member of that group.
The Kremlin adopted a neutral tone post-election election. “We acknowledge the results of the elections that took place in Serbia,” spokesman Dmitry Peskov said, Reuters reported.
Serbia remains the only Western Balkan country that has not joined EU sanctions against Russia. The Student List plans to send delegations to Washington and Moscow to address its oil and gas supplies.
Samorukov said the new leadership would eventually face a choice between fighting corruption and maintaining lucrative agreements with Moscow.
Zagreb and Tirana reach out
Croatian Prime Minister Andrej Plenkovic said on October 26 that he expected relations with Serbia to improve, describing the Student List’s statements as “rational and reasonable”.
Relations had deteriorated in March, when Croatian President Zoran Milanovic cancelled the annual Brdo-Brijuni summit rather than host Vucic, who had accused Croatia, Albania and Kosovo of forming a “military alliance” against Serbia.
Albanian Prime Minister Edi Rama also clashed with Vucic in August over Belgrade’s discussion of diverting the Ibar river, which spilled over into a broader dispute over Kosovo and claims of a “Greater Albania”.
Albania, an EU accession frontrunner alongside Montenegro, now has its own student movement. Protests over education began on October 13, prompting the government to propose tougher protest laws.
A reset for EU enlargement
Serbia’s political change could also revive EU accession prospects across the region, according to Bruegel’s Vujanovic.
“The EU explicitly requires good neighbourly relations and post-war reconciliation as part of the EU membership process for the region. While Vučić was in charge, these relationships were under strain,” she wrote.
The Student List’s emphasis on the rule of law and fighting corruption aligns with two of the most difficult EU negotiating areas: judiciary and fundamental rights, and justice, freedom and security. Progress could unlock Serbia’s share of the EU’s €1.588bn Growth Plan for 2024-2027.
Brussels froze payments to Belgrade in the spring over changes to judicial and prosecutorial laws. Some reforms, including the confirmation of senior judges and prosecutors, require a two-thirds parliamentary majority that the Student List does not have.
Vujanovic also proposed a deeper free trade agreement between Serbia and the EU, modelled on the bloc’s agreements with Moldova and Ukraine, to reduce non-tariff barriers and improve access to the single market.
“Such steps would have implications beyond Serbia if other Balkan countries that are only slowly moving towards EU accession (Kosovo, Bosnia and Herzegovina and North Macedonia) follow suit,” she wrote.
Serbia’s accession negotiations have barely progressed in five years. In July, eight EU member states blocked the opening of another negotiating cluster, citing democratic backsliding and weak alignment with EU foreign policy, according to Roos. Russia sanctions remain a major sticking point.
Kos told TVP World on October 28 that Serbia met the conditions to open the next cluster, but member states had withheld progress over backsliding. Slovenian Prime Minister Janez Jansa has added a new condition, saying he would block accession progress until Belgrade handed over Yugoslav-era secret service archives.
The Student List’s supporters are more pro-European than the electorate as a whole. “Surveys suggest that three-quarters of Student List supporters favour closer relations with the EU rather than Russia,” Roos wrote.
The movement must first establish a functioning government. “There is no clear leader of the Student List, and, as you noted, many of the winning candidates have little or no political experience,” Kupchan said.
Serbia must also hold a presidential election before the end of the year, while the SNS will retain more than 100 parliamentary seats.
The Hungarian parallel has been central to the think tanks’ assessments. “Six months after Viktor Orbán’s defeat in Hungary, another European strongman has fallen, conceding an election he expected to win, in a consequential turning point for the country and for Europe,” Roos wrote.
Orban’s successor Peter Magyar was among the first to congratulate the winners, pledging Hungary’s support.
North Macedonia’s ruling VMRO-DPMNE was another member of Orban’s network. Prime Minister Hristijan Mickoski has tied the country’s stalled EU accession to a dispute with Bulgaria over constitutional changes, and Skopje has yet to open a negotiating chapter.
Serbia’s example could prompt other countries in the region to consider whether mass democratic movements are possible, Mujanovic said.
“Change requires participation,” he wrote, urging the Western Balkans to ask “what is required to create anything vaguely approximating similar mass-based democratic movements in other parts of the Western Balkans.”
The new government offers Serbia an opportunity to rebuild relations with its neighbours and revive its European ambitions, but the movement has yet to name its prime minister or demonstrate how it will overcome entrenched political divisions.
“None of those changes is guaranteed,” Samorukov wrote. “But Serbia now has a historic opportunity to rebuild its standing in the region, provided its new leaders can agree on the direction of travel.”
Roos said the challenge was to turn the election victory into lasting democratic change. “Watching the clock will be essential.”