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Analysis

A super elections year: Romania’s 2024 political landscape

This year Romanians will experience an unprecedented four elections: local, European, presidential and parliamentary. The ruling mainstream parties have already demonstrated their joint strategy to curb the rise of populist and extremist parties. How the society will vote in this marathon of democracy remains unknown.

Romania has never had four rounds of elections in a single year. However, 2024 brings them all: European, local, presidential and parliamentary. Over the past year, there have been discussions about the possibility of merging some of them, especially European and local elections. Yet, until recently, the political calculations within the governing coalition did not favour this option as a means of simplifying the electoral calendar.

April 11, 2024 - Eugen Stancu

The rise of the pro-Putin Revival party in Bulgaria

The Bulgarian far-right Revival present themselves as “the only patriotic party” in Bulgaria. However, a review of their public discourse uncovers a rather disturbing fabric of their patriotism – a strange mix of anti-NATO rhetoric, unrefined populism, xenophobia, and profanity. Their sudden electoral success raises many suspicions.

From an underdog with merely 37,896 votes in the 2017 parliamentary election, Bulgaria’s Revival party (Vazrazhdane) has managed to gain 358,174 votes in the 2023 election and to secure itself 37 seats in the country’s 240-seat parliament. Its meteoritic rise is often used as an argument justifying the shameful union between the reformists (PPDB) and the establishment (GERB; DPS) in Bulgaria which, in turn, resulted in the election of Nikolay Denkov’s government in 2023. The marriage of convenience between PPDB, GERB, and DPS, which emerged in 2023, is presented as a Euro-Atlantic micro alliance protecting Bulgaria from the malicious influence of Vladimir Putin’s circles allegedly channelled by Revival – an account that feeds into the current dominant geopolitical narrative.

April 11, 2024 - Radosveta Vassileva

Empire or democracy

Democracy and imperialism are mutually exclusive. No empire was, is or can be democratic. The British Empire was not, the imperial People’s Republic of China is not, nor will imperial Russia become a democracy, even when a self-professed democrat is installed at its helm. The necessary precondition of democratization in an empire is decolonization.

In February 2024, the death (or rather, extrajudicial killing) of the leading Russian opposition leader Alexei Navalny sent shock waves across the democratic world. It could have been a subdued affair, as in the case of the Chinese 2010 Nobel Peace Prize laureate Liu Xiaobo. Beijing arrested him on trumped up charges in 2008 and withheld medical care, leading to the dissident’s premature death in 2017. The Chinese authorities did not want to turn Liu Xiaobo into a martyr for democracy. Hence, he was cremated and his ashes scattered at sea. No grave means no pilgrimage site.

April 11, 2024 - Tomasz Kamusella

Presidential pseudo-election in Russia: what does it tell us about Putin’s regime?

The 2024 “presidential election” (March 15th to 17th) is intended to consolidate Putin’s neo-totalitarian grip on Russia. The West should not recognize its results and hamper the Kremlin’s efforts to pursue its aggressive goals both in its foreign and domestic policy.

March 12, 2024 - Maria Domańska

Economies of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine in 2023 – the devil is in the details

The ongoing Russian aggression in Ukraine has influenced the economies of the three countries engaged in the conflict. While the similarities in the institutional setups of these economies have resulted in some resemblances regarding the results of this impact, there are also notable differences in what has happened in them.

February 26, 2024 - Kacper Wańczyk

Unravelling the anti-immigrant discourse in Poland’s 2023 election campaign

In the digital age, with information flowing freely and narratives shaping perceptions, there is less and less hope of arriving at a point at which one objective truth prevails or even exists. This leaves us with the task of understanding discourses surrounding political events and processes. From that vantage point, one may look at the case of immigration to Poland and how it appeared in last year’s electoral campaign.

February 21, 2024 - Maciej Makulski

War, inflation and central banks

The people who head the central banks of Belarus, Ukraine and Russia are usually regarded both in the West and in the expert circles of their countries as the most liberal or technocratic in the economic governance structures. They are all well-read, experienced and have contacts abroad. However, the institutional reality of Belarus, Russia and even Ukraine is that all three central banks remain heavily dependent on the presidential centres.

In the many economic analyses of the countries involved in the war on the borders of the European Union, little attention is paid to the role of the central banks of Belarus, Russia and Ukraine. However, a look at their functioning allows us to gain not only a better understanding of the current economic policies of Kyiv, Minsk and Moscow but also an insight into the peculiarities of these countries' economic systems.

February 7, 2024 - Kacper Wańczyk

What role can Romania play in facilitating Western Balkan integration?

Recent geopolitical developments have resulted in renewed discussions on the enlargement of the European Union – including in the Western Balkans. Many factors will determine how these talks go in 2024 but some local actors may have significant input. Through its experience, Romania can be one of these actors and play a unique role in this process.

The new geopolitical context stemming from Russia’s ongoing brutal war on European soil has had profound effects on the geopolitical dynamics of the European Union’s enlargement. After many years of inertia and stagnation, enlargement seems to be back at the top of the EU agenda. The geopolitical decision made by the European Council in June 2022 to grant Ukraine and Moldova candidate status was followed by the (re-)opening of previously stagnating accession negotiations with the countries of the Western Balkans (Albania and various ex-Yugoslav states).

February 7, 2024 - Marius Ghincea Miruna Butnaru-Troncotă

The spectre of Slobodan Milošević continues to haunt Serbia

Despite having died over 17 years ago following his war crime tribunal in The Hague, Slobodan Milošević continues to make a mark in Serbian politics. Helping to understand his legacy and why it lives on should be the first step in overcoming the divisive politics of today. This will ultimately redirect Serbia back on the path to integration with the West.

The collapse of communist Yugoslavia was undoubtedly the biggest tragedy for the Balkans at the end of the 20th century. What had been agreed during and after that conflict still greatly affects Balkan politics to this day. Other than the changes in borders or alliances, many politicians and political parties rose to prominence during the war or afterwards because of it. The most familiar person to anyone both in the Balkans and in the West that made their claim to power during the Yugoslav Wars is the former president of Yugoslavia, Slobodan Milošević.

February 7, 2024 - Stefan Mandic

From war propaganda to aggression: recognizing a new crime

Disinformation has become an effective weapon in Russia’s ongoing assault against Ukraine. However, there is currently little that can be done to prosecute those guilty of spreading such dangerous narratives. A new framework is needed in order to effectively challenge this key part of Moscow’s war.

The brutal Russian invasion of Ukraine, the full-scale stage of which began in February 2022, was both preceded and further accompanied by a rampant propaganda campaign that reached new heights of cynicism, bloodthirstiness and warmongering in just a matter of days. The propaganda machine spent immense resources on justifying Moscow’s heinous acts of aggression by employing a combination of manipulative and selective reporting on the hostilities in eastern Ukraine.

February 7, 2024 - Maksym Popovych

A common red line? Limits of European engagement in Russia’s war against Ukraine

The Russian war against Ukraine has substantially changed perceptions of conflict and crisis in the European Union. As a recent comparison study shows, the conflict has encouraged fears of war, awareness of developments in Ukraine, questions concerning the broader frame of this war, and the involvement of the respective countries in it.

November 19, 2023 - Christos Katsioulis

Mapping scenarios for Belarus

A recent study sought to design and investigate possible alternative (and mutually exclusive) futures for Belarus. The scenarios from that study presented here can act as a compass to help observers make sense of Belarus’s future direction. This is in spite of the dense fog of regional geopolitics and Lukashenka’s often unreadable black box of repression.

November 19, 2023 - Andrey Makarychev Stefano Braghiroli

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