Lack of information, ethnic distance and confusion characterize citizens’ attitudes about the Kosovo dispute

The results of the public opinion surveys conducted by BCSP and KCSS was presented at the event.

“The voice of people must be heard and these public opinion surveys show how people are confused regarding the messages from the politicians. It is finally time to democratic principles be connected with dialogue process between Belgrade and Pristina”, emphasized BCSP Director Igor Bandović.

What do citizens think about the Kosovo dispute?

BCSP researcher Maja Bjeloš explained that there is “cognitive dissonance” among Serbian citizens when it comes to dialogue with Kosovo. She said that two thirds of respondents support it, but do not see that it has changed anything, nor do they feel personal benefit. Most do not even know what the goal of the dialogue is. In addition, although half of Serbian citizens have a strong desire to see Kosovo returned, big majority finds it unacceptable to have Kosovo Albanians in any significant position in the society because they consider the existing differences are too great an obstacle. Three-quarters of citizens would not accept Kosovo Albanians being public officials in Serbia or being married to a member of their family.

“Although Kosovo is present in the media as a topic, information on the content of the dialogue is limited or non-existent. Data clearly shows significant soft power in the hands of the Serbian Government and their ability to affect and shape public opinion of the citizens, especially when taking into account that a significant majority predominantly relies on television for information. The government obviously has the “tools” to influence the citizens to trust it unconditionally, but it does not use them to normalize relations between the two communities and the two peoples,” Bjeloš pointed out.

The KCSS research shows that the citizens of Kosovo also support the dialogue, but they also do not feel changes or improvement in their personal lives, said the KCSS researcher Plator Avdiu. He stated that that is not good because the technical agreements of the Brussels dialogue have been applied since 2011, and about 80 percent of citizens still do not feel the changes. He added that a third of citizens do not know what the goal of the dialogue is, which he interprets as a consequence of non-transparent messages from politicians. In addition, only 17 percent of Kosovo citizens see a solution to the dispute with Serbia as a condition for joining the EU, and 83 percent see organized crime and corruption as the biggest problem. According to Avdiu, a great ethnic distance can be seen in this research – 93 percent of Albanians would not accept Serbs as family members, and 70 percent would not accept them as superiors at work.

Commenting on the results of the research, Nikola Burazer, program director of the Center for Contemporary Politics, emphasized that “it is a good thing that the research has shown us that people support dialogue, and it is bad that there is huge mistrust between the two communities. Social ties are weak as most people have never had contact with the “other side” and the only contact they have is through politicians. The political narrative must therefore change.”

What do citizens think about foreign policy and regional relations?

According to the opinion of the citizens, the greatest friends of Serbia are Russia and China, while our enemies are Croatia, Albania and the USA, stated BCSP researcher Vuk Vuksanović. He stated that the positive perception of Russia is a product of the Kremlin’s strong support for Serbia on the issue of Kosovo in the United Nations Security Council, as well as Russia’s confrontation with the West, which provokes the sympathy of a large part of the Serbian public due to negative perceptions of NATO and the USA.

“The positive perception of Russia in the Serbian public and Moscow’s stance on the status of Kosovo represent a potential problem for Serbian leadership. The Serbian elite are fearful that Moscow may veto in the UN Security Council any settlement of the Kosovo dispute negotiated by Belgrade with Priština. Due to that, a certain scaling back in the relations between Belgrade and Moscow has been visible lately, which is also reflected in the political discourse in the pro-government media. In addition, besides Russia, the public perceives China as a benevolent, rising global power that did not recognise Kosovo’s independence, and the memories of the bombed Chinese Embassy during NATO intervention of 1999 also generate a sense of sympathy. The increase in pro-Chinese attitudes in the public is undoubtedly the outcome of the campaign of the authorities in Belgrade. We can see the result of that campaign in the fact that 75% of respondents falsely believed that China provided most aid to Serbia to combat the pandemic, even though the European Union (EU) was the biggest donor”, Vuksanović explained.

The attitudes of the citizens of Kosovo towards friends and enemies are completely different. Ramadani Ilazi from the KCSS states that 86 percent of citizens think that America and Germany have the most positive influence on Kosovo, and that 60 percent think that China has a negative influence, and 78 percent think that about Russia. In the region, the most negative influence of the citizens of Kosovo (89 percent) is estimated to come from Serbia.

“The dialogue between Serbia and Kosovo have been poorly managed in the past two decades. There was huge lack of transparency of the process, the narratives were controlled by the politicians. People are not sufficiently informed, which can be seen in the fact that Serbia sees Albania as enemy, even though they have never been in conflict, even the President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, is cooperating with the Albanian Prime Minister, Edi Rama, on the mini-Schengen”, concluded Engjellushe Morina from the European Council on Foreign Relations, commenting on the results of the research.