Politics

The Republic of Serbia is a parliamentary democracy in which the government is divided into three distinct branches - executive, legislative and judicial. Most of the executive power belongs to the Prime Minister and the Government, which is elected by the National Assembly. The National Assembly of Serbia is the highest legislative body and has 250 deputies who have a four-year mandate. The President of the Republic is elected in direct elections for a term of five years and by law may not remain in this position for longer than two terms.

The current President of Serbia, Aleksandar Vučić, was elected for his second term in elections held on April 3, 2022, when he secured an absolute majority in the first round of voting, with more than 60% of the votes. The most recent parliamentary elections were held on the same day in 2022, and the coalition gathered around the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) won 120 out of 250 parliamentary seats, and the coalition gathered around the Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) won 31 parliamentary seats. The Serbian Progressive Party decided to form a coalition with the Socialist Party of Serbia with the support of several parties representing national minorities in Serbia. Together, they secured an absolute majority in this legislative body.
 
Serbia began the transition from the period of communism to parliamentary democracy with the first multi-party elections being held at the end of 1990. At that time, Serbia was still part of the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. However, unlike many other former communist countries of Central and Eastern Europe, where the abandonment of communism ended with the establishment of democratic political systems, a new type of authoritarian political system was established in Serbia under the rule of Slobodan Milošević. Only in the elections of 2000, when Slobodan Milošević was finally overthrown, did Serbia truly begin its transition towards a democratic political system.

Serbia has made significant progress in consolidating democracy and democratic institutions in the period after 2000. However, after the Serbian Progressive Party came to power in 2012, and especially since 2014 when the party secured an absolute majority in the Parliament, democratic freedoms began to weaken. The level of democratic development in Serbia, according to Freedom House, has been declining since 2017.

During 2022, Freedom House assessed the system in Serbia as partially free. However, the organization's evaluation according to data for 2023 shows that rights and freedoms are significantly reduced. Freedom House assesses Serbia in 2023 as a country in a transitional or hybrid regime. The organization's main criticisms are that the Serbian Progressive Party dominates all political institutions in Serbia, while the opposition remains fragmented.

According to this, and other relevant international reports (Reporters without Borders or IREX Media Sustainability Index), the assessment of media freedom has also dropped drastically.

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