Regression of Serbia

Students of the Faculty of Law in blockade announced on Sunday, August 24, 2025, that the President of Serbia once again did not respect the institutions of his native country and that he violated the Constitution by interfering in the work of the executive branch. "This time to the Ministry of Trade, Tourism and Telecommunications", as they stated in a statement on the X social network, because in his address to the nation he himself announced "the limitation of trade margins to 20 percent". No minister drew his attention to it. Only the spiritual poor call out to him in the streets because they don't even know what the word "institution" means, with the repetition of which the students are already bored.

It is an unusual impression that someone in the 21st century, in Europe, has to explain to anyone the concepts of institutions, laws and the rule of law, the division of power into three branches and everything that, with the Civil Revolution in France (1789-1799), created the modern era in the history of the entire humanity, and that to someone in Serbia, which immediately after France abolished feudalism (1835), driving out the previous Turkish feudal lords. It brought to power a bourgeois class, with bourgeois laws. It divided power into legislative, executive and judicial, building administration and state institutions modeled on Europe at the time (1838). It entered the twentieth century with a developed society that did not need the charisma of anyone's personal authority.

Today, in Serbia, two hundred years after the first civil laws, supporters of such an order are derogatorily called "citizens" and persecuted. It is as if we have returned to the time of communism. The Communist Party of Serbia, like the one that rules Serbia today, did not like supporters of the civil order, it called them "bourgeoisie", "civic elements" and "enemies of the present", and when it came to power in 1945, civil thought and civil society, like some kind of enemy, were exiled and removed from political and public life in general. In addition to the already existing socialist society in the one-party system, civil society was not allowed to exist. But, in the daily life of individuals and the whole community, civic consciousness prevailed. People had jobs, factories existed in every city, children and youth had free education and studies, the economy progressed, social security and trust in state institutions was, for a reason, at the highest level. Social responsibility was recognized as the highest ethical category of the community. Only a few generals from some kind of meeting still slightly threatened "civic forces", "forces of darkness and the past" and "retrograde tendencies" as enemies in "collusion with foreign services", but he too was aware that society is mature and developed and that it no longer has an ideological but a civic consciousness.

The phenomenon that the absolutist government persecutes anyone who wants respect for laws and institutions is old, all feudal states had opponents in the civil class (the third class), which demanded the abolition of feudal estates, the bringing to power of civil society with civil institutions and the restoration of the rule of law, i.e. the rule of law. Let's say, in the 18th century, when the educators, who prepared the spirits for the Civil Revolution in France, were attacked by the feudal absolutist government that identified itself with the state.

What did the abolition of feudalism, feudal consciousness and bringing citizens to power mean in legal sense and legal history? Why were lawyers, judges and lawyers the most famous among the leaders of the revolution? What did they mean by the rule of institutions as opposed to the rule of individuals or anyone's personal authority? They believed that authoritarian figures seek tribal and subject rather than social consciousness among their supporters, that they prevent the division of power into three branches, prevent the normal work of institutions, often abolish the constitution or do not respect it and do not allow the independent work of the judiciary.

All these values ​​are based on Roman law, which is more than two and a half thousand years old.

The strength of the former Roman state was the perfect rule of institutions and Roman law, codified between 449 and 287 BC. That law, among other things, explained the entire order in the state, the list and role of every institution, the entire legislation and clerical services, the rights of every citizen and the complete Roman administration. The complete transparency of that administration before the citizens, who could read the laws on the street and in the main square (forum), was impressive. Politics was not supposed to be a secret business because everyone had to participate in it and know exactly what was happening in the country. Trust between citizens and institutions was complete.

Holding any political office was free. That is why it was often the duty and privilege of only the wealthiest people, but they did not seek to enrich themselves from their position, but rather to help enrich the state, as a common or public good.

The Code of Twelve Tables became the basis of Roman law. It was the first codification (list) of all laws, institutions and services in Rome, the way of performing state administration and the rights and obligations of all citizens, a kind of constitutional act. It got its name from the fact that the laws were engraved on twelve large bronze tablets and displayed in the main Roman square (forum), so they were also called "the laws of the bronze tablets".

The most important institutions of the Roman Republic began to weaken already with the proclamation of the empire in 31 BC The reason was simple. The successor of the greatest Roman statesman Gaius Julius Caesar, Octavian Augustus, fearing for his life since Caesar had died announcing the restoration of the monarchy, never officially proclaimed the monarchy. He assigned himself only the title of "first senator" (princeps senatus), a republican position that until then belonged to the oldest in the senate according to protocol. And he was the youngest in the senate since he was much less than 50 years old. He called the order "principate", as the authority of the first senator. Then he added the honorary name "Caesar" to his name, which became a synonym for the new form of monarchy "Caesarstvo" (lat. caesar, empire or empire), then the title of commander-in-chief of the army "emperor" (also a later synonym for empire), and finally he became the patriarch of the Roman religion (Pontiff Maximus). Towards the end of his life, he officially appointed his successor - Tiberius, who will also rule with all these republican functions, as the new Caesar and emperor.

The Roman Republic existed before that for five whole centuries and all magistracies (political functions) of the state order were designed in the republic. Several of the first Roman emperors still swore to the republic, as its greatest protectors and leaders, but they combined the most important of these functions with their personal rule. In this way, the republican institutions during the Empire were not abolished, but most importantly they were abused and meaningless by the supreme authority.

It would be like in Serbia. And that in Serbia, which, as mentioned above, introduced a civil society two hundred years ago, and in which, despite all that, today the supporters of the civil order are derogatorily called "citizens" and enemies of the people. Which nation, the one created by those who regress Serbia? Those who, enthusiastic about their own statecraft, offer the citizens Parisier to eat, even advertise it on television channels by showing it on a slice of bread, convince them of the advantages of an ascetic life with a minimum menu of only two eggs a day, and praise the settlements that are not built for the citizens but for themselves with budget funds from citizens' taxes, unless they want to buy them at their prices, those who are bothered by the institutions.

Serbia today, as if it had no previous experience, has politically regressed towards the rule of one man from solitary posters, who is addressed as the state itself, as the nation itself, as the "guardian of Serbia", who identifies himself with the "leadership of Serbia" and the "nation" itself.