Analyzing strategies related to the manipulation of people, Noam Chomsky labeled one of them as "gradual change". This one by manipulation the public is gradually, "by the spoonful", preparing to accept what is essentially and value unacceptable. This process takes months, years. Namely, the changes could cause resistance if they were carried out suddenly and in a short period of time, so they are implemented with a policy of "small" steps... The regime in Serbia, led by Aleksandar Vučić, he has been implementing the manipulation strategy "by the spoonful" since he came to power. "Kašičica" in its gradations becomes a bitter spoon from the case of "Savamala". The resistance regarding that "case" was actually lukewarm, so the "supreme strategist" continued to poison the public with propaganda, squeezing it into an increasingly tight circle of authoritarianism. It seemed that with the fall of the canopy, the poisonous drop was finally spilled - there was a broad, long-lasting rebellion of students, teachers, professors, lawyers, farmers, representatives of the judiciary, in general - citizens. However, despite the undeniable change in perception and understanding of the problem in a significant part of this society, one gets the impression that the freak regime has developed too much over time, that it is protected by accumulated financial power, and that it has put the apparatus of force under its control, especially the police. The repression of students and citizens is carried out cruelly, in the most naked way. In order to avoid the trap of wider bloody conflicts, hope is placed in parliamentary elections (whenever they are held). Of course, the regime also turned the election process into a dirty campaign, with a whole spectrum of irregular mechanisms that should enable it to win in any election, so the question arises as to how much the hope that changes can be achieved in this way is grounded in reality.
Our interlocutors talk about previous experiences and the current state of the election process - Vukosava Crnjanski, director of CRTE; Slobodan Orlović, professor of constitutional law at the Faculty of Law, University of Novi Sad; Zoran Gavrilović, sociologist, executive director of the Bureau for Social Research (BIRODI).
RACE WITH TIED LEGS
Vukosava Crnjanski says that Serbian society is insufficiently educated about the electoral process and voters' rights.
"When they talk about irregular elections, many people think only of literal theft. Political actors also contribute to such confusion. Let's remember how, when they were in the opposition, the former and current presidents of the state, Tomislav Nikolić and Aleksandar Vučić, created a circus by showing bags of ballots as 'proof' that their party was stolen", recalls Vukosava Crnjanski. "For many years, the 'Line' has been pointing to the fact that the quality of elections is not measured only by election day and events at the polling station. Much of the dirty work is done earlier. We simply do not have the conditions for free and fair elections. The ruling option is running a race with opponents whose legs are tied. There is no political pluralism in the media even during the official election campaign, and especially outside of it." Vukosava Crnjanski points out that the government is illegally using state and public resources for its own promotion, handing out monetary and other forms of aid to citizens, i.e. voters, "hands and hats", which is especially noticeable at the local level.
"We see how campaigns for local elections turn into asphalting festivals," continues Vukosava Crnjanski, "and every new meter of road is presented by the propaganda machine as a charity of the authorities and not a public investment, that is, an investment of citizens' money. Institutions whose job is to prevent such behavior, such as the Agency for the Prevention of Corruption, but also prosecutors, mostly pretend to be dead." Not to mention pressure on voters.
"It has been a normalized practice for a long time that employees in the public sector, especially those temporarily employed, are conditioned to protect the only source of existence with their vote and by gathering other 'safe' voices", Vukosava Crnjanski believes. "Even the private sector of the economy is not immune to the influence of the political powerful. Then, data from the social protection system is misused, and the most vulnerable are blackmailed - and there are, unfortunately, many such cases in this country. We have recorded cases where health care for the most seriously ill was the subject of electoral trade." In other words, "electoral corruption is only part of the picture of a systemically deeply corrupt society and a captive state. In electoral autocracies, power is practically unchangeable even though elections are held regularly."
The perpetrators of the most flagrant crimes in the election process are also protected by impunity, warns Vukosava Crnjanski.
"During the recent elections in Sečnje, we waited for hours for the police to come out to investigate the application for vote buying. A few years ago Crta's observers were physically attacked in the courtyard of the police station in Odžaci, where they went to report the case of the so-called Bulgarian train which they had witnessed. Their car was broken into by thugs who have remained unknown to this day. Finally, the operation of voter migration on an unprecedented scale would not have been possible without complicity in issuing false residences and manipulations of the voter list of services under the jurisdiction of the Ministry of State Administration and Local Self-Government and the Ministry of Internal Affairs."
How against all this, we ask the interlocutor. "I believe that it is possible to achieve a lot with a good organization in the mobilization of voters, because today Serbia is no longer the same as it was a year and a half ago. However, it is not a small task to gather more than 16 thousand members of the polling boards, the so-called controllers, and train them well enough to prevent any irregularity at the polling station. Or at least, knowing the rights and obligations of the members of the polling board, enter adequate remarks in the record of the work of the polling board", concludes Vukosava Crnjanski.
photo: aleksandar canić / tanjugTRADITIONAL ELECTION ICONOGRAPHY: The Mayor of Zaječar in a black environment, June 2025.
MASS AS AN ANSWER
And Slobodan Orlović believes that a normal democracy is an "impossible story", and "the president of the Republic ("expression of state unity" of Article 111 of the Constitution) has long been in the party's election campaign. He does so, as he has done all these years, with unprecedented arrogance in the matter of abuse of public resources, using both the budget and dirty money, official vehicles and bodyguards, presidential working hours, brought masses, sandwiches, tips, promises, thanks, fantasies and with what not. At the same time, he sporadically puts on the mask of a universal (soul) carer for the fate of all of us, and the world. But he does it clumsily because the mask, which is inadequate and slippery, constantly reveals the nakedness of hatred and division," says Orlović.
However, the electoral machinations, which are "a matter of technique", this time, Orlović believes, "will get a new 'quality', their 'newest version'. In addition to uniting to some extent all the frauds seen so far, they will also contain - I cringe - an extremely violent potential in this edition. Historically speaking, it was the last step of all autocracies and personal governments before the fall, but that fall from the height of the hijacked state can also be prolonged. As an element of the genetic in the Serbian election model, there is an open hatred of the opponents - the unsuspecting opposition - the buying and selling of votes on the black market; the voluntary collection of votes (from 10 to 10000, for example); the circulation of dirty money for the purposes of the mentioned underground buying and selling voters from the environment; possession of the majority of the electoral bodies - it is up to 'us' to count the votes and reject objections; if necessary, reform election laws "for and against the opponents" (to paraphrase Pašić); inventing similar electoral lists and churning the already muddy electoral water in which undecided voters would "drown"; and, most importantly: money, money, money, wherever it is needed for the sake of victory.”
When asked how to oppose, Orlović is clear: "To heal the electoral process in Serbia at all levels, which according to the democratic diagnosis has been in the terminal phase for a long time, but is still surviving, there is no other remedy than massiveness. Citizens who are not interested in politics, (son) idiots, they need to wake up from their social coma and vote. If so, it will be against the rulers. The opposition and the new vanguard - students should get closer politically, make a non-aggression pact and an agreement on non-cooperation with the ruling parties, which would naturally, in case of victory, lead to a post-election coalition. And that is already a step towards the exit of Serbia from the terminal phase of the autocratic disease. On the election day itself, the student and old opposition must cover all polling stations with their trained representatives, in each polling committee and, if possible, secure the surroundings of the polling station, because this is where illegal buying and selling for cash usually took place. And such a mass, when it is already there, is convenient to defend the electoral will, the real one."
ELECTION FORENSICS
Zoran Gavrilović draws attention to the perspective we are talking about when we talk about elections - whether we are simply talking about elections or acclamation about the personal power of Aleksandar Vučić, "who is a participant in all elections, whether they are presidential in which he regularly participates, whether they are parliamentary, provincial or local. In these circumstances, we have a statement about the character and work of Aleksandar Vučić, who bases his rating on the hyper presence in the media where he is presented on an advertising-positive level".
In other words, Gavrilović continues, this means that the difference between "Vučić as a president with clear constitutional competences and a 'deity' who solves all problems and participates in all elections by renting his rating to SNS by giving his name, ignoring the fact that this directly violates the Constitution and the law. He can do it. The Agency for the Prevention of Corruption turns a blind eye, and the Constitutional Court declares itself incompetent".
Relying on BIRODI's research, Gavrilović says that the president of the Republic deals in the media with topics that are the responsibility of the prime minister, which is an increasingly clear indication that Vučić is preparing to become the prime minister after the end of his mandate.
"For that to happen", continues Gavrilović, "he must have a majority in the assembly after the next elections. By achieving a majority, the regime could enable the new president of the state to be elected in the assembly and thereby avoid the 'torture' of presenting his candidate for immediate elections, which is a challenge for Vučić because, in addition to his charisma, he did not allow someone to be made who would be the second, third, or fourth person in the party. The current president of the party was ousted of his own free will, without The question arises whether it is possible to have regular elections at the state level if there are no such elections in the ruling party.
When asked what the solution would be, Gavrilović says: "Part of the solution is the application of electoral forensics, which allows the use of statistical methods to determine polling stations at risk, when it comes to electoral irregularities and when a new vote is held. According to the analyzes carried out so far, the greatest risk is polling stations with 100 or fewer voters, as well as places where the opposition has no voting committee members."
Forensic analyzes showed that there are the following risks: voting outside the polling station (home voting) as the most vulnerable segment and manipulation through invalid ballots (repackaging/"correcting" errors in favor of one list); with the increase in turnout, the share of votes for the ruling party also increases, while support for the opposition decreases, which is a typical indicator in elections with manipulations in comparative practice.
“Extreme clusters”: very high turnout plus very high support for one list (forensic “fingerprints”), that is, with almost total turnout and almost total support for one party, a pattern that rarely occurs without adding ballots or inflating turnout. Furthermore, dramatic reversals in repeated voting at the same polling station - a case where after repeated voting the result is "reversed" in a short period of time without a credible political reason, which points to the risks of pressure on voters, intimidation or replacement of ballots.
"The solution is the existence of full and fast transparency of raw data per polling station, that is, the need to immediately publish unprocessed data - including home voting, invalid ballots and turnout - because without this, supervision becomes practically impossible," concludes Gavrilović.
