Predrag Marković, historian and Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) official, for NIN: A carnation from the SNS for the SPS |The socialists’ electoral defeat has raised questions about the survival of one of Serbia’s… Ceo tekst
Predrag Marković, historian and Socialist Party of Serbia (SPS) official, for NIN: A carnation from the SNS for the SPS
|The socialists’ electoral defeat has raised questions about the survival of one of Serbia’s longest-standing political parties. The SPS (Socialist Party of Serbia) survived 10/05/2000 (the date of the uprising that led to the fall of Slobodan Milošević) and the collapse of Slobodan Milošević, but it fell below the electoral threshold after 14 years in power with the SNS (Serbian Progressive Party). Historian and SPS official Predrag Marković speaks about the socialists’ responsibility, the “deadly embrace” with the SNS, Ivica Dačić, and the future of the left.
The SPS has, for the first time in many years, fallen below the electoral threshold. Is this an electoral defeat or the end of a political era?
The SPS is an institution roughly as old as the newspaper “Politika”. In 1903, the first socialist party in Serbia was founded. The SPS traces its roots from Dimitrije Tucović, through the communists, to the Socialist Party of the 1990s. It would be a historical loss if something so enduring were no longer to exist. Through its predecessors, the SPS is the oldest political institution in our country.
Can this be seen as the final end of communism in Serbia after the SPS’s failure in these elections?
The student tsunami has finally erased all traces of the 1990s. All parties that existed in the 1990s no longer exist. The Progressive Party was a new party, or at least it claimed to be, although toward the end it returned to its Radical-era settings. Still, it is different from its Radical mother party. These elections completely reset Serbia’s political scene and erased the parties that existed in the 1990s or the early 2000s.
How do you explain the fact that the SPS did not politically survive 14 years in power with the SNS?
The SNS (Serbian Progressive Party) has one unusual characteristic: it suffocates all its partners. Not a single partner of the Serbian Progressive Party has politically survived.
You were not saying that while you were in coalition with the SNS. Does the SPS bear responsibility for the electoral failure?
The SPS had loyal voters. In recent years, it had a problem conveying its message to younger generations. Clearly, it failed to mobilise them, although no one managed to mobilise younger generations in comparison with the Student List. The SPS had one wonderful feature: several generations, not just one family generation, were activists and supporters of the SPS. It is the only party in which three or four generations of one family belong to the same political option.
Was the SPS harmed in the elections by its stated readiness to cooperate again with the SNS after the vote?
The aggression of Aleksandar Vučić and his circle was extraordinary. Every so often, he would attack Ivica Dačić and the SPS. The leader of a party that betrayed its own leader while he was in prison attacked the SPS for being fickle. The SPS did not betray its leader in prison. Which party was created through the betrayal of its leader? They have no moral right to reproach anyone for that.
How do you explain the attacks by the Progressives on the SPS during the campaign, when that was not happening while you shared power?
The arrogance of the top leadership of the Progressive Party is to a large extent responsible for their major electoral defeat, despite such control over the media and such vast financial resources. At certain moments, it seemed there was no clear system in whom Vučić was attacking, as when he attacked RTS (Radio Television of Serbia, Serbia’s public broadcaster) or the SPS.
How much influence could the SPS exert on joint policy, and how responsible is it for remaining in a “deadly embrace” with the SNS?
We never had a coalition agreement. The Progressives put us in an extremely thankless position. On the one hand, the public blames us for cooperating in a government that was losing popularity, while on the other, our partner constantly breaks agreements and sidelines our personnel.
It is an incredibly complex arrangement, and not one that is easy to resolve to your own advantage. There was hypocrisy among part of the SPS membership and leadership: some criticised obedience to the Progressives, yet for the most part they did not renounce the positions that resulted from that cooperation. Very few resigned. There was strong pressure from the party apparatus to retain posts in local government, public enterprises, and so on. Many people tied their livelihoods to participation in government. It is hard to break out of that circle, that deadly embrace.
Ivica Dačić presented himself as a “factor of stability”. It turned out, in the end, that this did not bear fruit?
I think he really is a factor of stability. Imagine if a less conciliatory man had been in charge of the police during all these events. The greatest recognition of Ivica Dačić came from Čedomir Jovanović, who said in a television programme that Ivica directly prevented bloodshed when he stopped some thugs from attacking demonstrators. A conciliatory man means a great deal in such a frightening post as minister in charge of the use of force. The police did at times use violence, but it would have been even more violent and worse had there been a less stable and less conciliatory man there.
Can the SPS reform itself and survive without a change at the top of the party?
That would not be good. No other SPS official has that kind of popularity and connection with ordinary people that Dačić has. He is one of the most popular politicians. Creating a new Dačić would be a major and rather insoluble problem. At this moment, that is not possible.
The elections did not show that he is one of the most popular... Branko Ružić had warned that the SPS would pay the price for close cooperation with the SNS. How do you view his warnings now, after the elections?
It is easy to say that now. The prevailing view was that voters of the Student List would never vote for the SPS and that we had nothing to seek on that side. Ružić believed that perhaps we could win something from that side as well. The prevailing view was that this was impossible, that the SNS and the SPS draw votes from the same reservoir.
Can the SPS survive while remaining below the electoral threshold?
It is difficult not to be in parliament and not to be in power, especially for a party that has been in power all along. It is a major test. For now, we have the example of a party that fell below the threshold and survived — the Radicals, who spent 10 to 12 years in opposition.
On what ideas does the SPS intend to base a political comeback, if that is possible at all?
It needs to return to basics. Social justice and patriotism are the two main pillars of the SPS. Dačić is the symbol of that party and of its popular and social character. It is important that there should be a major traditional party of the left. Various informal left-wing movements cannot replace the vacuum that would be created by the disappearance of the great left-wing tradition embodied in the SPS.
At party level, have you analysed the reasons and causes of the electoral failure, and what conclusions did you reach?
Here, parties never conduct post-election surveys. Everyone is interested in whom you will vote for or why you will vote, but not in why you voted the way you did. We do not have a developed culture of post-election surveys, so it remains a great mystery why people voted for something. Where did Nestorović’s voters go? That has always puzzled me — in many countries there are post-election surveys, but not here.
What will determine whether the SPS survives or disappears?
If the SPS fails to learn its lesson, that will be the end of a major party. Either a lesson will be learned, or it will disappear.