From 1997 to 2000, I lived and worked in the Balkans. I arrived in the interwar period--shortly after the Bosnian war ended and before the war in Kosovo. My assignment was to support local efforts to establish rule of law in these former Communist countries. Initially, I landed in Belgrade, Serbia, which was living under the "soft" dictatorship of Slobodan Milosevic. Despite his efforts to control civil society, the judiciary, and the press, people had organized in opposition. Just months before I arrived, tens of thousands of Belgrade citizens spent three months of a freezing winter in the streets protesting his theft of local elections won by his opposition. Five courageous judges validated their efforts by publishing a letter in the press, explaining that Milosevic's actions violated the law. These five judges formed an independent Judges' Association. My assignment was to support them by connecting them to international jurists.
After much work and many false starts, we organized a successful conference with judges from France, Italy, the United States, and other countries. I gave a speech at the end in which I congratulated them on their achievement under difficult circumstances, including an authoritarian government. Despite not having a crystal ball, I told the assembled judges that, while U.S. lawyers and judges had helped make the conference possible, someday we in the United States might need their help to maintain rule of law and an independent judiciary. While I was trying to equalize our relationship, my prediction has become all too true. Given the Trump Administration's contempt for the rule of law and political appointment of judges who support the unitary executive theory of government in which power lies with the president and not the people's representatives, those of us in the U.S. who support the rule of law and our constitution might well welcome assistance from abroad.
Unfortunately, Serbian progressives' efforts to establish an independent judiciary and rule of law have been thwarted under the presidency of Aleksandar Vucic. But citizens are still active. Students took to the streets over a year ago after a railway station awning collapsed, killing 16 people. The protesters charge the government with corruption in granting a contract for the awning which resulted in shoddy workmanship and hence the deadly collapse.
Serbia has been a candidate for accession to the European Union since 2012. Recently, the European Commission announced that it is considering suspending 1.5 billion euros of payment to Serbia during its accession due to rule of law problems and controversial judicial reforms. It appears we cannot look to Serbian reformists for help in maintaining U.S. rule of law and an independent judiciary at present. We might check out Hungary. Despite Orban's 16-year autocratic rule, he lost badly in recent elections.