Serbia’s students have shown how to beat an autocrat at the ballot box

Serbia’s Student List won a dramatic victory in the 2026 Serbian election, ending Aleksandar Vučić’s hold on power. Denisa Kostovicova and Jessie Barton Hronešová explain how a leaderless student movement succeeded in unseating an entrenched regime and assess the challenges it now faces in government.

Pobeda! Pobeda! Victory! Victory! Shouted ecstatic crowds that flooded the streets of Serbia’s cities and towns minutes after Aleksandar Vučić, Serbia’s autocratic strongman of 14 years, conceded electoral defeat on the evening of a tense election day on 25 October 2026.

The winner of the historic vote is the “Student List – Students Are Winning”, backed by a two-year-old student movement without a leader and any prior political experience. The win was delivered thanks to a high turnout of nearly 70%, which gave the students 53% of the vote while Vučić and his Serbian Progressive Party (SNS) achieved only 39% (according to official figures yet to be certified).

Although there were 16 other lists on the ballot, the context in this referendum-like vote was between Vučić and the students. Unprecedented volunteering efforts to monitor polling stations by citizens and civil society activists reduced possibilities for fraud during the vote and the count. The wide margin of over 500,000 votes left the regime with no choice but to admit defeat. It was the outcome many had hoped for, but only the most optimistic considered attainable.

Hope against fear in Serbia

SNS’s regime, well-seasoned in intimidation and unflinching in its use of violence against opponents, has shown little restraint since the student movement burst onto the scene in 2024. This was especially evident during the six-week-long pre-election campaign, which only widened support for the students.

“It finally feels like there is hope for change” was a shared feeling among supporters in the capital on the eve of the vote when the Student List held a peaceful rally. The positive “vibe” around the students and their vision of a Serbia governed by the rule of law was infectious: “almost like a victory before the vote itself” for some. Outside the capital, people simply hoped for change: “this is not a life, this is survival”, a citizen in central Serbia said a day before the elections.

On the election day, hundreds of reports of voting irregularities poured in: compromised ballot secrecy, voting without IDs and other tactics were followed by news of violence near polling stations. Tensions rose as it became clear that the high turnout would favour the students. To create momentum, the Student List urged citizens to vote early and without fear. Long queues formed from the early morning, a testament to a public that would no longer be passive and intimidated.

Meanwhile, the diaspora did its share abroad, overcoming the obstructions it faced: the authorities refused to open polling stations in cities well over the required number of registered voters and insisted that voting abroad follow Serbian time. Serbs in New York demonstrated defiance by flocking to the polling station in pyjamas and with sleeping masks at 1am. Elsewhere, they organised car shares or travelled for thousands of miles to cast their votes.

A unique political movement

The remarkable road to the 2026 Serbian election and its outcome can hardly be overstated. The Student List is a unique political movement. After a newly renovated canopy of the railway station in Novi Sad fell and killed 16 people, including children, in November 2024, students organised sit-ins, blockades, marches and even a cycle ride to Strasbourg, demanding accountability, transparency and rule of law. The collapse has been widely blamed on construction failures rooted in corruption.

The government responded by empty gestures of appeasement, which later escalated into repression and blackmail against students and university staff, whose salaries were withheld, as well as journalists, artists, athletes and others who voiced support.

Instead of caving in, the movement grew stronger. Its message reached the furthest corners of the country through iconic marches through small towns and villages long kept in the dark by the regime’s grip on the media.

The support swelled, bridging ethnic, generational, ideological and class differences. Images of Bosniaks from Sandžak and Serbs embracing, pensioners greeting students alongside roads, sharing music and dance, became symbols of unity, love and civility that stood against hate, fear and corruption.

When in May 2025, it became clear that the regime would not budge, the students asked for snap elections. Parliamentary elections were finally announced on 9 September 2026, and the students were ready.

“Student List – Students are Winning” epitomised this intentionally leaderless movement that has relied on a democratic deliberative tool of “plenums”, organised around individual faculties where every student’s view had an equal weight.

The same horizontal democracy that shaped the movement’s tactics and strategy also produced the candidates. The plenums drew up a list of 250 thoroughly vetted candidates based on their expertise and independent credentials, such as academics, professional experts, artists and athletes, who had no prior involvement in politics. This stood in stark contrast to the regime’s culture of nepotism and party loyalty.

Graffiti wars and polarisation

The “now-or-never” stakes of the elections were well depicted in graffiti wars across Serbia: the regime’s messaging crossed out by the students and vice versa.

Regime supporters tried to discredit students’ election slogans, denoting them as “traitors”, “terrorists”, and “Ustaše”, referring to Croatia’s World War II fascist regime that also targeted Serbs. These charges were aimed at delegitimising students as unpatriotic foreign mercenaries unlike Vučić, who used nationalism to boost his position as a protector of Serbia.

Constantly pressed to demonstrate their national credentials, the students refused to take the bait. While staying on the corruption message, their candidates merely stated respect for the Serbian constitution (that defines Kosovo as part of Serbia) and pledged support for their “Serbian brethren” in Republika Srpska, the Serb entity in Bosnia and Herzegovina, without further details.

They approached the “ghosts of the past” evasively too, a Belgrade-based analyst noted, largely staying away from discussions about accountability for war crimes during the 1990s. But when the regime goaded them that they would betray friendly Russia, they declared a refusal to impose sanctions on Russia that would align Serbia’s policy with the EU over the Ukraine war.

While criticised by some or even dismissed as being equally nationalistic as the SNS regime by less contextually versed observers, this approach allowed the students to prioritise the defeat of the regime by drawing support from the progressive left to radical right alongside war veterans and humanitarians. The more “painful” policies, they argued, can only be dealt with once Serbia is internally liberated of the criminal regime.

How will the Student List govern Serbia?

The Student List comes into power in Serbia with an in-tray full of challenges. Beyond the taxing task of reforming a system mired in corruption, informal power and criminal networks, it faces stalled EU integration, regional instability and Russia’s growing influence in Serbia.

Serbian citizens and Serbia’s neighbours, faced with nearly a decade and a half of SNS’s policy of overreach framed as protection of Serb interests, now have high hopes for change. Yet the very same strategies that brought electoral success may prove problematic.

The Student List’s leaderless movement proved effective for attracting people tired of the privatisation of power. But it raises questions about both the capacity and the popularity of the leader and the team that will front their political agenda in parliament. Serbia’s foreign policy will also be of utmost importance, given the current stakes.

If Hungary is anything to go by, a short window of opportunity has opened up: reforming the media, judiciary and the security services must be tackled quickly. Investigating embezzlement and corruption will be the top priority for citizens.

Judging by their programme, the Student List is aware of these challenges. Only time will tell whether this unorthodox political movement will be able to overcome them and live up to the hope it has inspired. But for now, this is good news for Serbia and Europe alike.

Note: This article gives the views of the authors, not the position of LSE European Politics or the London School of Economics.

Source: https://blogs.lse.ac.uk/europpblog/2026/10/27/serbia-student-list-election-vucic/ (CC BY 4.0)