Armend Bekaj: Former Combatants, Democracy, and Institution-Building in Transitory Societies. Kosovo and North Macedonia

Before the Russian war against Ukraine, the Balkans had the dubious distinction of being the last European region to have experienced armed conflict. From 1991 until 2008, during the breakup of Yugoslavia, no less than seven new countries emerged in the Balkans, namely Slovenia, Croatia, North Macedonia, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Serbia, Montenegro, and Kosovo. With the exception of Montenegro, they all experienced violent intrastate conflicts to various degrees. Armend Bekaj writes about the aftermath of the two conflicts in Kosovo and North Macedonia, specifically, how and why the combatants were incorporated into the respective postconflict governments. The 1998–1999 Kosovo War and the 2001 North Macedonian (then the Former Yugoslav Republic of Macedonia) insurgency resulted from the armed uprising of the Albanian population, who were deeply dissatisfied with their position in the successor states of Yugoslavia. Bekaj’s book focuses on how the Albanian war leaders achieved the status of peacemakers in the new states, while posing the overarching question: “How does the political integration of former combatants contribute to democracy and institution-building?” (5).

The book begins with a thorough review of the literature on similar intrastate conflicts, outlining the commonalities between the different scenarios that emerge after guerrilla freedom fighters lay down their weapons. The author highlights the holistic approaches to conflict resolution, going beyond political inclusion to also include human rights protection. To “disarm, demobilize and reintegrate (DDR)” (6, 10) combatants is portrayed as crucial for peacebuilding in countries where conflicts largely arose due to the unresolved grievances of a minority group. For peace to triumph, Bekaj argues, compromises need to be reached through a “technical and logistical” (14) process of DDR, comprising the inclusion of the leaders of insurgencies in formal political structures, and clearing the path for socio-economic recovery.

The cases Bekaj examines concern two armed groups, those being the Kosovo Liberation Army (Ushtria Çlirimtare e Kosovës, KLA) operating in Kosovo in the late 1990s, which was then part of what was left of Yugoslavia, and the National Liberation Army (Ushtria Çlirimtare Kombëtare, NLA), leading the insurgency in North Macedonia in the early 2000s. Both forces fought for the rights of the Albanian minorities, and both stemmed from the Marxist–Leninist People’s Movement of Kosovo (Lëvizja Popullore e Kosovës, LPK) that was formed in the 1980s (54). The LPK’s ideological orientation was influenced by Enver Hoxha’s communist Albania, which the Yugoslav Albanians saw as the mother country. Their left-wing nationalism clashed with Yugoslav President Josip Broz Tito’s socialism.

Whatever political model Albania had, Albanians in Yugoslavia would try to emulate it. Bekaj explains that the left-leaning LPK was also influenced by other liberation movements at the time – in Africa, Central and Southeastern Asia – which also tended to be leftist (86). In Kosovo’s case, the LPK led the struggle until the formation of the Democratic League of Kosovo (Lidhja Demokratike e Kosovës, LDK), which used peaceful resistance as a means to achieve independence. However, this changed in the late 1990s, when Slobodan Milošević, the president of Yugoslavia at the time, escalated the persecution of the Albanians especially in the countryside. It is there that an armed resistance movement arose calling themselves the KLA. At least in the beginning, this movement received political support from the LPK, which by then, was largely working through the diaspora. In the North Macedonian case, it was members of the LPK (and at the same time also the KLA) from this area who founded the NLA in 1999. Driven by the successful resistance in Kosovo, both combatants and weapons crossed the border with North Macedonia and joined fellow ethnic Albanians there in fighting against the government.

Bekaj convincingly elaborates on the events that led to the creation of the KLA and the NLA, focusing on the ideological currents flowing through these armed groups. Although the leadership of the KLA originated in the leftist LPK, the author notes that during the war in Kosovo, the movement underwent an ideological transformation influenced by Western liberalism. There were two reasons for this shift: the fall of the People’s Socialist Republic of Albania in the wake of the collapse of state socialism in Eastern Europe as a whole, and, more importantly, the support the KLA received from the United States and NATO during the war. The effects of this reverberated in the leadership of the NLA in North Macedonia as well.

Bekaj goes on to describe how established ethnic Albanian political elites in Kosovo and North Macedonia, comprising literary critics, journalists, writers, doctors, and professors, were pushed aside by the newly formed political class of former combatants, largely from rural backgrounds and with loyalties based on deep-rooted war camaraderie and kinship. The author does not explicitly state that the international community turned a blind eye toward the formation of these new clientelist relationships. However, readers will deduce that he supports the stance adopted by the three Albanian war-wing parties created in Kosovo – the Kosovo Democratic Party, the Alliance for the Future of Kosovo, and the Social Democratic Initiative (Partia Demokratike e Kosovës, Aleanca për Ardhmërinë e Kosovës, and Nisma Social Demokrate, respectively) – and the one established in North Macedonia – the Democratic Union for Integration (Bashkimi Demokratik për Integrim) – that they were seen by the international (Western) community as factors contributing to stability and democratization (137). Consequently, the latter made no attempts to stop the new parties from forming strong clientelist relationships with their voter bases.

The transformation of NLA combatants into political leaders in North Macedonia after the 2001 conflict aimed to achieve balance and fair representation in the already established institutions. The peace deal signed in Ohrid emphasized ethnic power-sharing and language rights for the North Macedonian Albanians, who made up a quarter of the population and were concentrated mostly in the west and north of the country. The reformed ex-NLA leaders drew inspiration from Kosovo. Mobilizing Albanian national identity and capitalizing on international support, the Democratic Union for Integration successfully advanced their position and served as junior partners in all but one of the governments in North Macedonia until May 2024. They were a key party in the Prespa Agreement with Greece, which settled the dispute about the country’s name, the most important step on North Macedonia’s path to NATO membership. In Kosovo, on the other hand, the postwar process focused on building new institutions with the war-wing parties as pillars. However, as Bekaj correctly notes, while the structures they established were mostly democratic, there were major issues with corruption in both cases.

Bekaj achieves his goal of analyzing how former combatants have been integrated in the postconflict societies of Kosovo and North Macedonia, specifically on the political state-building level, and how this has impacted democracy. His study is based on an in-depth analysis of secondary sources, while his fieldwork consists of interviews that provide firsthand accounts by former combatants, academics, and civil society members who experienced the transition under study. Above all Bekaj does an excellent job of fleshing out the conditions under which the transformation from the LPK to the KLA and the NLA, and of the members of these movements to postconflict political leaders occurred. His key finding is that the process of transforming combatants into politicians in the two countries has ensured stability at the expense of democracy, spoiled by clientelism.

I would make the following critical observations about Bekaj’s study. The book lacks more comprehensive insights into the role the international community played in supporting the war-wing parties. Although the author provides his readers with an impression of the general scope of international support, there is no mention of Western diplomats such as Christopher Dell (US), Michael Steiner (UN), James W. Pardew (US), François Léotard (EU), or others who played a crucial role in the peace negotiations and the integration of combatants in the postconflict governments. Both in Kosovo and North Macedonia, the Albanians were those with staunchly pro-Western attitudes, particularly during the rule of the parties mentioned above. This made them strong political allies in a region susceptible to Russian and Chinese influences. In particular, the role of the US was critical and often intrusive (especially in Kosovo) when it came to creating governments with war-wing parties that the citizens perceived as immensely corrupt, but proponents of Western interests nonetheless.

In addition, in the case of Kosovo, one factor that is mentioned just once or twice, and even then only in passing, is the prosecution of war crimes allegedly committed by the former insurgents. The prosecution led to three major governmental resignations, two by Prime Minister Ramush Haradinaj (2005 and 2019) and one by President Hashim Thaçi (2020), both former KLA leaders charged with war crimes at the International Criminal Tribunal for the former Yugoslavia or the Kosovo Specialist Chambers courts based in The Hague. Bekaj’s analysis of the DDR process in these two cases should at least have included an addendum elaborating on the impact of trying former insurgence leaders for war crimes after they had become important government actors.

Bekaj correctly represents the integration of former combatants in politics as a strategic choice in both of the countries under study, influenced by international support and pressure. Combatants were brought to the negotiating table to end the war and achieve peace. They were persuaded to transform themselves into political parties. The transformation from “bullets to ballots” (136) ensures ownership in the country the ex-combatants fought against (North Macedonia), or enables them to become founders of a new country altogether (Kosovo). More than that, such integration gave political and economic prospects to the marginalized communities the insurgents represented. However, the need to swiftly resolve conflict and safeguard stability came at the cost of producing clientelist and generally corrupt government structures. The author conclusively proves that this was the case in Kosovo and North Macedonia.