From Resilience to Participation: Three Questions with Gorana Radovanovic on Civic Space and Democracy in Serbia

As civic space in Serbia becomes increasingly constrained, the challenge for civil society and independent media is not only to withstand pressure, but to adapt and remain effective. Drawing on learning from the ACT project, implemented in Serbia with support from the Swiss Agency for Development and Cooperation (SDC), Project Manager Gorana Radovanovic shares key insights on how targeted capacity development, community engagement, and principled participation can strengthen resilience and democratic practice in highly polarised contexts.

1. From ACT’s experience, what are the key capacities CSOs and independent media need to remain resilient and effective in a restrictive political environment?

Over the past six years, ACT has worked with more than 200 civil society organizations across Serbia. They differ in size, focus, and the way they operate - but what we see are common pressures, and common traits in those who manage to withstand them.

The first is financial resilience and the courage to build it. Financial sustainability is one of the most pressing challenges facing civil society in Serbia today. Organizations are under constant pressure: how do you secure stable funding when your environment is becoming more restrictive, when donor priorities shift, and when a single funding shock can threaten your existence?

What we found when we started working with these organizations is that most had little to no experience with diversified income: crowdfunding, private sector partnerships, citizen donations. And those who had heard of these channels were skeptical. Understandably so. They weren't sure it could work for organizations like theirs.

What ACT did was invest in practical capacity – training and intensive one-on-one mentoring. Because knowledge alone isn't enough. You also need confidence. And what happened next is something I'm genuinely proud of: 90% of the organizations that ran crowdfunding campaigns exceeded their original fundraising targets. Organizations that previously relied almost entirely on a single donor, with just 1–2% of income coming from citizens or businesses have increased that share to around 15% on average, in just two years. That is not a small thing. That is an organization that is harder to silence, harder to defund, and harder to pressure into self-censorship.

Resilience in a restrictive environment is not just financial. Organizations need to adapt how they communicate, how they advocate, and how they position themselves publicly. That often means doing things they haven't done before - speaking to new audiences, trying new formats, making their work visible in ways that go beyond traditional reporting to donors.

But perhaps the most important capacity we've seen is the ability to build coalitions and networks. In a shrinking civic space, no organization can afford to stand alone. When CSOs connect - across sectors, across regions they show strength in numbers. They demonstrate solidarity. And they create structures that are much harder to marginalize than any single organization working in isolation.

What we've learned from six years of this work is that resilience is not a fixed trait. It's built deliberately, with support, over time. And the organizations that are thriving today are those that invested in that process, even when it was uncomfortable. Especially when it was uncomfortable.

2. How do local CSOs and independent media supported by ACT strengthen citizens’ participation and trust in democratic processes at community level?

One of the most persistent challenges civil society faces in Serbia is not just political pressure, it is also the narrative that accompanies it. For years, organizations like the ones we work with have been portrayed in government-controlled media as foreign hirelings, as traitors, as forces working against ordinary people. That narrative is deliberate. And it is still strong. Over the past two years, as civic protest has grown across Serbia, trust in civil society has moved in a different direction. Not because the narrative disappeared, but because CSOs got closer to people. They showed up. And people noticed.

Many of the organizations ACT works with have fundamentally changed how they communicate. They’ve moved away from donor language toward the language of the communities they serve. They've learned new methods for citizen engagement, gone into communities, and invited people into their work rather than just reporting at them.

Trust is also built through action in moments that matter. When people were illegally detained during protests, CSOs provided legal aid. When democratic processes were deteriorating, they were the first to name it - clearly and publicly. That kind of presence is what builds trust that no media narrative can easily erase.

The results are tangible: over 150,000 people have directly benefited from the work of ACT supported CSOs. Those are people whose lives were touched by an organization that showed up for them, in their community, at a moment when it counted.

What we are witnessing is a slow but real redefinition of what civil society means to ordinary citizens. It is becoming something people turn to, trust, and increasingly join.

3. In a highly polarized context, what practical entry points have you seen for restoring dialogue between civil society, media, and public institutions while safeguarding their independence?

Let me be honest about the context first. The space for genuine dialogue between civil society and government institutions in Serbia has not shrunk. It has, in many areas, effectively closed.The gap is growing. Transparency is declining. And for many organizations, the experience of formal participation has become an exercise in frustration, where presence is tolerated but input is ignored.

And yet, CSOs keep showing up. Not out of naivety, but out of principle. What we see among the organizations ACT works with is a deeply held belief that following the rules matters, even when those in power don't. That civil society's place is at the table, not because the table is fair, but because there are people who have no other representative in that room. Women survivors of violence. Persons with disabilities. Marginalized communities whose lives depend on whether a law is well-written or poorly implemented. These organizations cannot afford to walk away, because their beneficiaries cannot afford it either. They need ministries to respond. They need laws to work. So, they stay engaged - not as partners of the government, but as advocates for the people the government is supposed to serve.

And sometimes, persistence produces results. Such was the case of election of new REM - Serbia's regulatory body for electronic media. The process was flawed. Civil society representatives were not properly elected according to regulations. The conditions were far from fair. But civil society stayed engaged anyway. And that persistent, principled participation prevented a complete institutional takeover. It slowed a process that, without any civic presence, would have moved much faster and much further. That is not a victory. But it is a line held.

This is the practical entry point we have found in highly polarized contexts: show up, stay principled, and make the cost of exclusion visible. Not every working group will produce results. The organizations we work with understand that their independence is not threatened by engagement. It is threatened by disengagement, by becoming invisible in the processes that shape people's lives.

Restoring dialogue is a long game. It requires civil society that is financially resilient enough to not be bought, principled enough to not be co-opted, and connected enough to communities that it cannot be dismissed as irrelevant. That is exactly what ACT has been investing in and why, even in this environment, we remain cautiously, stubbornly hopeful.