1. Legitimising external missions: Deconstructing citizens' perceptions towards EULEX in Kosovo
- Author:
- Emma-Louise Rose
- Publication Date:
- 08-2020
- Content Type:
- Special Report
- Institution:
- Kosovar Centre for Security Studies (KCSS)
- Abstract:
- On the EU’s part, EULEX has been its largest ever civilian mission in an attempt to strengthen what is considered to be the EU’s weakest spot: foreign and security policy. Despite its lengthy presence, EULEX has not gained the trust of the citizens of Kosovo. The Kosovo Security Barometer (KSB) conducted annually by KCSS has been measuring the amount of trust that Kosovo citizens have in the mission and have found the number to be consistently low when compared to other local and international institutions. The lack of trust, and therefore support, from the public seems to stem from many different areas particularly EU/EULEX’s neutrality on the issue of Kosovo independence (due to lack of recognition by 5 member states) and a failure to carry out its mission. Based on the quantitative measurement of KSB, the lack of trust has remained fairly stable over the years, with all of the given statistics being within 15% of each other (between 16% and 31%), the lowest amount of trust was recorded in 2015. This brought the legitimacy and public support for the mission into question.
- Topic:
- Security, Foreign Policy, European Union, Institutions, and EULEX
- Political Geography:
- Eastern Europe and Kosovo