Building National Media in Montenegro and Kosovo Rebecca Mueller

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Introduction

As academics turn increasingly towards transnational modes of inquiry, certain small

corners of the world continue to subscribe to dreams of national sovereignty. In southeast

Europe, two unlikely “candidates” have realized this dream during the past decade. In 2006,

Montenegro voted to secede from their federal union with Serbia and exist as an independent

nation. In 2008, Kosovo, a de facto autonomous region within Serbia, declared its independence.

Montenegro and Kosovo are Europe’s newest independent nation-states. Though rarely

viewed in a comparative framework, these two countries arguably share not only the

contemporary challenges of nation-building, but also a common heritage and many shared or

similar experiences. The regions that make up modern-day Montenegro and Kosovo were

sparsely populated, geographically isolated, and economically under-developed during the

medieval and Ottoman periods. Though both entities experienced brief periods of national

identity formation in the modern period, they remained peripheral backwaters under the

Kingdom of Yugoslavia and, later, socialist Yugoslavia. Finally, from 1990 until their respective

establishment of national independence, both Montenegro and Kosovo were lesser constituents

to the Serb-dominated Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY) and were subjected to different but

parallel forms of political and social oppression by the Milošević regime.

A strong enthusiasm for statehood has, perhaps unsurprisingly, characterized public

attitudes in both countries over the past five years. Indeed, in a 2008 Gallup poll of the western

Balkans, Montenegro and Kosovo are described as “the only countries where a majority of

respondents (59% and 62% respectively) were optimistic about their country’s future” (Gallup

2008). They were also “the only two territories where a majority of respondents spoke positively

about their governments’ performance,” at 55% and 53% respectively. These numbers are

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notable in the former Yugoslav space, where government approval ratings in Bosnia dip to single

digits and a majority of even relatively well-off Croats have a negative outlook on the future.

More recent iterations of the Gallup poll have suggested that citizens of Montenegro and Kosovo

continue to rank as more optimistic than their Balkan peers, though percentage points fell in both

cases according to 2010/11 results (Gallup 2011).

Such widespread enthusiasm masks the continued challenges of statehood, different in

scope but similarly discouraging in both countries. Montenegro and Kosovo face a range of

difficulties that might be described as post-socialist, post-conflict, and post-dependence (on

union with Serbia, and on international administration in the case of Kosovo). The convergence

of these difficulties influences the practical or tangible aspects of “state-building”—governance,

economic development, international relations—as well as less tangible issues related to “nation-

building” such as national belonging, national identity and the like. In the interest of broadening

our scholarly understanding of state- and nation-building in contemporary Montenegro and

Kosovo, I will turn now to a comparative examination of developments in a specific sector:

media.

The role played by mass media in national movements (what I call “nation-building”) has

been well established by major theorists of nationalism. Benedict Anderson views the rise of

“print-media” as crucial to the history of modern nationalisms, as it allowed “growing numbers

of people to think about themselves, and to relate themselves to others, in profoundly new ways”

(Anderson 1982:36). “Nation” and “national,” for the purposes of this paper, should not

automatically be associated with right-wing, exclusionary nationalism. When I employ the term

“nation” I refer, following Anderson’s model, to an imaginary project informed by shared

practices and traditions. What I call “national media,” by extension, is a system of media-related

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practices and traditions that attempt to speak to or for the “nation” and are thus concerned with

national identity or national issues.

I take “national media” as a concept and topic of study for several reasons. First, mass

media have been shown to reflect both state structures and political currents within a society. In

the context of brand new nation-states—where an entire government structure is being shaped by

contemporary politicians and politics—this conflation seems particularly appropriate. Similarly,

modern media influence and are influenced by stakeholders at all levels of society. The top-down

projects of lawmakers, policy-shapers, media owners and professional journalists are tempered

through their interactions with their audience, who control the economy of media through their

consumption habits. The study of national media seeks intersections between a variety of

national actors whose projects and goals naturally affect one another. Finally, even a terse

examination of print and electronic media in contemporary Montenegro and Kosovo suggests

that media play a role in debates over national identity, territorial sovereignty, politics and other

themes concerning nation-building.

In this paper, I will describe the development of national media in Montenegro and

Kosovo, situating them in pre-socialist and socialist periods before focusing in depth on the past

twenty years. How have media systems in each context been shaped by conflict, state control,

and Serbian hegemony during the 1990s? How have these systems been defined in the years

leading up to and following national independence? I will trace the relationship between national

media and nation in Montenegro and Kosovo, ultimately suggesting how the building of national

media in these countries informs our understanding of nation-building.

Historical Media Development

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In this section, I will present a brief overview of the development of media systems in

Montenegro and Kosovo. I will argue that these systems in the pre-socialist and socialist periods

remained largely underdeveloped when compared with media systems in neighboring areas,

reflecting wider socio-political disparities in the region. I will designate Montenegro and Kosovo

as “peripheral” areas and introduce the “center-periphery” paradigm as crucial to understanding

media development into the post-socialist period.

The Foundations of Modern Media

Montenegrins proudly trace their media history to 1494, when then-capital city Cetinjë

welcomed the first Gutenberg printing press in the Balkans. The apparent promise of this Balkan

“first” went largely unfulfilled in later centuries. Though a handful of intellectuals became

involved in regional literary movements, the great majority of Montenegrins were illiterate well

into the twentieth century. In the lead-up to World War I, neighboring Serbia boasted 775

publications (Parquette 2002). Tiny Montenegro, in contrast, was home to a handful of small

publishing houses and periodicals, the weekly South Slavic-language newspaper Crnogorac,

founded in 1881 (Paquette 2002), and not a single daily newspaper.

Media in neighboring Kosovo was equally underdeveloped. Very few works were

produced in the Albanian language, though educated inhabitants could, like their neighbors in

Montenegro, access publications from their northern South Slavic neighbors or farther-flung

European countries. In the late 19th century, ethnically Albanian intellectuals—many based

outside the region, in Istanbul, Bucharest, and Western Europe—sought to standardize written

Albanian as part of a greater movement for national recognition within the Ottoman Empire.

They gathered in Prizren, Kosovo, in 1880, and Kosovo’s first weekly newspaper, Prizren, was

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founded in connection that same year (Vickers 2002). As in Montenegro, no daily newspaper

existed prior to World War II (Paquette 2002).

Montenegro and Kosovo were absorbed into the newly-constituted Kingdom of Serbs,

Croats, and Slovenes—later the Kingdom of Yugoslavia—following the Balkan Wars in 1912-

1913. Official anti-Albanian policies virtually prevented freedom of expression—including mass

media—in Kosovo, and media as a rule fared poorly under King Alexander I. The King declared

a royal dictatorship in 1929, and all independent press was prohibited from that point until the

dissolution of the Kingdom during World War II.

Media in both Montenegro and Kosovo prior to the socialist period remained sorely,

though “differently,” underdeveloped. Montenegrins occupied a more privileged position than

their Kosovar Albanian neighbors in modern Yugoslav society. Because they spoke South Slavic

dialects, they could easily access both literary texts and the literature of the everyday:

newspapers, government notices, public signs and public school instruction. In fact, the epic

poem Mountain Wreath, widely considered a foundational text of the 19th century South Slavic

national movement, was written by Montenegrin “Prince-bishop” Petar Njegoš in 1847.

Kosovo’s Albanian population, by contrast, was treated as an ethnic, linguistic and religious

“other” and remained isolated to varying degree from 20th century cultural developments in

Albania proper.

After Yugoslavia’s socialist takeover, Tito’s ideology of “Unity and Fraternity”

addressed inter-ethnic grievances by creating a system of highly managed nationalisms.

Montenegro was recognized as a Republic and placed on equal footing with the territories of

more dominant nationalities like Serbia and Croatia. Kosovo, though larger, was designated a

Province, and Albanians enjoyed fewer rights to representation, recognition, and self-

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determination. Similarly, Montenegrins became a narod, or nationality, while Albanians—who

made up a majority of the population in Kosovo and a significant minority in Montenegro,

Serbia, and Macedonia at the time—were deemed a protected national minority or narodnost.

These designation influenced the eventual relationship between Montenegro and Kosovo as

peripheral entities to “the center”: Belgrade as the administrative capital of Yugoslavia and, later,

of its post-socialist successor, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia.

Socialist Media

As early as 1951, socialist leader Tito had liberalized what had briefly begun as a

strongly-centralized state and economy modeled on Stalin’s Soviet Union. In the new,

decentralized system, industry and social institutions were collective- or people-owned rather

than state-owned. Yugoslavia’s media system was also de-centralized. National media were

transferred from state to “collective” ownership, and while the Belgrade-based federal

government continued to license media and broadcast frequencies and support republic- and

province-wide news and broadcast entities, a range of entities—including local chapters of the

Communist Party, factories and worker collectives, and youth organizations—were authorized to

sponsor smaller-run newspapers and journals.

By the 1970s, the capital of each administrative entity—the republics of Bosnia, Croatia,

Macedonia, Montenegro, Serbia, and Slovenia and the provinces of Kosovo and Vojvodina—

published state newspapers and broadcast radio and later television. However, media disparity

was evident, particularly in peripheral areas like Montenegro and Kosovo. Logistical

challenges—mountainous topography and geographical distance from economic and cultural

centers such as Belgrade, Sarajevo, and Zagreb—greatly limited media development and access.

For instance, 100% broadcast coverage of Montenegro would have required the installation of

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approximately 100 antennas (Đuranović 2005). In contrast, full broadcast coverage in Vojvodina,

nearly twice the size of Montenegro, required fewer than 10.

State media in Montenegro and Kosovo was also affected by socio-economic

underdevelopment. When Tito took power in 1944, the Communist Party founded the first daily

newspapers in both Podgorica (Pobjeda) and Prishtina (Rilindja). The immediate effect of these

papers is unclear, as large numbers of Montenegrins and Kosovars at that time remained

illiterate. Regarding wider print media, only 1% of book titles in the former Yugoslavia were

published in Montenegro, and publishing was so under-realized in Kosovo that schools in the

province imported Albanian-language textbooks from neighboring Albania (Duijzings 1996).

The socio-economic gap was equally reflected in broadcast media. Podgorica (then Titograd) and

Prishtina each managed one single-frequency radio station and one single-frequency television

station (Robinson 1979:48), though programming exchanges between Prishtina and Tiranë began

during the 1970s (BBC 1979). By comparison, Vojvodina, the third smallest Yugoslav entity,

hosted programming on three radio frequencies and two television frequencies and was home to

an array of newspapers and periodicals in a variety of languages.

Media development in Yugoslavia reflected wider socio-political trends. In 1970 and

1971, a wave of Croatian nationalism encouraged by right-wing weekly newspapers in Zagreb

led to constitutional revision awarding greater national recognition to Muslim Slavs (Bošnjaks)

and ethnic Albanians. Tito’s death in 1980 was followed in 1981 by student-led protests

advocating the recognition of Kosovo as Yugoslavia’s seventh republic. Many Yugoslav

journalists (Albanian and not) were sympathetic to the protestors’ suffering but hesitant to cover

the full extent of the violence. Individual journalists revealed that they feared being charged by

the Communist authorities for “inciting nationalist chauvinism” and were aware of the

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destabilizing effect that coverage might have during a time of economic depression (Ashanin

1985).

If Yugoslav journalists in 1981 still demonstrated a commitment to the Tito-ist principles

of “brotherhood and unity,” their allegiances had shifted from state support to state criticism by

the mid-1980s. This criticism took different forms. Croatian, Slovenian, and Macedonian media

became strongly pro-regional (and anti-federal), and consumption of Yugoslavia-wide media

plummeted. In Kosovo, intellectuals and local politicians were encouraged by these

developments, even as human rights within Kosovo deteriorated.

News from Belgrade—Yugoslav and Serbian media—underreported this growing

dissatisfaction and pro-regionalism and stressed the “unity” that allowed Serbia to maintain its

political advantage as the largest republic and the site of national authority. Montenegrins,

historically construed as “little brothers” of the Serbs, were split between pro-regional and pro-

federal aims. By the late 1980s, the threats of decentralization and dissolution were construed as

direct threats to Serbs, and Serbian journalists and media outlets seized the helm of the

Yugoslavia-wide shift towards nationalist-oriented media.

Building Opposition Media

When compared with other East European media systems, the “post-socialist” trajectory

of media in the former Yugoslavia is more complicated. The usual challenges of post-socialism

(privatization, changing media law and professional standards) combine with those related to

conflict. In this section, I will examine media-related developments in the FRY during the 1990s,

looking specifically at media policies imposed under Slobodan Milošević from the “center” and

responses to these policies in Montenegro and Kosovo as “peripheries.” I will argue that this

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time period and its immediate aftermath was formative for media systems in both contexts, albeit

in different ways.

Media under Milošević

In 1989, the Serb-dominated Yugoslav government amended the federal constitution,

reducing the status of Kosovo and Vojvodina from federal, autonomous provinces to territorial

provinces within the Republic of Serbia. Officially, this amendment countered dangerous

nationalist elements among ethnic Albanians in Kosovo. Unofficially, it increased Serbia’s

geographic and numerical advantage, pandered to heightened nationalist sentiment among ethnic

Serbs, and drew sharp backlash from Yugoslavia’s other nationalities. Ultimately, it became an

impetus for the secession of Slovenia, Croatia, Bosnia and Macedonia from the Yugoslav

Federation. By 1992, the Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (FRY), commonly known as Serbia

and Montenegro, was the “rump” and self-declared successor state of the former Yugoslav

Federation.

Numerous reconfigurations of the media system of the FRY accompanied and partially

facilitated the rise of Slobodan Milošević and his subsequent consolidation of power. Beginning

in 1989, media professionals in Serbia were subjected to state-sponsored “purges.” Powerful

figures in the government ordered media outlets to fire journalists and editors who undermined

Milošević’s regime. The regime defined its opponents according to their alleged political

affiliations, their undesirable (or non-Serb) ethnic identity, or their reputations as investigative or

even impartial journalists. Publishers and broadcasters who refused to be strong-armed saw their

media outlets closed outright under various technical guises, such as back taxes or failure to meet

deadlines for licensing reapplications. In this way, the Milošević administration quietly and quite

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successfully fashioned a media machine that proffered unanimous support for wars waged in

Slovenia, Croatia, and Bosnia and the oppressive, apartheid-like conditions imposed in Kosovo.

The Milošević media machine was directly supported by the media controls introduced in

Montenegro and Kosovo. Media “policy” in Kosovo aimed to completely cripple Albanian

media outlets. Besnik Pula notes that in 1989, Albanian-language (state) media in Kosovo

capitalized on what would prove a temporary disintegration of “traditional Party censorship” and

responded with criticism to the revocation of Kosovo’s autonomous status (2004:804). However,

in 1990, Serbian authorities implemented policies amounting to martial law and laid off

approximately 100,000 ethnic Albanians from provincial-level and local government, schools,

hospitals and other public institutions, and industries, then still state-owned (see Duijzing, ed.

1996). Belgrade also ordered the immediate closure of all Albanian-language media, including

the provincial broadcasting agency Radio-Television Kosovo and the Kosovo Communist Party

newspaper Rilindja (Trix 2001:161). Serbian media filled with anti-Albanian propaganda was

widely available, in both the original Serbian and Albanian translation. A handful of Kosovo’s

smaller-run periodicals, mainly trade journals, escaped closure.

The reconfiguration of media in Montenegro was less blatant due to the republic’s ties to

Belgrade. Montenegro's Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS), the successor to the repubic's

Communist Party, maintained a close relationship with Slobodan Milošević's Socialist Party of

Serbia. In 1992, under Montenegrin Prime Minister and DPS president Milo Đukanović,

Montenegro joined the FRY via a politically-orchestrated “public” referendum. From this point

forward, media choices in Montenegro included domestic and Serbian state media (all pro-

Milošević), several state-manipulated and propagandistic titles, also from Serbia, and a single

independent weekly newspaper, Monitor, founded by University of Montenegro professor

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Miodrag Perović in 1990. Monitor was to be the sole private media outlet in Montenegro until

1997.

Towards Media Alternatives

Milošević’s media machine was designed to prohibit political alternatives in the FRY.

Nonetheless, it met with various forms of resistance for the decade between its creation in 1990

and the time Milošević was removed from power in 2000. A growing number of scholars have

begun to (re)examine everyday life under the Milošević regime (Živkovic 2011) and specifically,

within various opposition movements (Beiber 2003, Carothers 2009). At least one media scholar

has examined the ways that activists, both domestic and international, used the internet as an

effective alternative medium to spread information during the strictest periods of state media

control (Tunnard 2003). However, all of these works examine Serbia as the site of resistance, and

ethnic Serbs as actors. An examination of opposition from the FRY periphery—Montenegro and

Kosovo—is virtually absent from the current literature, as is any serious treatment of the role of

media in such opposition.

In Montenegro, the weekly Monitor, mentioned above, led the opposition media. It has

been described as one of “only a handful of truly independent and anti-institutional newspapers”

that existed in the former Yugoslavia (Radojković 1994:146), and as the only media outlet in

Montenegro which “raised its voice against the war in the former Yugoslavia,” (Zadrima

2005:353). In the early days of Monitor’s existence, there was little indication that popular

opposition existed elsewhere in Montenegrin society. Elite and popular support for Milošević

seemed the norm, and though Montenegrins avoided war on their territory, men participated in

military attacks on Dubrovnik, Croatia, and especially in Bosnia and Herzegovina.

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By the mid-1990s, however, it became clear that public opinion in Montenegro was

slowly turning against Milošević. As popular dissatisfaction with the prolonged conflict and

economic turmoil associated with Belgrade grew, Montenegrin Prime Minister Đukanović began

to distance his own politics from Milošević, gradually adopting a pro-independence stance.

These changes in the political climate developed parallel to changes in the Montenegrin media

scene. A newly-positioned government in Podgorica allowed more space for the creation of

media outlets

In 1995, Montenegro's first private electronic media outlet, Blue Moon TV, began

broadcasting from Podgorica to a small local audience. Then, in 1997, Miroslav Perović a

handful of journalists connected to Monitor, founded Vijesti, Montenegro’s first independent

daily. From its founding, Vijesti assumed the role as voice of the opposition. It also aimed to

present the most professional and marketable print product on the Montenegrin market.

The establishment of Vijesti was followed closely by the appearance of more

“opposition” newspapers. First, it was joined by two equally anti-Milošević print outlets, albeit

Serbian ones. In 1997, Montenegro became home to Dnevni Telegraf and Danas. These

opposition newspapers, previously registered in Belgrade, had been forcibly closed by the

Government of Serbia. Because of the structure of jurisdiction set up in the FRY union between

Serbia and Montenegro, these papers were able to re-register in Montenegro, still within the

country, yet beyond the reach of Milošević’s media law. They could also legally distribute

throughout the FRY (Belgrade Center for Human Rights 1999).

Vijesti also triggered the creation of a “counter-opposition” daily newspaper Dan,

founded by Duško Jovanović in 1998. Initially, the link between Dan and the pro-union Socialist

People's Party (of former FRY Prime Minister Momir Bulatović, a Montenegrin) was explicit,

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and the paper was believed to operate with Milošević’s blessing to counter the newfound

popularity of independence media. Later, Dan spoke for a more general pro-union audience.

In neighboring Kosovo, the socio-political situation during the 1990s was much more

tenuous, with ethnic Albanians subjected not only to structural segregation but also police

brutality and other forms of violence. Despite the risks, independent media arose to serve the

information needs of the population as well as voice political opposition. Certain media were

pushed “underground,” while others established themselves abroad, either in the region or in

western Europe. After the closure of Prishtina-based daily Rilindja, newly unemployed Rilindja

journalists continued to publish for a time through the Kosovo agricultural journal Bujku. It, too,

was shut down several months later. After this, publications from the Albanian Diaspora became

the most important media for Albanians in Kosovo (Trix 2001).

During the 1990s, the Montenegrin and Kosovar media scenes were greatly influenced by

the tendentious relationship between the policies of the central FRY government and both elite

and popular opposition to these policies from Podgorica and Prishtina. National media played

what were in the very least practical roles in anti-Milošević political resistance. Montenegro

became the de facto home base of FRY-wide anti-Milošević opposition media during the late

1990s. Albanian-language media operated, ad hoc, from both within and outside the physical

borders of Kosovo, filling an important gap during the existence of the Kosovar “parallel state.”

In each place, a foundling national media sector arose in spite of a decade of Serbian official

hegemony.

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Building National Media

During the past ten years, the peripheral location of Montenegro and Kosovo in relation

to Belgrade has diminished in importance. In both contexts, the period from the end of the

Kosovo conflict until the present day can be viewed as a series of gradual steps towards national

independence. The development of national media has tended to parallel state-building. In this

section, I will first introduce the basic context of post-1999 national media-building. I will then

consider the development of public and independent media outlets and the changing nature of

journalism in both countries.

Recent History

In Montenegro, the Democratic Party of Socialists (DPS)—which proceeded directly

from the Montenegrin branch of the Yugoslav Communist Party—has held virtally uninterrupted

control since 1991. DPS president Milo Đukanović has personally spent most of the last twenty

years as either the most powerful or second most powerful individual in the Montenegrin

government. After the Kosovo conflict, Đukanović became even more strongly pro-

independence and pro-European. Montenegro has officially used the euro since 2002, the same

year the FRY became the much looser confederation of “Serbia and Montenegro.”

Montenegrin politics divide along ethnic lines, with major opposition parties either

overtly pro-union (with Serbia) or minority rights, whether Serbian, Bosnian, or Albanian. This

has not changed since the May 2006 independence referendum, in which pro-independence just

barely secured the 55% of the population necessary to dissolve union with Serbia. The

population of 620,000 is split with approximately 44% identifying as Montenegrin, 30% as

Serbian, 8% Bosnian, 5% Albanian, 3% Muslim with additional smaller groups (MONSTAT

2011).

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In Kosovo, the political situation is dominated by former Kosovo Liberation Army

(KLA) militia members. Hasim Thaçi, president of the Democratic Party of Kosovo and Prime

Minister of Kosovo since 2008, was the political leader of the KLA during the late 1990s.

However, international organizations have been as influential as, if not more influential than,

national political parties. In June 1999, the UN Security Council Resolution 1244 established the

civil presence United Nations Interim Administration Mission in Kosovo (UNMiK) The NATO

Kosovo Force (of KFOR)—overseeing military and security sectors—entered Kosovo two days

later. In 2001, Provisional Institutions of Self-Government (PISG)—including the Assembly and

Government of Kosovo, President, Prime Minister and judicial system—were created, with all

reporting to the UN Special Representative of the Secretary General for Kosovo. Since 2008, the

European Union Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) has begun to gradually replace a

phasing-out UNMiK. The population of 1,730,000 is approximately 92% Albanian, 4% Serb,

and 4% Bosnians, Turks, Roma and others (ASK 2010).

Newly-National Media

The past decade has seen a number of new media laws and policies established in

Montenegro and Kosovo. Such laws do not, however, reflect media transformations “on the

ground.” Indeed, most of the language surrounding media issues is borrowed, boiler-plate, from

the international and inter-governmental organizations funding media projects. A look at cases

relating to public and private media in action is necessary to ascertain the state of the national

media in each context.

The major stakeholders in media development since 1999 have included the Montenegrin

and Kosovar states, domestic ruling and opposition parties and politicians, the international

community (including inter-governmental and aid organizations), the owners and managers of

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media outlets, journalists and other media professionals, and the public. One big change in

stakeholders is the exit of Serbia as a major influence. Though political tensions regarding

relations with Serbia continued in Montenegro and Kosovo, the actual influence of the Belgrade

government on the ground following the Kosovo War was nominal in each case.

Perhaps bigger than the change in stakeholders is the change in stakes. Contemporary

media in Montenegro and Kosovo, as I have argued, were shaped to great extent by their

situation in historical backwaters and, later, in political peripheries. During the 1990s, national

media in both places took on an oppositional role in the struggle for national autonomy. Indeed,

media outlets in 1990s- Montenegro and Kosovo functioned in opposition to what was arguably

one of the most thorough and successfully executed media machines in recent memory.

After the Kosovo War, Serbia backed down—immediately in Kosovo, more gradually in

Montenegro—and national media were left to focus inward. Montenegro and Kosovo, while

perhaps still peripheral in the context of the global community, became centers in their own

right. Political debates focused increasingly on domestic divisions. New, internal “peripheries”

were peopled by Serbs (in northern Kosovo and Montenegro), Albanians (in Montenegro), Roma

(in each) and others. Those once hailed by “opposition” media as heroes now held political

power, and it was unclear “who” or “what” public service media or independent media were

supposed to support.

Building Public Media

In the period of post-socialist democratization in Eastern Europe, “state-owned media”

were the focus of great international concern. Western governments and media professionals had

long held the view that media under state socialism were state-owned and served as the voice of

the government. The complexities and variations of state-media relationships across the former

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Communist bloc were either poorly understood or completely ignored. The neoliberal

Washington Consensus favored the immediate privatization of media outlets, while western

Europe favored a less drastic process of private investment and the creation of a depoliticized but

state-mandated public media.

In Kosovo, state media was non-existent after 1990. However, post-conflict Kosovo saw

the creation of new state media. Radio Prishtina and Television Kosovo began broadcasting with

the help of foreign funding following the end of the war, though these early days included just

two hours of “emergency” programming per day (RTK website). The two joined to become

Radio Television Kosovo (RTK) in October 1999. A year later, Radio Blue Sky, the UNMiK-

sponsored mutli-ethnic youth radio station, was integrated with RTK in 2000. Radio Blue Sky

included programming in Albanian, Serbian and Turkish. A large amount of money directly

following the conflict paid for the construction (or reconstruction) of physical broadcasting

transmitters and the refurbishing of stations, newsrooms, and publishing houses. International

organizations also subsidized the development and day-to-day activities of a range of new media

outlets, including RTK.

By 2001, RTK was the “most watched and most trusted TV station in Kosovo” (INDEX

Kosova 2001). At that time, it competed with two private national broadcasters, RTV-21 and

KohaVision Television (who remain its only domestic competitors in 2012). The Government of

Kosovo funded 40% of its operating costs, 31% came from (foreign) donations and 29% came

from advertising and other sources of revenue. By 2003, RTK employed 336 people, of whom

231 worked in television and 105 in radio stations (Berisha 2005). That same year, it opened a

correspondents’ office in Tiranë, Albania.

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Since 2001, RTK has followed strict regulations designating 26% of airtime to minority-

language media. However, in March 2004, RTK was at the center of controversy for its role in

inciting ethnic unrest. The drowning of three ethnic Albanian boys was reported in a sensational

manner by all three of Kosovo’s major broadcasters, including RTK. The news stations relayed

that the boys had been chased into the river by dogs belonging to a group of Serbs, a story that,

while unsubstantiated, sparked the participation of several tens of thousands of Albanians in anti-

Serb riots.

Despite the fact that the OSCE report calls the events “the first serious crisis that the

Kosovo media has ever faced,” the behavior of RTK as the “only public broadcaster” (2004:3) is

singled out as particularly unacceptable. In the months following the drowning incident, RTK

was fined, media professionals drafted a journalist Code of Ethics, and the Government of

Kosovo created a strategic plan designating more government money to minority media support.

In theory, public service broadcasting should exude impartiality and professionalism. In practice,

RTK can be seen as reflecting the wider social tensions present in Kosovo five years after the

Kosovo War.

In Montenegro, the rise of independent media coincided with new debates over public

media, and specifically over the status of state-owned Radio Television Crna Gora (RTCG).

Critics from independent media outlets decried its unfair advantage in the market (thanks to its

state-subsidized budget) and its unwavering pro-government reporting stance. In September

2002, at the urging of the international community, the Government of Montenegro approved

new legislation that refocused RTCG as a “public service broadcaster” and streamlined broadcast

licensing for all media, public and private, in the country.

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This move was hailed by the international community as a “leading example in the region

of how legislative changes ultimately bring about de-politicization of state-owned media outlets”

and “introduce independent regulatory bodies” but also “create free market [conditions]” and

“much-desired democratization” beyond the media sector (Sredanović 2004). An important

feature of restructuring was the creation of an independent RTCG Council, a pan-partisan, pan-

sector independent advisory body in charge of managing the newly-public RTCG. USAID’s

Montenegro Independent Media Program (MIMP) funded an entire conference in which civil

society representatives elected RTCG Council members (IREX 2003).

After the new media laws were implemented in November 2002, there was only local

resistance to state-owned media going “public.” The mayor of Budva’s efforts to block the

transformation of Budva Television into a public service culminated in the dismissal of the

station’s editor-in-chief in early 2003 (Sredanović 2003). By and large, however, it seemed that

restructuring enjoyed the support of ruling and opposition parties alike. As Montenegrin media

analyst Velizar Sredanović notes cynically, “It seemed as if everyone simply could not wait for

Radio Montenegro and TV Montenegro to be transformed into true services for citizens…”

(Sredanović 2004).

Then, on June 1, 2003, the RTCG Council ceased the broadcasting of “Parliamentary

TV,” a program that, akin to the American C-SPAN, had previously covered every minute of

every session of the Parliament of Montenegro for a less-than-rapt public. The members of the

council based their decision on the unpopularity of the program among viewers, and believed

they had acted according to their mandate. In response, the political opposition—at the time led

by pro-union (pro-Serbian) parties—walked out of Parliament. The opposition parties argued

that, while Đukanović’s ruling party enjoyed wide coverage in the private media outlets he

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

20

influenced, opposition points of view were ignored in these outlets and thus depended on the

public television service to reach voters. The opposition parties boycotted Parliament for a year

and a half, and ultimately, an agreement between the parties and the independent council was

brokered by the head of the OSCE in Montenegro. Parliamentary TV would air again.

The debate over Parliamentary TV illuminates the range of issues confounding the

mission of public service media in Montenegro and Kosovo. First is the impracticality of shaping

a non-partisan, democratic media outlet, particularly when the representation of minority

political opinions and, simultaneously, of minorities (as they tend to converge in Montenegro) is

at stake. Should an impartial public outlet provide proportional airtime for groups it represents?

Equal time? Should separate channels broadcast for each majority and minority language? Even

the best-equipped advisory council would have trouble weighing these options, and most of its

actual members lacked expertise.

Second, as Sredanović notes, the advisory council received paltry amount of support from

journalists. Where was the outcry against political intrusion into editoral policy? A sustainable

media model

A third concern is the behavior of the international community. That the OSCE ultimately

fell on the side of the opposition is particularly ironic considering the fact that the OSCE

championed the creation of the council and the public media policies it was created to defend in

the first place. Thus, efforts to facilitate the de-politicization of RTCG both originated with and

were killed by the international community.

The continued political manipulation of public media is disheartening. However, the

greatest challenge facing state or public media in Montenegro or Kosovo is financial

sustainability. For example, a 2011 South and East Europe Media Organization (SEEMO) report

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

21

concludes that, with 700 employees and 100 freelancers, RTCG is overstaffed. A total of 300-

400 employees could cover operation and allow funds to be allocated to increasing the quality of

programming and in new production and broadcasting technologies (SEEMO 2011).

Furthermore, though obvious alternative to state-managed public media is its

privatization. In a small market like Montenegro, this has proven a less than workable solution.

Negotiations regarding the privatization of Pobjeda have been in progress on and off since 1991.

It has been officially “for sale” since 2007, with several foreign corporations contemplating and

later deciding against its purchase. The paper draws a small and shrinking readership, down from

20,000 in 2004 (Berisha 2004) to under 5,000 in 2012, and has racked up 10 million euro in debt

in recent years. It is also located in one of the smallest, yet most saturated media markets in

Europe.

Building Independent Media

The privatization of state-owned media paralleled the creation of new private media

outlets, broadly known as “independent media.” Independent media, along with the various

stages of legislation governing it, has perhaps been more influential in Montenegro and Kosovo

than state- or public media. In fact, there has been so many new media that in both countries, the

media scene since 1999 has been characterized first and foremost as “oversaturated.”

One factor supporting the proliferation of unsustainable media outlets is foreign aid. In

Kosovo, funding for the media sector between 1996 and 2006 reached 58.6 million euros,

trailing only Bosnia’s 87.1 million. Montenegro drew a net 7.6 million euro, still a fairly high

amount considering its relatively small population, even vis a vis Kosovo (Rhodes 2007:15).

Rhodes notes that in the post-conflict Balkans, “For the first time in history, media support

became a significant and even central strategy for the international community to address a range

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

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of political and social issues” (2007:11). In the 2000s, independent media were associated

explicitly with stability and state-building.

Long-term media development in Montenegro and Kosovo has been dominated by the

Organization for Security and Cooperation in Europe (OSCE), USAID and partners. The OSCE

Mission in Kosovo, established in 1999, is the largest OSCE field office. It considers media to be

an “integral part of any democratic society.” Media “perform an oversight role and a watchdog

function,” facilitate “public engagement in political and economic life” and promote “dialogue

and tolerance between different communities” (OSCE Mission in Kosovo website). The Mission

has assisted with media legislation, media regulation, and public broadcasting since the end of

the Kosovo conflict in 1999. The OSCE supported the creation of Radio Television Kosovo in

1999; the formation of the Independent Media Commission, which handles broadcast frequency

allocation and licensing, in 2002; the Press Council of Kosovo, a self-regulatory body; and the

Kosovo Media Institute, the first institution in Kosovo to offer both a masters degree in

journalism as well as continuing education and courses for professional journalists.

The OSCE Mission to Montenegro is the newest OSCE field office, established after the

country became independent in 2006. There, the OSCE Media Section works with Montenegrin

authorities and public and private media outlets “to democratize and modernize relevant

institutions and strengthen professional journalism in accordance with internationally accepted

standards” (OSCE Mission to Montenegro). During its first five years, the Mission was

instrumental in the eventual passing of a Free Access to Information law and the creation of the

Journalist Code of Ethics, the National Public Broadcasting Service and Broadcasting Agency,

and the journalism department at the University of Montenegro.

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

23

USAID also maintains a large presence in both countries, frequently funding projects that

are managed by such organizations as IREX and the Montenegro and Kosovo Foundations for

Open Society. A 1999 USAID publication details the philosophy of the organization and, by

extension, of the United States Department of State, regarding media development:

“Access to information is essential to the health of democracy for at least two reasons: First, it

ensure that citizens make responsible, informed choices rather than acting out of ignorance or

misinformation. Second, information serves a ‘checking function’ by ensuring that elected

representatives uphold their oaths of office and carry out the wishes of those who elect them”

(USAID 1999:3).

Because of the wide availability of funds, Montenegro and Kosovo experienced an

artificial explosion of new media outlets, particularly taking into consideration their small

population sizes. In Montenegro in 1997, there existed one private weekly newspaper, one state-

owned daily newspaper, 3 state-owned television channels and some 15 radio stations. Four

years later, Montenegrin media had burgeoned to encompass 4 daily newspapers, 17 print

periodicals, 15 TV stations, and 43 radio stations plus several electronic outlets by the end of it.

Montenegro’s population enjoyed access to one media outlet per 4,000 inhabitants (SEEMO

2011).

Of course, funding dries up when donors’ goals change. As Rhodes notes, western

governments “strongly promoted independent media” in Montenegro until their “campaign

against the Miloševič regime was successful.” At that point, some funding was even transferred

from Montenegrin media outlets directly to Serbian ones, to support Milošević’s successor and a

continued union between Serbia and Montenegro (Rhodes 2007:17). Between 1997 and 2000,

Montenegro’s media sector received foreign donations of approximately 500,000 euros annually.

By 2004, this had slowed to just 150,000. According to former Monitor editor Drasko

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Đuranović, “foreign analyists obviously concluded that the worst period was behind us and that

the media must provide their own sustainability” (Đuranović 2005). While a fine goal, the self-

supported survival of all these media outlets is impossible.

Private foreign investment, so characteristic of the post-socialist East European media

scene, has been a nearly unattainable economic boost for outlets in Montenegro and Kosovo's

less than lucrative markets. Interest in a single Montenegrin media outlets came from German

media conglomerate WAZ-Mediengruppe. WAZ began negotiations to purchase a 50% share in

Montenegro's Daily Press, publisher of Vijesti, Monitor, and several smaller-run journals, in

2002. A deal was completed in March 2003 and WAZ assumed the marketing and business

aspects of management of Daily Press, leaving editorial policy to its Montenegrin co-owners.

Under WAZ, Vijesti maintained its status as most popular Montenegrin daily, in large part due to

marketing techniques (unprecedented in Montenegro) such as packaging Montenegrin

translations of popular novels and nonfiction general interest books with the Sunday paper for

one low price.

While Vijesti enjoyed incomparable success by Montenegrin standards, WAZ failed to

make a worthwhile profit. As time passed, the company was also pushed towards de-investment

by allegations of tax fraud on the part of Daily Press' Montenegrin owners, unprofessional

reporting standards, and, allegedly, the strongly anti-government stance of the paper, especially

after 2006 (US Embassy 2008). WAZ sold its shares back to their original owners in 2007, and

the pattern that had predominated the Montenegrin print media since the late 1990s was restored:

A diversity of outlets competing by any means necessary for their share of the same dismal

market.

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

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Media outlets in both countries have utilized a number of strategies to prolong their

survival. Strategies for these so-called “independent” media usually involve assistance from a

more powerful entity, whether a political party or an international organization. Blue Moon TV,

for example, mainly offered entertainment programming until it became an IREX partner. At that

point it changed its name to the Montenegrin Broadcasting Company, hired thirty professional

journalists, and began to produce news programs (Zadrima 2004). In Kosovo, the daily

newspaper Infopress receives most of its advertising from the government (CPJ 2009).

Unsurprisingly, its editorial policies are noticeably pro-government, at times even virulently so.

It should be noted that neither the Montenegrin Broadcasting Company nor Infopress have

demonstrated improved audience numbers through such “partnerships.” Infopress—despite

selling the government the majority of the total advertising it purchases—is actually at the

bottom of the list in terms of readership (OSCE Kosovo 2010).

The editorial policy of Dan, the pro-Serbian “opposition to the opposition” daily referred

to previously, presents an extreme example of media “survival mode” in Montenegro. In 2002,

Dan published the name of a protected Hague witness who was testifying on war crimes in the

former Yugoslavia, an act that not only constituted contempt of (international) court, but an

unprofessional and irresponsible move at best and an egregious act intended to cause violence or

threat of violence against the witness at worst. Dan owner and editor Duško Jovanović was

himself summoned to the Hague for a hearing, in which he stated that he “wanted to raise

circulation” (Zadrima 2004). The Hague charges against Jovanović were dropped when he

published an apology in April 2004. A month later, in May 2004, he was killed in a drive-by

shooting outside of Dan headquarters in Podgorica (Reporters without Borders 2004). Though a

hitman was arrested later in 2004, the real orchestrator of the murder has never come to light.

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

26

Conclusion

At the time of Jovanović’s killing, Dan was among the most outspoken, anti-government

(anti-DPS, anti-Đukanović) media outlets in Montenegro. Since 2006, Dan competitor Vijesti, as

alluded to above, has taken an almost equally critical “opposition” stance. Part of this opposition

stems directly from improving journalistic practices. After hundreds of trainings and massive

efforts, domestic and international, to establish journalist codes of conduct and self-regulatory

bodies, journalists in both countries are making shaky advances in professionalism. But in

practice, news-making involves a range of considerations that go beyond simple professional

judgment. Particularly for larger media outlets—those able to survive financially without

speaking directly for special interest groups—the question of loyalty has been a major one.

Fatima Muminova notes that in the Central Asian republics, the “national” promise

presented by state sovereignty after Communism created a special dilemma for media. On one

hand, regime change offered journalists and media professionals an opportunity to create a truly

independent press and broadcast sector that would meet international standards of

professionalism and serve as a Western-style “fourth estate.” On the other hand, media could

align with ruling parties—often nationalist-oriented—who were already successfully meeting the

expectations of an audience focused on the nation as a new core value. Shifts in the political

stance of a newspaper like Vijesti are tied to wider “national” concerns, insofar as a national

independent media outlet must speak to its audience in order to sell papers.

At times, such “national” concerns can conflict with professional standards. Journalists in

Kosovo, particularly in recent years, have transformed into an increasingly professional force or

the public interest. They have, however, increasingly become the targets of anonymous attacks—

Rebecca Mueller 04-25-2012

27

nine were reported in 2011 alone—as well as frequent public chastisement by the politicians and

otherwise powerful figures they attempt to hold accountable.

In February 2011, for example, prominent Kosovo media outlets Koha Ditore and

Express published photographs of the United States Ambassador to Kosovo, Christopher Dell,

communicating political advice via text message to President Pacolli and his advisors during a

controversial third round of Assembly of Kosovo voting on his confirmation. (Pacolli was

ultimately confirmed in the vote.) Dell responded with an open letter to Kosovar journalists,

reprimanding them for “unprofessional, unethical, and potentially illegal activity” and reminding

them that the newspapers publishing the photographs receive aid from the US government.

The Ambassador’s letter has been strongly condemned by SEEMO, which notes that

journalists photographed Dell in a public place and that their actions did not constitute wire-

tapping, which is illegal. The letter represents a potential setback in media freedom and an

example of blatant political intimidation, particularly when one considers that Dell (or more

accurately, the position of the U.S. Ambassador) enjoys more popularity and public confidence

than any of Kosovo’s elected leaders. It is fairly easy for a journalist to interpret her or his role in

Kosovo in light of such a message. The media must be “for” the United States or, in the very

least, “for” political stability.

In cases where journalists threaten to expose mafia connections, of course, repercussions

go beyond open letters. But fear is not the only inhibitor of a fully impartial professionalism,

vibrant investigative reporting and the like. In some sense, national media in Montenegro and

Kosovo play the role of national spokespersons, managing the public relations of their respective

countries (see Taylor 2000). Stories about societal successes, government achievements and the

like reflect a positive picture to the international community, and suggest that Montenegrins and

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Kosovars were ready for independence and are ready for NATO accession, European

integration, visa liberalization and the like. Coverage of failures suggests the opposite.

Journalists who work to expose the connections of government officials to organized

crime or even war crime undertake what might be considered a self-defeating project. Holding

one politician accountable can send an entire government into deadlock. Exposing one national

secret can set the entire nation “back” politically and economically, as European officials rethink

plans for EU enlargement and international investors reconsider the stability of Europe’s newest

nation-states.

This paper examined the many factors influencing the development of national media in

Montenegro and Kosovo. Further study should incorporate a more direct consideration of the

Kosovar and Montenegrin nations. The past twenty years have been formative for national

identity in both cases, and in the Montenegrin case, perhaps particularly so. The positioning of

opposition media—complex and ever-changing—deserves closer examination. Finally, future

research should consider the view from the “new” media periphery in these contexts. This paper

failed to address in any meaningful way issues relating to minorities and the media, or for that

matter, local media.

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