Impact of the Europeanization process on the transformation of the party system of Montenegro

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Notes

¹ The Europeanization of National Political Parties—Power and Organizational Adaptation, Routledge, London and New York, 2007.

² Carter et al., ‘European integration and internal party dynamics’, in Thomas Poguntke, Nicholas Aylott, Elisabeth Carter, Robert Ladrech and Kurt Richard Luther (eds), The Europeanization of National Political Parties, Routledge, Oxford, 2007, pp. 4–5.

³ The (Montenegrin) Council for European Integration was founded in April 2004 and its head is the President of Montenegro. Its members include the President of the Government, the President of Parliament, the Vice-President of the Government for European Integration, the Rector of the State University, the President of the Montenegrin Academy of Sciences and Arts, the President of the Constitutional Court and the President of the Supreme Court. One seat intended for an opposition party representative is still unoccupied.

⁴ The change in the ruling elite within the governing Alliance of Communists of Montenegro that after a number of riots caused an economic and political crisis in the country took place in January 1989 was popularly called the ‘Anti-bureaucracy revolution’.

⁵ Srđan Darmanović, ‘Duga tranzicija u Crnoj Gori—od polukompetitivnih izbora do izborne demokratije’, in Veselin Pavićević et al., Izbori i izborno zakonodavstvo u Crnoj Gori od 1990–2006. godine, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 84.

⁶ Vladimir Goati, Političke partije i partijski sistemi, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 295.

⁷ Srđan Darmanović, ‘Duga tranzicija u Crnoj Gori—od polukompetitivnih izbora do izborne demokratije’, in Veselin Pavićević et al., Izbori i izborno zakonodavstvo u Crnoj Gori od 1990–2006. godine, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 85.

⁸ Although elected by the people, the President of Montenegro only has ceremonial powers and the real centre of power is the Government.

⁹ Ibid., p. 87.

¹⁰ Atilla Ágh, according to Vladimir Goati, Političke partije i partijski sistemi, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 266.

¹¹ Montenegro has an indirect proportional electoral system for electing members of the unicameral Parliament. Indirect proportional system is a term introduced by Vladimir Goati (Vladimir Goati, Političke partije i partijski sistemi, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 122) to describe the fact that after voting on closed lists only half of the won mandates are received according to the position on the list. The other half can be given by the political party leadership to any person from the list regardless of his/her position. The term ‘indirect’ therefore indicates that political parties once again have an opportunity to intervene after the will of the citizens is established.

¹² For more about the subject ‘influence of the electoral system on the Montenegrin party system’, see Veselin Pavićević et al., Izbori i izborno zakonodavstvo u Crnoj Gori od 1990–2006. godine, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007 and Vladimir Goati, Političke partije i partijski sistemi, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007.

¹³ Endru Hejvud [Andrew Heywood], Politika, Clio, Beograd, 2004, p. 490.

¹⁴ The Movement for Change (Pokret za promjene) was established in 2005 from a non-governmental organization called the Group for Change (Grupa za promjene), which worked with the goal of changing the dominant state status debate with social and economic related issues.

¹⁵ Russell J. Dalton and Hans-Dieter Klingemann, ‘Citizens and political behaviour’, in Russell Dalton and Hans-Dieter Klingemann (eds), The Oxford Handbook of Political Behaviour, Oxford University Press, New York, 2007, p. 11.

¹⁶ Vladimir Goati, Političke partije i partijski sistemi, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 313.

¹⁷ Political parties in Montenegro were able to take away mandates from their own members of Parliament if they wished so. It was an instrument for assuring party discipline. The Constitutional Court declared such a mechanism unconstitutional and introduced a free mandate in 2004.

¹⁸ Vladimir Goati, Političke partije i partijski sistemi, CEMI, Podgorica, 2007, p. 283.

¹⁹ The Declaration on association with the EU was adopted within the regular session of the Montenegrin Parliament on 8 June 2005. The text of the Declaration was prepared on the initiative of the European Movement in Montenegro as well as some other NGOs in Montenegro (Centre for Citizens Education, Centre for the Development of NGOs, the CEDEM, the Group for Change and the Monitoring Centre CEMI).

²⁰ The Belgrade Agreement was signed on 14 March 2002 by the President of former Federal Republic of Yugoslavia (which has ceased to exist), the Vice-President of its federal government, the President of the Republic of Montenegro, the Presidents of the Serbian and Montenegrin republic governments and, as a witness, the High Representative of the EU for foreign policy and security. This Agreement prepared the framework for the state union of Serbia and Montenegro. The Union was officially created on 4 February 2003 by the passing of the Constitutional Treaty.

²¹ One of the powers was the so-called ‘golden vote’. Namely, referendum commissions at all levels including the Republic Referendum Commission consisted of an equal number of members from both sides and if the decision-making process was blocked the decision would be shifted to a higher level. The highest level was the Republic Referendum Commission where there were eight members for each bloc and the Head of the Commission with one ‘golden vote’ to finally decide if voting was blocked.

²² The expression ‘grey zone’ was used to describe a possible result of between 51 and 55 per cent of people voting for independence in which case a very strange situation would have occurred: the pro-independence movement would win the majority of votes and yet lose the referendum. It was perceived that such a situation in which the winners would be losers would produce possible riots and deepen conflict instead of being a solution.

²³ The CEDEM is the Centre for Democracy and Human Rights, a non-governmental organization from Montenegro which is very successfully conducting periodical political public opinion researches. Reports from their research can be found at < http://www.cedem.cg.yu/opolls/archivesmn.php?type = 1>.