This paper examines how political, civil society, media and public opinion dynamics shape interethnic relations and reconciliation in Kosovo. The study explores how the key actors frame narratives on interethnic relations, how these narratives travel through media ecosystems, and how they are perceived by citizens across communities.
Empirically, the paper weaves together four strands. First, it analyses semi-structured interviews with four senior political figures (PDK, LDK, AAK and the Minister for Return) alongside a rule-based coding of their parties’ Facebook posts between September 2022 and October 2024. Second, it examines interviews with leading civil society organizations working on dialogue, transitional justice and non-majority rights. Third, it assesses journalists’ and editors’ accounts of their own practice, complemented by a narrative analysis of coverage in 16 Albanian- and Serbian-language outlets from September 2022 to October 2024. Finally, it draws on a nationally representative omnibus poll (N≈1,165) conducted in September 2025 to capture citizens’ views on interethnic relations, media, and political narratives.
Qualitative testimonies are treated as expert accounts of discursive environments and constraints, while media and social-media content is coded into conciliatory, hardline/security focused, stigmatizing and neutral categories; the poll provides a bottom-up picture of normative priorities and trust patterns.
The findings on political-elite discourse are stark. All interviewed leaders agree that interethnic relations have deteriorated, though they stress different drivers, from Serb boycott and instrumentalization of other minorities to “law before dialogue” approaches and deepening distrust between central and local levels. Systematic analysis of party Facebook posts shows that across VV, PDK, LDK, AAK and especially Lista Srpska, communication that explicitly addresses interethnic themes is dominated by hardline, security-first frames, with only a small share of conciliatory messages and, in the case of Lista Srpska, a visible layer of stigmatizing content. AAK maintains a mixed, but still securitized profile, while Nenad Rašić appears as an outlier whose communication is largely non-confrontational. Together, these patterns normalize a conflict centered agenda in citizens’ information diets and send repeated signals that dialogue is exceptional and risky rather than a routine part of democratic life.
Civil society leaders working on reconciliation describe a persistent asymmetry of leverage. They are able to sustain cross-ethnic contact, cultivate “micro-trust” and build counter-narratives through coalitions, civic education, debunking and storytelling, but these gains are repeatedly undermined by escalatory rhetoric, smear campaigns, security incidents and a tightening civic space since 2021. Delegitimisation of bridge-builders as “collaborators,” unresolved and competing narratives of the 1990s war, and chronic funding precarity further narrow the room for sustained, long-horizon reconciliation work. The cumulative picture is not one of failure but of contingent success: progress is possible, yet it resets whenever state and party actors send exclusionary rather than reassuring signals.
The media environment sits between restraint and polarization. Compared with the pre independence period and crises such as March 2004, mainstream Albanian- and Serbian language outlets are more disciplined: they largely avoid explicit hate speech, rely on the national Code of Ethics, apply higher verification thresholds and use de-ethnicised language and senior gatekeeping to “cool” potentially inflammatory stories. Yet structurally, coverage remains skewed toward security, crisis and high politics rather than everyday coexistence, shared interests and local-level cooperation. Language deficits among reporters, weak field presence in Serb-majority areas and two largely parallel media ecosystems combine to produce a “stereotype of absence,” in which ordinary cross-community life rarely appears in the news, while a politicized, click-driven belt monetizes identity and grievance. Journalists report operating in a pressure environment shaped by economic fragility, shrinking donor support, opaque institutions, militant online networks and cross-border propaganda from Belgrade-aligned outlets, all of which encourage caution or self-censorship, particularly in the north. At the same time, “professional islands” already model more constructive practice through multi-source reporting that includes non-majority voices, mixed-studio formats, citizenship-first language and cross-language content sharing.
The opinion poll adds a crucial bottom-up perspective. Around 78% of respondents rate interethnic relations and reconciliation as important or very important in their own lives, with this high level of normative commitment broadly shared across Albanians, Serbs and other communities, as well as across age and gender groups. Nearly two-thirds believe Kosovo’s politicians should adopt a clearer and more open approach to promoting interethnic reconciliation, with outright opposition limited to 5% of the sample. At the same time, trust in key intermediaries is very low. Only about one-third of respondents express any trust in media reporting on interethnic relations, while roughly two-thirds report little or no trust, a pattern that is most pronounced among Serb respondents but evident among Albanians as well. Political narratives and media are nevertheless seen as highly influential: majorities in all groups believe that both significantly shape public perceptions of interethnic relations. However, Albanians tend to view political communication as modestly helpful for reconciliation, Serbs overwhelmingly see it as harmful, and other minorities often judge it as having no real effect, revealing sharply divergent experiences of the same discourse. Taken together, the four pillars point to a basic asymmetry. On the societal side, there is substantial latent demand for more constructive interethnic relations and for a political agenda that takes reconciliation seriously. On the institutional side, the actors best placed to respond to this demand – especially political elites and partisan media – too often produce securitised and sometimes stigmatizing narratives that circulate in a low-trust information environment.
In sum, the study argues that Kosovo does not face a lack of public demand for reconciliation, but a shortage of credible, trusted intermediaries and institutions willing to use their communicative power to build, rather than erode, interethnic trust. The paper therefore concludes with targeted recommendations aimed at aligning leadership, media practice and civic initiatives with this broad societal mandate. It calls on the Presidency, Government, Assembly and political parties to adopt and internalise a doctrine of responsible speech that avoids hate speech, ethnic slurs and collective blame, rejects exaggerated security-focused framing that portrays entire communities as threats, and uses fact based, de-escalatory language, especially in times of crisis. This should be embedded in party rules and matched by concrete guarantees through consistent enforcement of language rights, proportional representation of non-majority communities in public institutions and systematic consultation with locally elected Serb and other representatives of non-majority communities.
Public and major private outlets are urged to invest in Albanian Serbian bilingual capacity and joint editorial projects so that sensitive topics, such as developments in north Kosovo, mixed municipalities and security incidents, are reported from the ground in a professional, inclusive and bilingual manner, with donors and regulators incentivizing content that highlights coexistence, joint economic interests and local cooperation.
Finally, political leaders and state officials should cease delegitimising cross-ethnic initiatives and instead publicly affirm the work of civil society actors engaged in dialogue, transitional justice and non-majority rights, ensuring that storytelling on practical cross-community cooperation is systematically linked to mainstream and local media rather than remaining confined to project reports.
Read the full report here: Interethnic Relations and Reconciliation in Kosovo: Political and Media Narratives in Perspective
