<span class="vcard">Kurt Bassuener</span>

Kurt Bassuener

Guest Author

Kurt Bassuener (BlueskyLinkedInX) is a co-founder and senior associate of the Democratization Policy Council (DPC), a Berlin-based think-tank established in 2005. Among other efforts, DPC is part of the GEO-POWER-EU consortium under the European Commission’s Horizon Europe program, which will develop a comprehensive strategy for the EU toward the Western Balkans and Eastern Partnership candidate countries. Kurt co-authored DPC and Eurothink’s “Sell Out, Tune Out, Get Out, or Freak Out?” book-length study on the political economies of Bosnia and Herzegovina and North Macedonia, with a focus not only on these systems as generators of corruption and popular discontent, but the role of external actors – including Western democracies – in their reinforcement.

Kurt received his PhD in 2021 from the University of St. Andrews’ Centre for the Study of Terrorism and Political Violence, after successfully defending his dissertation, “Peace Cartels: Internationally Brokered Power-Sharing and Perpetual Oligarchy in Bosnia and Herzegovina and North Macedonia.” In it, he demonstrates that internationally brokered peace agreements with integral power-sharing arrangements in these countries “entrench an incentive structure that preserves warlord politics and resists endogenous change.” Peace brokering powers that midwife these systems have a propensity for helping elites maintain them over time. He wrote for Just Security on Lebanon’s peace cartel following the August 2020 port explosion. His Fulbright-St. Andrews Award (2016–2017) enabled his doctoral studies.

Kurt is co-author and research director for the Diplomat’s Handbook for Democracy Development Support, a project of the Community of Democracies. Prior to studying at St. Andrews, he lived for 11 years in Sarajevo, starting in 2005 as a strategist for then-High Representative Paddy Ashdown. He was political and campaign analyst for the OSCE-ODIHR election observation mission in Ukraine in 2004–2005, and previously conducted analysis-based advocacy in Washington D.C. for the Balkan Institute, the Balkan Action Council, the U.S. Institute of Peace, and the International Rescue Committee.

Prior to his PhD, Kurt received his MA from Central European University in 1994 and his BA from The American University’s School of International Service in 1991. He lives in Sarajevo.

Articles by this author:

The photo shows two soldiers in camouflage uniforms and helmets sitting next to each other in the open-top assault vehicle. The one on the left is saluting.
Schmidt stands at a podium with the OHR logo on the front, against a backdrop of the logo and the name of his office, with the OHR and Bosnian flags at the left edge of the photo.
People lay floral tributes on February 5, 2024, at Sarajevo's main produce market, "Markale," during a commemoration marking the 30th anniversary of the first of the two "Markale massacres" during the siege of Sarajevo in the Bosnian War. A single mortar shell fired from Bosnian Serb artillery positions onto the market killed 68 civilians and injured 144 on February 5, 1994. (Photo by ELVIS BARUKCIC/AFP via Getty Images)
NATO Secretary General Jens Stoltenberg inspects an honor guard unit of Bosnia and Herzegovina's Armed Forces, during a welcoming ceremony as part of his trip to Bosnia and Herzegovina to discuss the country's membership in the alliance, in Sarajevo, on February 2, 2017. (Photo by ELVIS BARUKCIC/AFP via Getty Images)
President of Republika Srpska Zeljka Cvijanovic (C) and, to her right, Milorad Dodik, Serb member of Bosnia's tripartite presidency, smile during a parade showcasing the entity's police force marking the "Day of Republic Srpska", in Banja Luka, on January 9, 2022. Muslims in Bosnia oppose the event as it marks the creation of a "Serb republic" in Bosnia on January 9, 1992, three months ahead of an ethnic war that claimed 100,000 lives and displaced more than two million people.  (Photo by ELVIS BARUKCIC/AFP via Getty Images)
Daniel Escobar meets with Milorad Dodik and others around a table with microphones, in Sarajevo, on November 8, 2021. The flag of Bosnia and Herzegovina stands against a wall behind the conference table.
US government's special envoy for Western Balkans Matthew Palmer poses with members of Bosnia and Herzegovina's tripartite presidency, Milorad Dodik, Zeljko Komsic, and Sefik Dzaferovic in Sarajevo on July 5, 2021 as Palmer held several meetings with national political leaders in Bosnia as well as state officials.
office, Dragan Covic, addresses the media after voting, in Mostar, on October 7, 2018, as Bosnia and Herzegovina holds it's general elections.
A Lebanese protester waves a national flag amid clashes with security forces in the vicinity of Parliament in central Beirut on August 10, 2020.
US Ambassador to Germany Richard Grenell (C), the Presidents of Kosovo Hashim Thaci (L background) and Serbia Aleksandar Vucic (R background) watch the signing of an agreement between Kosovo and Serbia for railway and street projects.
People walk by a board advertising the refurbishment of Mitrovica bridge by the European Union on February 20, 2019 in Mitrovica, Kosovo.
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