Who Is Jovo Bakić

Jovo Bakić (born in Belgrade on 23 March 1970) is a Serbian sociologist, university professor and politician. He is an associate professor in the Department of Sociology at the Faculty of Philosophy, University of Belgrade, where he works in the sociology of politics. He is best known for his research on nationalism, the disappearance of Yugoslavia and the European far right, as well as for his sharp public criticism of the government in Serbia.

He has written three monographs: “Ideologies of Yugoslavism between Serbian and Croatian Nationalism 1918–1941” (2004), “Yugoslavia: Destruction and Its Interpreters” (2011) and “The European Far Right 1945–2018” (2019). Beyond academia, he has left a mark on politics: he took part in the creation of several left-wing organizations, and during the student protests that began after November 2024 he became one of the best-known university supporters of the students. In the parliamentary election of 25 October 2026 he ran as a candidate of the Student List.

Early Life and Childhood

According to available sources, Jovo Bakić was born on 23 March 1970 in Belgrade, then part of the Socialist Republic of Serbia and the Socialist Federal Republic of Yugoslavia. His date of birth is given in his official academic biography on the website of the Institute for Sociological Research, while the place of birth is listed on the Serbian and English Wikipedia.

Information about his family, parents and childhood is not publicly known. Bakić himself has not spoken publicly about these subjects, so this part of his biography rests only on what can be verified: he was born and educated in Belgrade, the city where he still lives and works.

Education

Bakić completed his entire academic path at the Faculty of Philosophy of the University of Belgrade. He graduated from the Department of Sociology in 1996 with an average grade of 9.19, under the mentorship of Professor Todor Kuljić. The same mentor guided him through his master’s studies, which he completed in 2002 with an average of 9.80.

He earned his PhD in 2009 at the Department of Sociology. His dissertation dealt with the development of interpretations of the disappearance of Yugoslavia, and his mentor was again Todor Kuljić.

In addition to formal schooling, he attended international summer schools of sociology in Budva (1998) and Igalo (1999 and 2000), led by Professor Mladen Lazić. In 2006 he also took part in the summer seminar “War, Conflict and Identity” in Olympia, organized by Yale University and the Kokalis Foundation.

Early Career

He began his professional career in 1997 as a research trainee at the Institute for Sociological Research of the Faculty of Philosophy. The following year he became a teaching assistant trainee in the sociology of politics and remained in that position until 2002. After his master’s degree he was promoted to assistant, a title he held until his doctorate in 2009.

His early work focused on the image of Serbs and of the breakup of Yugoslavia in the foreign press. In 1997 he published a text on how the foreign press wrote about the breakup of Yugoslavia and about who was to blame for the war, and in 1998 a study on whether Western public opinion had come to see Serbs as the enemy. The same year he also wrote on research approaches to ideologies of Yugoslavism, a subject he would return to for decades.

Academic Rise and Study Abroad

In 2009 he was elected assistant professor (docent), and in 2019 associate professor. From 2006 to 2014 he was also an associate researcher at the Institute for Sociological Research. He held several professional positions as well: editor-in-chief of the journal “Sociologija” (2011–2012), member of the Ethics Committee of the Serbian Sociological Society (2009–2012) and president of the Association of Sociologists of Serbia and Montenegro (2015–2019).

He trained at several foreign universities. In 2004 he stayed at the University of Oxford as a Chevening scholar, and in 2009 at the University of Helsinki as a postdoctoral scholar of the Erasmus Mundus programme (IMESS). In 2010 he worked at the University of Massachusetts Amherst, at the Donahue Institute. In 2018 he was a visiting lecturer and researcher at Charles University in Prague under the CEEPUS programme.

Greatest Achievements: Books and Scholarly Work

Bakić’s most important contribution to scholarship consists of three monographs, along with more than forty shorter studies according to his professional biography. Other sources give a smaller number, so the exact count depends on how the works are tallied.

Ideologies of Yugoslavism between Serbian and Croatian Nationalism 1918–1941

His first book was published in 2004 in Zrenjanin by the “Žarko Zrenjanin” City Public Library. It is a sociological-historical study of how the ideas of Yugoslavism clashed with Serbian and Croatian nationalism in the interwar state. It was preceded by articles on real Yugoslavism between 1904 and 1918 and on fascism in Yugoslavia.

Yugoslavia: Destruction and Its Interpreters

His second book appeared in 2011, published by Službeni glasnik and the Faculty of Philosophy. In it Bakić analyzes not only the disappearance of the state but also the way domestic and foreign authors have interpreted it. The book sparked debate among scholars: the sociologist Vladimir Ilić published a critical review in the journal “Sociologija”, and Bakić replied in 2012 with a text on the critique of nationalism and the critique of imperialism.

The European Far Right 1945–2018

His third monograph was published in 2019 by the Belgrade publisher Clio. In it Bakić traces the development of the far right in the old European capitalist states after the Second World War. He distinguishes the “extreme” right, which does not shy away from violence and biological racism, from the “radical” right, which uses moderate rhetoric. The book covers, among other subjects, the French National Front and the German party Alternative for Germany. It was reviewed by scholars in Serbia, Bosnia and Herzegovina and Croatia, among them Todor Kuljić, Vladimir Ilić and Dejan Jović.

Other Works and Editorial Roles

Bakić also published a study on the Serbian Radical Party in the “Journal of Contemporary European Studies” (2009), and in 2023 a chapter on the Serbian far right and football hooligans in “The Routledge Handbook of Far-Right Extremism in Europe”. He has written about the homophobia of football fan groups during “pride parades” (2022), about the influence of the ideas of Nikolaj Velimirović and Justin Popović on the far right after 1990, and, in a 2025 paper, about Dragoš Kalajić as a transmitter of the ideas of Julius Evola. He edited the collection “Research on Nationalism in Serbia at the Beginning of the 21st Century” (2021) and, together with Marinko Lolić and Slobodan Antonić, a collection on the thought of Ljubomir Tadić (2019). His paper on the age of the Serbian nation, which examines the earliest Serbian writers, is announced for publication in 2026 in the journal “Nations and Nationalism”.

Political Engagement

The Serbian Left

Bakić increasingly appeared in public as a critic of the government and an advocate of a new left. In June 2015 he sided with Borko Stefanović in his dispute with the leadership of the Democratic Party. When Stefanović founded the Serbian Left in December 2015, Bakić, according to the sources, contributed significantly to its ideological profile. He argued for a left-libertarian orientation based on secularism, democracy, anti-capitalism and internationalism. He nevertheless did not join the party because of disagreements with Stefanović over strategy, above all over admitting members who had previously belonged to large parties.

The Social Democratic Union and the Party of the Radical Left

He joined the Social Democratic Union (SDU) in 2019. He was the main initiator of its reorganization and of its unification with other smaller left-wing, labour and student organizations. This led in September 2020 to the founding of the Party of the Radical Left (PRL), in which he continued his political work. In March 2021 he left the PRL. He gave as his reason the insults and moral and political lectures of some members of the party leadership, and also mentioned that his criticism of Chinese imperialism had bothered the leadership.

The NIN Interview and the Police Summons (2019)

One of the best-known moments of Bakić’s public career came in June 2019, during the “1 of 5 Million” protests. In an interview with the weekly NIN titled “The Mafia Has Captured the State, a Revolution Follows” he said that storming the RTS building was foolish unless one went in with “long barrels”. The RTS news programme Dnevnik 2 reported this as Bakić saying that RTS should have been stormed with long barrels.

Bakić maintained that his interview had been misused and that he never said RTS should be stormed. He was summoned to the police for an informative talk as a private citizen. The then Minister of the Interior, Nebojša Stefanović, stated that the interview called for violence. Bakić replied that he had received the summons because of what he says about the links between the authorities and organized crime. The case was unusual because a university teacher was summoned to the police over a publicly spoken word.

Pressure and Attacks over Public Statements (2023–2025)

In May 2023, after two mass shootings in Serbia, the television channel Pink aired a short clip in which Bakić was quoted out of context, accompanied by an accusation that he was inciting violence. According to PEN International, his home address was also published, and on 3 June 2023 an unknown person approached him twice and threatened him. PEN International called for the harassment to stop and listed Bakić’s case in its records. According to the same source, minister Milica Đurđević Stamenkovski called him an extremist in 2024.

In July 2023 the Ministry of Education sent a letter to the Faculty of Philosophy asking it to state whether it distanced itself from Bakić’s statements that citizens would chase President Aleksandar Vučić and his supporters. Dean Danijel Sinani replied that the faculty’s bodies are not obliged to comment on the views of employees expressed in a personal capacity and outside the workplace, citing university autonomy and freedom of expression. Vreme described the letter as a precedent in the recent history of the University of Belgrade.

In 2025 Bakić stated that he had received several threats after local officials of the Serbian Progressive Party published his phone number and address on social media. He also said he would not turn to the police because he does not trust the institutions of a “hijacked state”, and that he would hold Vučić responsible in case of an incident.

The Student Protests and the Student List

After the collapse of the canopy at the railway station in Novi Sad in November 2024 and the beginning of the student protests, Bakić became one of the most visible academic supporters of the movement. He spoke at rallies across Serbia and frequently appeared on the television channel N1. He also became known for a remark made after the student rally “15 for 15” in March 2025, when he compared political processes to stewing tough beef, which spread quickly on social media.

Ahead of the large rally on Vidovdan 2025 he compared Vučić to Sultan Murad and said that “Murad must fall on Vidovdan”. The daily Večernje novosti presented this as a call for Vučić’s death. In October 2025, at a protest of education workers in Kraljevo, he said that the people would not stop until the culprits ended up in court and then in prison.

In September 2026 Bakić was presented as a candidate of the Student List, which the student movement formed for the snap parliamentary election scheduled for 25 October. The first candidates were presented at a rally in Novi Sad on 10 September. Bakić later acknowledged that during candidate selection the student plenums had initially vetoed him, but that he was then reinstated on the list. The list of 250 names, headed by the physician Ilija Srdanović, was submitted to the Republic Electoral Commission, and Bakić was placed 76th. His candidacy drew sharp criticism from pro-government media, which highlighted his earlier statements, including one that he hates supporters of the ruling party.

According to preliminary results, the Student List won about 140 of the 250 seats. According to the Serbian Wikipedia, Bakić won a seat in the fifteenth convocation of the National Assembly of Serbia. In an interview with Danas after the election he said he has a plan to cut the state’s links with organized crime and to thoroughly reform the police.

Private Life

Information about Bakić’s private life, family and partner is not publicly known, and no reliable sources confirm it. He mostly speaks about his work and political views, so this text respects his privacy. It is known that he lives in Belgrade and is an academic who ties his public life to the Faculty of Philosophy.

Interesting Facts

• He speaks English excellently and can read Spanish and German.
• In November 2023, on the programme “Utisak nedelje” hosted by Olja Bećković, he asked the then leader of the Zavetnici party, Milica Đurđević Stamenkovski, about the origin of the word “zavet” (vow), and his questioning went viral. Savo Manojlović came to her aid in that exchange.
• He was a member of the informal group of intellectuals “Samoodbrana” (Self-Defence), which included the actor Nikola Kojo, the academician Dušan Teodorović, the cartoonists Dušan Petričić and Predrag Koraksić Koraks and the architect Dragoljub Bakić. Bakić said it was an informal gathering and that the name refers to the citizens’ duty to defend themselves.
• His March 2025 remark about “stewing” grew into an internet joke, and social media users began calling him their “chosen master chef”.
• His book on the European far right was presented in cafés as well, because, in his words, some cultural institutions did not dare to lend a hall.

Awards and Recognition

No confirmed state or professional awards for Jovo Bakić were found in the available sources. His international recognition consists mostly of scholarships and visiting positions: a Chevening scholarship for Oxford (2004), a postdoctoral IMESS Erasmus Mundus scholarship for Helsinki (2009) and a CEEPUS scholarship for Prague (2018). He was also elected associate professor (2019) and served as president of the Association of Sociologists of Serbia and Montenegro.

Legacy and Influence

Bakić is one of the leading Serbian researchers of the far right and of the ideologies of nationalism, and his books on Yugoslavism and the disappearance of Yugoslavia are cited in the scholarly literature. His study of the European far right attracted attention beyond Serbia, through reviews in regional journals.

At the same time, he has become a public figure whose statements divide opinion. Supporters see him as an intellectual who speaks openly at a time of pressure on the university, while critics, above all in pro-government media, object to his sharp tone. That contrast makes him one of the most recognizable university teachers in contemporary Serbian politics.