A Para-State: How a Shadow Partisan Network Governs State Administration in Authoritarian Serbia

This article examines how competitive authoritarian regimes reshape state administration through informal, extralegal structures that bypass formal institutional frameworks. While prior research highlights how regimes centralize power by restructuring bureaucracies and appointing loyalists, the formal institutional framework typically remains the main conduit through which partisan control and management of state administration are exercised. This article presents a distinct model of partisan control under competitive authoritarianism — showing how these strategies may be reinforced, or even replaced, by party-run parallel networks that redirect authority flows. Drawing on the case of Serbia under Vučić, it documents a “para-state” shadow governance system that displaces formal command. This model enables centralized, discretionary control across the entire public sector while shielding elites from accountability. Conceptually, the article argues that Serbia’s model blurs the line between competitive authoritarianism and totalitarian rule.