Justice or Realpolitik? Two Prime Ministers, Two Futures for the Balkans

In the Western Balkans, leadership is shaped less by policy choices than by underlying governing philosophies. Few contrasts are as pronounced today as that between the prime ministers of Kosovo and Albania, Albin Kurti and Edi Rama. Although their countries share deep historical, cultural and structural ties, the two prime ministers represent fundamentally different approaches to power: one emphasises justice and institutional reform, while the other operates through pragmatic realpolitik and deal-making.

At first glance, Kurti and Rama appear more similar than different. Both leaders head nominally socialist or social democratic parties and preside over highly centralised governments, exercising tight control across sectors, from foreign policy to urban development. Each governs, in effect, with an iron hand in a velvet glove: projecting democratic legitimacy while maintaining firm personal authority. In countries where institutions remain fragile and political fragmentation can quickly lead to paralysis, such consolidation of power is often justified as necessary for stability.

Yet beneath this similarity lies a deeper divergence in how each leader views the relationship between the state, the market and the international system.