AI is increasingly entering public administration across the Western Balkans as part of broader digital transformation and public sector modernisation efforts linked to EU integration. However, evidence on how these AI-related developments are being introduced, governed, and applied in practice remains limited and fragmented, making it difficult to assess their scope, coherence, and implications for transparency, accountability, due process, and fundamental rights.

To help address this evidence gap, Partners Albania is coordinating the regional project “Decoding AI Power: Civic Engagement and Governance in the Western Balkans”. This exploratory, evidence-based initiative examines how artificial intelligence is being introduced, used, and governed in public administration across the six Western Balkan countries: Albania, Bosnia and Herzegovina, Kosovo, Montenegro, North Macedonia, and Serbia.

Each country study examines AI use in a selected sector: tax administration in Albania; public procurement in Bosnia and Herzegovina; digital public service delivery through the eKosova platform in Kosovo; citizen services through chatbots and digital assistants in Montenegro; education in North Macedonia; and the use of algorithms and AI in the social welfare system in Serbia.

Using a common regional methodology, the project combines desk research, institutional mapping, and field research through stakeholder interviews and surveys. It examines whether AI systems are operational beyond pilots and political announcements, the administrative purposes and service gaps they address, and their intended benefits. It also assesses the adequacy of governance safeguards in law and practice, institutional openness to structured civil society engagement, and civil society’s technical and strategic capacity for sustained monitoring and policy engagement.

The six country reports will inform a regional synthesis, identifying shared challenges and opportunities for cooperation while recognising differences in national contexts. A validation meeting with experts in the field will provide an opportunity to review and validate the research findings.

This initiative is led by Partners Albania, in collaboration with the European Center for Not-for-Profit Law and regional experts, with financial support from Open Society Foundations – Western Balkans.