What happens when a regime figures out how to Photoshop its tyranny into “democracy”? When the dictator swaps the military jacket for a tailored suit and starts quoting human rights conventions between propaganda speeches?

Throughout history, hundreds of regimes have employed Titushky-like tactics. There is no denying their effectiveness; however, they also come with a huge risk. By openly failing to protect citizens, the state’s monopoly on violence slips and along with it, its legitimacy.

Major powers lose their sphere of influence, not due to encroaching adversaries, but to their denial of their neighbor’s autonomy. They overplay their hand, abuse their power, and fail to provide their neighbors with anything worth staying for.

This is no longer just a story of young people leaving and aging societies with significant internal migrations reshaping the spatial structure of the countries. It is the story of a region that has leveraged the EU integration context to ascend economically, but is demographically on the brink of erosion. Because where there is a vacuum, capital, influence, infrastructure—and often geopolitics—flow in.