This article compares the local perceptions of the EU Rule of Law Mission in Kosovo (EULEX) with those of NATO’s mission Kosovo Force (KFOR) and investigates the reasons for observed differences in those perceptions. It focuses on an oft-overlooked aspect of EULEX – its broadly defined security-related tasks. While the spotlight has been on the mission’s tasks in high-level corruption and war crimes, until recently EULEX could also be seen as a prominent security actor on its own. This is because of the mission’s robust police component and its function as a second security respondent. EULEX coexists in Kosovo with KFOR; although the two have different mandates – one being civilian and the other military - to a significant extent they complement each other in the security realm. Moreover, in practice some of their tasks are similar. However, the local perceptions of EULEX and KFOR have been very different as regards the levels of acceptance on the one hand and contestation on the other. This article argues that such differences are caused by different perceived power and authority of the two missions, as well as different levels of local trust in them, related to their mandate and performance. Thus, by going beyond the well-researched initial gratitude of Kosovo Albanians to NATO/US for intervening in 1999, this article offers a more fine-grained analysis of both Kosovo Albanian and Kosovo Serbian perceptions of EULEX and KFOR.
