- This survey has found that minority media outlets that existed before the disintegration of Yugoslavia have mostly been privatized and initial capital for creating new outlets has usually come from private individuals rather than from the state or from local communities.
- In all four countries the constitutional definitions of national minority rights and legislative solutions are in line with international and European standards.
- Analysis of the content of programs identifies all the same editing weaknesses that are found in general programming – use of just one source (or multiple sources with the same viewpoint), uncritical attitude and/or bias, influence of political parties and informal groups, and the mixing of information with commentary.
- In Bosnia and Herzegovina, there are no special programs in minority languages on the public broadcasting services, and only a small number of items covering the position of national minorities appear as part of regular news and information programs - and only on one of the three public broadcasters. In Serbia (Vojvodina) and Macedonia, programs are broadcast for national minorities, but public broadcasting services face criticism that these programs are closed, as they are aimed essentially at their respective national communities and have no stand on common issues related to the position of all minorities in the wider social context in which minorities live. In Macedonia, concerns have been raised regarding the poor mutual coordination of these programs, whereas in Serbia, with the exception of one Roma program, Bosniaks, Bulgarians and Albanians do not have any programs on the state broadcaster.
- New media covering national minority issues are underdeveloped. An exception is Macedonia, where there are several web portals in the Albanian language. The internet has entered the communications practice of activists in minority associations, but internet portals on minority issues, especially in minority languages, are underdeveloped and mostly form a part of larger projects supported by international donors and have very little chance of becoming self-sustainable.
- The non-governmental sector is a useful but underused source of information, according to a number of media surveys and broader sociological surveys from Southeast Europe. Cooperating with the non-governmental sector is a key role of public media because social pluralism can be expressed more effectively through this type of cooperation.
- Experience has shown that even the best examples of cooperation among the governmental, non-governmental and media sectors on minority programs or programs in minority languages are nearly always the result of a project that has temporary funding and is not, by its very nature, long-term. It is important to take a strategic approach.
- A media strategy on national minorities does not exist in any of these countries (with the exception of a small number of minority communities). Existing strategic documents (such as the Media Strategy in Serbia) highlight the importance of promoting information in minority languages, but they have an essentially declaratory character and they are not harmonized with available resources and potential.
