This paper seeks to explain why the civic resistance in Serbia rejects Europe's support for Critical Raw Material extraction in Serbia while a similar resistance movement in Slovakia embraces Europe's Green energy transition wholeheartedly. We explore how the EU's Critical Raw Materials initiative has led to tensions with a local Serbian resistance movement that includes greater local accountability over lithium resource extraction as one of its goals. In Slovakia by contrast, the country's growing reliance on an EU-dependent green-export growth model is now being challenged by Prime Minister Fico's deepening Russian ties. We will explore the proposition that resistance to the industrialized green transition in the region has come from a variety of sources that cannot always be reduced to the interests of stakeholders in the carbon-economy.
