Student protests have brought the entire society to its feet and led to the fall of the Serbian government. Some analysts estimate that this student movement is even bigger than the one from 1968. How does it work from the inside? And what are the possible outcomes?
The sound of a police siren and a message from a megaphone: "Dear professors, we inform you that it is about to begin." blockade This is how the wave of student blockades at the University of Novi Sad began, he writes Deutsche Welle (DW).
Olga Pantić, a first-year communication studies student, was on shift in the faculty canteen at the time. She left work and joined her colleagues. Since then, the faculty has been her home - she sleeps, eats and lives there.
"I got used to it so much that now it's even nicer here than at home." It all comes back to me about the blockage. It's like a job. Especially on the eve of some big protests," says Olga za DW.
Right from the start, the students presented their demands, among which are the determination of political and criminal responsibility for the fall of the canopy at the train station in Novi Sad, under which 15 people died and two people were seriously injured.
They also opened their doors to students from other faculties who came to inquire about how they could also join the blockade.
"We often ceded our amphitheater and classrooms to them for meetings and agreements about how they should join the blockade, how to organize their plenums, and some faculties actually held their first plenums at our faculty," remembers student Tatjana Rašić.
Thus, in just a few weeks, almost the entire university in Novi Sad was blocked.
Everything works like a Swiss watch.
Those who were often late for morning lectures and struggled to meet deadlines now function like a Swiss watch. All decisions are made through direct democracy, in plenary sessions, and tasks are implemented through teams.
Olga Pantić is the representative of her faculty in the university security team. They secure protests, stop traffic, direct protest columns and make sure everything goes smoothly.
"We have coordinators and delegates." Each coordinator has a walkie-talkie so that we can communicate with each other, and they tell the delegates what to do, when to start, when to stop, and the delegates have megaphones and each of them has their own section that they deal with. For example, delegates for the sides, for the back or the front. And we are all in tune. And we all listen to each other," explains Olga.
After numerous attacks on demonstrators, the guards got their own special unit - beavers. The name of the unit is a pun on the name of the state special military unit called "Cobras".
"Beavers wear motorcycle and helmet protection, so if a car hits them, they can fall off without getting hurt." And these are the most physically fit students. They are the first to run in front of the car if necessary."
Each faculty also has its own special teams. The team they call at the Faculty of Philosophy is in charge of hygiene Sanitary brigade, while the logistics team manages the donations, and these days they have their hands full to transport hundreds of sleeping mattresses to Kragujevac, where the next big protest will take place.
A special security team takes care of who enters and leaves the college. Students of technical sciences have created an application that helps them keep accurate records in order to avoid "uninvited" guests.
"These are the ones who caused problems, whether they insulted someone, or whether they were caught doing it." by espionage, to convey information from the plenum or to lie. We agree on that at the level of the entire university, and whoever is on one blacklist at one faculty cannot enter other faculties either," says Olga.
Plenums as a trademark
They proudly point out that all decisions are made at plenums in which all students who wish to participate participate.
"And every decision concerning the blockaded community is made on the spot by majority vote, and that is the only legitimate way in which our community makes decisions," student Nemanja Ćurčić explains to DW.
Sometimes hundreds of students participate in the plenum, and discussions can last for hours, because everyone has the right to speak.
"It is sometimes exhausting, but we students do not believe in a representative form of democracy." In our community, it turned out to be bad, because when we give an opportunity to an individual to represent us, it also leaves the possibility for some kind of corruption, personal opinion and everything that we see every day in our political life. Students don't want that. We chose this more difficult, but more correct and fair path," explains Nemanja.
What are the domains of movement?
World pop diva Madonna wrote on her Instagram profile that the biggest student protest since 1968 is taking place in Serbia. Some analysts agree with that. That movement woke up the entire education system, lawyers, doctors, the IT sector and numerous citizens, led to the fall of the Government and started protests in almost all municipalities in Serbia. But what are their actual ranges?
"They are the political force that has the greatest legitimacy at this moment in our country." If they were to propose and participate in the creation of a political platform - no matter what it looks like - that is the only platform that has a chance of success", assesses Professor of the Faculty of Philosophy in Belgrade Ognjen Radonjić.
For now, however, students show great distrust towards all opposition actors - from activist groups, through non-governmental organizations to political parties, but also the proposals that come from them, such as the formation of a transitional government that would ensure the work of institutions and ensure fair conditions for the next elections.
"I don't think it is expedient to impose anything on them at this moment." I am convinced that it will mature in them over time. We have to let them go. They are afraid of external influences and introduced elements and show some elements of closedness, but that is expected considering everything they have been through," adds Radonjić.
He reminds that it is their structure that is their greatest shield at this moment. "From the beginning, the government tried to insert its elements, but as long as they decide in the crowd, those elements cannot come to the fore, they cannot override them. Another thing is that they don't have leaders, so the government has no one to recruit and bribe or disavow him in public," adds Radonjić.
But it is precisely at the plenums, they say, that they are already extensively discussing these topics, and investigating all the models that have been proposed in public.
"We are really aware of our power in society at this time." For this reason, we always observe every next step, every opinion that we will go public with, every topic that we put on the public airwaves", explains Tatjana Rašić.
But above all, they expect their demands to be met. Because without that, they say, there is no hope that anyone in Serbia can expect justice.
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