student activism

Student activism is work done by students to affect political, environmental, economic, or social change. It has often focused on making changes in schools, such as increasing student influence over curriculum or improving educational funding. In some settings, student groups have had a major role in broader political events



Japan


Japanese student movement began during the Taishō Democracy, and grew in activity after World War II. They were mostly carried out by activist students. One such event was the Anpo opposition movement, which occurred during 1960, and again in 1968 – 1970, in opposition to Anpo. During the second riots, leftist activists barricaded themselves in Universities, resulting in armed conflict with the Japanese police force. Activists organized in places known as "agitating points". Some wider causes were supported including opposition to the Vietnam War and apartheid, and for the acceptance of the hippie lifestyle.
[edit]Germany
See also: German student movement




Procession of students at Wartburg Festival


In 1815 in Jena (Germany) the "Urburschenschaft" was founded. That was a Studentenverbindung that was concentrated on national and democratic ideas. In 1817, inspired by liberal and patriotic ideas of a united Germany, student organisations gathered for the Wartburg festival at Wartburg Castle, at Eisenach in Thuringia, on the occasion of which reactionary books were burnt.
In 1819 the student Karl Ludwig Sand murdered the writer August von Kotzebue, who had scoffed at liberal student organisations.
In May 1832 the Hambacher Fest was celebrated at Hambach Castle near Neustadt an der Weinstraße with about 30 000 participants, amongst them many students. Together with the Frankfurter Wachensturm in 1833 planned to free students held in prison at Frankfurt and Georg Büchner's revolutionary pamphlet Der Hessische Landbote that were events that led to the revolutions in the German states in 1848.
In the 1960s, the worldwide upswing in student and youth radicalism manifested itself through the German student movement and organisations such as the German Socialist Student Union. The movement in Germany shared many concerns of similar groups elsewhere, such as the democratisation of society and opposing the Vietnam War, but also stressed more nationally specific issues such as coming to terms with the legacy of the Nazi regime and opposing the German Emergency Acts.




Canada


In Canada, several New Left student organizations emerged in the late 1950s and 1960s. There were several dominant New Left groups in Canada, the two main political organizations being the Student Union for Peace Action (SUPA) and the Company of Young Canadians (CYC). SUPA grew out of the pacifistic and moralistic Combined Universities Campaign for Nuclear Disarmament (CUCND) in December, 1965, at a conference at the University of Saskatchewan, and expanded its scope of affairs to include grass-roots politics in disadvantaged communities and ‘consciousness raising’ to radicalize and raise awareness of the ‘generation gap’ experienced by Canadian youth. SUPA was a decentralized organization, rooted in local university campuses, and thus inherited the distinctly middle-class orientation of Canadian students. After SUPA disintegrated in late 1967, its members either moved to the CYC or became active leaders in the Canadian Union of Students (CUS), leading the CUS to assume the mantle of New Left student agitation. The organizations were marked by widespread intellectual debates. For example, with respect to the working class, the idea that the traditional ‘working class’ had been bought off and integrated into the system was widespread in these discussions, leaving the question of who now represented the most important actor in the struggle for a new and better socialist society. Indeed, SUPA fell apart over these debates over the role of the working class and the 'Old Left'. In 1968 Students for a Democratic University (SDU) was formed in McGill and Simon Fraser University. The SFU SDU was originally composed of former SUPA members and New Democratic Youth but also absorbed members from the campus Liberal Club and Young Socialists. SDU was prominent in the Administration Occupation of that year and the student strike in 1969. After the failure of the student strike SDU broke up. Some members joined the IWW and the Youth International Party. (Yippies) Other members helped form the Vancouver Liberation Front in 1970.
Since the 1970s Public Interest Research Groups (PIRG's) have been created as a result of Student's Union referendums across Canada e.g. Ontario Public Interest Research Group, the Alberta Public Interest Research Group (APIRG) and the Nova Scotia Public Interest Research Group. For a more complete list of PIRGs in Canada see pirg.ca .
Canadian PIRG's are unique from their American counterparts in that, in principle, the projects are student directed and run. Most, if not all, Canadian PIRG's operate on a consensus decision making model. Canadian PIRGs are student run and the majority of their funding comes directly from students. Although some efforts have been made towards collaboration Canadian PIRGs are independent of each other.
The Student Coalition Against War was formed to focus on public education, non-violent activism, organizing, advocacy and above all, reform.




Eastern Europe and the post-Soviet Union states


During communist rule, students in Eastern Europe were the force behind several of the best-known instances of protest. The chain of events leading to the 1956 Hungarian Revolution was started by peaceful student demonstrations in the streets of Budapest, later attracting workers and other Hungarians. In Czechoslovakia, one of the most known faces of the protests following the Soviet-led invasion that ended the Prague Spring was Jan Palach, a student who committed suicide by setting fire to himself on January 16, 1969. The act triggered a major protest against the occupation.
Student-dominated youth movements have also played a central role in the "color revolutions" seen in post-communist societies in recent years. The first example of this was the Serbian Otpor ("Resistance" in Serbian), formed in October 1998 as a response to repressive university and media laws that were introduced that year. In the presidential campaign in September 2000, the organisation engineered the "Gotov je" ("He's finished") campaign that galvanized Serbian discontent with Slobodan Milošević, ultimately resulting in his defeat.
Otpor has inspired other youth movements in Eastern Europe, such as Kmara in Georgia, that played an important role in the Rose Revolution, and Pora in Ukraine, the most important movement organising the demonstrations that led to the Orange Revolution. Like Otpor, these organisations have consequently practiced non-violent resistance and used ridiculing humor in opposing authoritarian leaders. Similar movements include KelKel in Kyrgyzstan, Zubr in Belarus and MJAFT! in Albania.
Opponents of the "color revolutions" have accused the Soros Foundations and/or the United States government of supporting and even planning the revolutions in order to serve western interests. Supporters of the revolutions have argued that these allegations are greatly exaggerated, and that the revolutions were positive events, morally justified, whether or not Western support had an influence on the events.




Australia


Australian Students have a long history of being active in political debates. This is particularly true in the newer universities that have been established in suburban areas. The National Union of Students has sometimes been at the forefront of campus activism in Australia.[citation needed] As in other Western nations, students across Australia also protested the domination of state-run education on the back of some very strong protests and even violent clashes with police and other educational and state-represented authorities - such clashes probably peaking by the year, 1967. As in other nations, left-wing students, in particular, demanded significant changes in educational perspective that reflected the down-trodden state of the working classes. This perspective was a virtual about-face on the more traditional functionalist view that had previously prevailed in state education. These clashes and the immensity of opposition of students to traditional state-perceived functional views of society paved the way for a 'consciousness' of minority groups within society which has changed the Australian persona on the view of functional society ever since. The newer theory had graduated by the 1980s into what was perceived as a more 'critical view' of society.


Malaysia


Since the amendment of Section 15 of the Universities and University Colleges Act 1971 (UUCA) in 1975, students were barred from being members of, and expressing support or opposition to, any political parties or "any organization, body or group of persons which the Minister, after consultation with the Board, has specified in writing to the Vice-Chancellor to be unsuitable to the interests and well-being of the students or the University." However, in October 2011, the Court of Appeal ruled that the relevant provision in Section 15 UUCA was unconstitutional due to Article 10 of the Federal Constitution pertaining to freedom of expression.


France


In France, student activists have been influential in shaping public debate. In May 1968 the University of Paris at Nanterre was closed due to problems between the students and the administration. In protest of the closure and the expulsion of Nanterre students, students of the Sorbonne in Paris began their own demonstration. The situation escalated into a nation-wide insurrection during which a variety of groups, including communists, anarchists, and right-wing libertarian activists, used the tension to advocate their own causes.
The events in Paris were followed by student protests throughout the world. The German student movement participated in major demonstrations against proposed emergency legislation. In many countries, the student protests caused authorities to respond with violence. In Spain, student demonstrations against Franco's dictatorship led to clashes with police. A student demonstration in Mexico City ended in a storm of bullets on the night of October 2, 1968, an event known as the Tlatelolco massacre. Even in Pakistan, students took to the streets to protest changes in education policy, and on November 7 a college student was shot dead as police opened fire on a demonstration.




China


Students on Tianasquare in 1919
Since the defeat of the Qing Dynasty during the First (1839–1842) and Second Opium Wars (1856–1860), student activism has played a significant role in the modern Chinese history.[5] Fueled mostly by Chinese nationalism, Chinese student activism strongly believes that young people are responsible for China's future. This strong nationalistic belief has been able to manifest in several forms such as democracy, Anti-Americanism and Communism.
One of the most important acts of student activism in Chinese history is the May Fourth Movement, which over 3000 students of Peking University and other schools gathered together in front of Tiananmen and held a demonstration. It is regarded as an essential step of the democratic revolution in China, and it had also give birth to Chinese Communism. Anti-Americanism movements led by the students during the Chinese Civil War were also instrumental in discrediting the KMT government and bring the Communist victory in China. In 1989, the democracy movement led by the students at the Tiananmen Square protests ended in a brutal government crackdown which would later be called a massacre.


Indonesia


In Indonesia, university student groups have repeatedly been the first groups to stage street demonstrations calling for governmental change at key points in the nation's history, and other organizations from across the political spectrum have sought to align themselves with student groups.
In 1928, the Youth Pledge (Sumpah Pemuda) helped to give voice to anti-colonial sentiments.
During the political turmoil of the 1960s, right-wing student groups staged demonstrations calling for then-President Sukarno to eliminate alleged Communists from his government, and later demanding that he resign. Sukarno did step down in 1967, and was replaced by Army general Suharto.
Student groups also played a key role in Suharto's 1998 fall by initiating large demonstrations that gave voice to widespread popular discontent with the president. High school and university students in Jakarta, Yogyakarta, Medan, and elsewhere were some of the first groups willing to speak out publicly against the military government. Student groups were a key part of the political scene during this period. For example, upon taking office after Suharto stepped down, B. J. Habibie made numerous mostly unsuccessful overtures to placate the student groups that had brought down his predecessor, meeting with student leaders and the families of students killed by security forces during demonstrations.