Skip to content
Sprachrohr

"Students of all faculties, unite!" (Tobias Eisch, fzs) Lecture: History, aims and forms of action of student protests

Blog

This article was originally published in German. The English version is an automatic translation and may contain errors. The German original is authoritative.

The Free Association of Student Bodies (fzs) is the umbrella organisation of student representations in Germany and represents approximately 1 million students. Before the collapse of the Jamaica negotiations, there were exploratory talks with those responsible from the science committees of the various parties. Regarding "housing shortage", there is joint exchange with the German Student Services Organisation (DSW); the fzs also cooperates with trade unions (e.g. GEW) to achieve better wages for student staff. In North Rhine-Westphalia, they organise jointly with the ABS and the LAT NRW the fight against the introduction of tuition fees for non-EU students.

In the lecture held on 30.11.17, a brief overview was given of students in National Socialism, the 68 movement, the Lucky Strike of 1997 as well as the Unibrennt education strike of 2009. It concluded with the alliance "Learning Factories … Mutiny!" which has been active since 2015. Due to time constraints, unfortunately it was not possible to address the student strikes in the 70s against the professional ban, the Unimut strike or the SPAR-WARS protest, amongst others.

  1. Students and National Socialism

In the Weimar Republic there were two large student organisations. On the one hand, the German Student Body, which consisted of General Student Committees (AStA), which were dominated for the most part by fraternities. On the other hand, there was the National Socialist German Student League (NSdStB), which formed the student group of the NSDAP. Whilst the German Student Body was academically elitist and shaped by its enemy image against the "hereditary enemy" France in a völkisch-national manner (as well as with its racial proofs), the NSdStB tended more towards the socio-revolutionary "Strasser" wing (after Gregor and Otto Strasser) of the NSDAP and had personnel overlaps with the Stormtroopers (SA), which under Ernst Röhm sought a socialist revolution from a national perspective. The goal of both student organisations was an Aryan science, to be freed from un-German research ideas. After the defeat in the First World War, many students joined the so-called "Freikorps" in order to take armed action against the newly created Polish state, through which they saw the German Reich or Germanness in the now Polish territories threatened. In 1920, many students also supported the Kapp-Lüttwitz Putsch, in which they sided with mutinous Freikorps units against the democratically elected SPD government in Berlin. In 1933, the German Student Body organised the book burning (which goes back to the book burning of 1817, at which, amongst other things, the book "Germanomanie" by the Jewish writer Saul Ascher was burned). After the Nazi takeover, students burned works by Jewish, communist or pacifist authors. Shortly thereafter, the German Student Body was absorbed into the NSdStB through coordination. After 1945, the Allies established Constituted Student Bodies (VS) and General Student Committees (AStA) at universities in order to teach a culture of democracy at the universities. Students were to debate themselves, vote and thus assume social responsibility. VS and AStA are thus to be seen as a means of democracy education as a reaction to the crimes of the Holocaust.

After 1945, the Allies established Constituted Student Representations (VS) and General Student Committees (AStA) at universities in order to teach a culture of democracy at the universities. Students were to debate and vote themselves and thus assume social responsibility. VS and AStA are therefore to be seen as a means of democratic education in response to the crimes of the Holocaust.

Further reading:

  • StuRa Uni Jena: Elitist & Reactionary since 1815. 200 Years of Urburschenschaft in Jena. Jena 2015
  1. The 68 Movement

The so-called 68ers emerged as a response to the Grand Coalition of 1966 (Kiesinger-Brandt), whose overwhelming majority in the Bundestag meant there was no longer any serious parliamentary opposition. This circumventing of the democratic basic principle as well as the introduction of emergency laws, which enabled the government to temporarily suspend fundamental rights, awakened memories of the one-party rule of the NSDAP and the decree of the Reich President for the Protection of People and State ("Reichstag Fire Decree"), which from 1933 suspended the civil rights of the Weimar Republic. To demonstrate against the danger of a new undemocratic government, the Extra-Parliamentary Opposition (APO) formed, whose most famous face was sociology student Rudi Dutschke. In 1967, a large demonstration took place in Berlin on the occasion of the Shah's visit (Mohammad Reza Pahlavi), in which students protested against the courting of the Persian head of government by the Federal Government, who had political opponents persecuted and tortured by his secret service. During this demonstration, student Benno Ohnesorg was shot dead by a police officer. Ten months later, a nationalist-minded worker carried out an attack on Dutschke, feeling inspired and encouraged by the inflammatory reporting of the BILD newspaper against the student movement. In 1968/69, student protest movements occurred worldwide, such as during the "Prague Spring" for a "socialism with a human face" in the CSSR (Czechoslovak Socialist Republic), in South Korea for democratisation of society and against the ruling military dictatorship, or in the People's Republic of China under the term of the Cultural Revolution.

The aims of the 68 movement in the Federal Republic were the coming to terms with the Nazi past, since many NSDAP members still held high leadership positions in business, society and science, as well as a democratisation of the university, in which students, academic staff and professors in committees have an equal vote (so-called "one-third parity"). Furthermore, a Constituted Student Body with a political mandate was demanded, as the university was understood as a starting point for changing society. But the women's movement also gained momentum. Thus, the spokesperson of the Action Council for the Liberation of Women of the SDS (Socialist German Student League), Helke Sander, accused her board in a speech of not addressing the role of women – whilst left-wing men demonstrated and made politics, women were responsible for reproductive work. Since the comrades were not willing to discuss this speech, Sigrid Rüger threw tomatoes in the direction of the board table. The media dissemination of this action led to a reorientation within the student movement and the formation of many women's groups at universities. In the following years, Constituted Student Bodies were banned in many federal states, as conservative politicians saw in student representation a potential breeding ground for violent left-wing terrorism. Within a short time, however, the ban was lifted again; in Baden-Württemberg only in 2012 with the green-black government. Only Bavaria is now the only federal state in which the Constituted Student Body is legally prohibited, as the creed there still seems to be that "the left swamp at universities must be drained".

Forms of action of the 68 movement were assemblies and discussions, occupation and blockade of lecture halls and courses, as well as the media-effective interruption and disruption of academic ceremonial events at the university. Furthermore, many theoretical discourses were conducted and conversations sought with, amongst others, Theodor W. Adorno or Max Horkheimer. New forms of living emerged such as the commune or the nowadays common shared flat (WG) and own projects of student childcare ("children's shops") to enable young mothers to study. In the subsequent university reforms, the democratisation of the university was implemented in parts.

Further reading:

  • SDS University Memorial Document: University in Democracy. 1961
  • Aust, Stefan: The Baader-Meinhof Complex. Hamburg 2005
  • Eichinger, Bernd: The Baader-Meinhof Complex. Constantin Film. Munich 2008. 143 min. Esp. 5:25-23:00
  1. The Lucky Strike 1997

Although democratic bodies had been established at universities through various university reforms, which ensured student participation in decision-making processes, high student numbers combined with low education spending led to a glaring underfunding of the education sector and thus rapidly deteriorating study conditions. At the beginning of WS 1997/98, a professor at the University of Giessen sent half of the students present in the lecture hall away, as he was unable to hold a reasonable course in the completely overcrowded lecture hall. Thereupon, the students called for a strike, which spread to the entire federal territory in the shortest time.

The aims of the protest known as the "Lucky Strike" were the full funding of universities, i.e. the renovation of old buildings and the construction of urgently needed lecture halls. Likewise, the employment of more teaching staff was demanded in order to reduce the overload of employed university staff and to ensure good teaching. Furthermore, the university should again become a place of education aimed at developing a mature person, and not a place of mere training that creates an economically compliant employee.

Forms of action were the occupation of lecture halls to interrupt teaching operations and the holding of general assemblies with strike and protest plenums to discuss further proceedings. People ate, slept and debated in the lecture hall, held theatrical performances on the university grounds or organised a demonstration in the city centre.

4. "#University Burns. Education Protest 2.0" – Education Strike 2009

In the course of the Bologna Reform (1999-2010), there was a widespread introduction of Bachelor's and Master's degree programmes as well as the credit point system "European Credit Transfer System" (ECTS), which was intended to enable Europe-wide comparability of degree programmes and achievements. However, this led to an enormous increase in performance pressure through now universally mandatory examinations, and the comparability resulted in a rational economisation of the education system due to the now postulated measurability of "learning". Furthermore, many federal states introduced tuition fees, which resulted in social selection and thus inequality of educational opportunities. Whilst in 2007 young people in almost all federal states had to pay €500 per semester to continue studying, during the banking crisis of 2008, financial companies designated as "systemically relevant" were subsidised with billions in contributions. The economisation of the university was also evident in the way self-administration worked, in which decision-making powers were gradually transferred from elected bodies to the university presidency, so that it increasingly resembled a management administration. An example of this is the teaching exemption of university presidents and their close associates, who hardly held any more seminars or exercises, but instead devoted themselves to running the "university" enterprise and raising third-party funding. From the perspective of students, there was no longer room for critical personality development; rather, the goal of the university was more of a usable education and optimisation of students towards market-efficient human capital.

The aim of the education protest in 2009 was to resist social selection through tuition fees and numerus clausus and to oppose the economisation of the university (third-party funding from private companies, arms manufacturers), the schoolification, the high performance pressure and the elitist excellence initiative. As in the Lucky Strike of 1997, full funding of universities and the end of precarious employment relationships in teaching and research were demanded again. In many places, students worked together with schoolchildren who campaigned against the introduction of the eight-year gymnasium, an overcrowded curriculum and for a democratisation of schools.

Forms of action included, in addition to the occupation of lecture halls and the striking of teaching operations, discussions with politicians on the education issues mentioned. Following the successful popular referendum against tuition fees (17–30.1.2013), the CSU-FDP coalition in Bavaria abolished tuition fees; Lower Saxony dispensed with the socially exclusionary "campus toll" as the last federal state from WS 2014/15.

Further reading:

  1. "Learning Factories … Mutiny!"

In 2015, following the revision of the Lower Saxony Higher Education Act, local grassroots groups were formed, whose aim was to oppose the social exclusion of students. Likewise, this new movement continued to protest against the economisation of education. In November 2015, for the first time in the history of student protests, an entire university, the University of Landau, was struck, so that teaching operations at all faculties came to a standstill. This action was successful through personal canvassing in individual seminars and lectures for the student general assembly and direct address in the canteens via megaphone.

The alliance "Learning Factories … Mutiny!" holds a coordination meeting every semester. Next date: 26–28 January 2018 in Halle (Saale).

Further reading:

Daniel Schneider

← Back to overview