Serbia’s Student Movement: From Protest to Power
LONDON, November 9 (IPS) - On the night of 25 October, tens of thousands filled the streets of Belgrade and other cities, as they’d so often done in protest over the past two years. But this time they came out to celebrate. In that day’s National Assembly election, Student List, a slate of political newcomers, defeated Aleksandar Vučić’s Serbian Progressive Party (SNS), in power since 2012. The student-led movement behind the protests, which rose up against corruption, has given Serbia the opportunity for a democratic reset.
From grief to protest
Serbia became steadily more autocratic under Vučić. Public institutions served ruling-party interests amid a web of corruption, patronage, coercion and impunity. Public media became a ruling party mouthpiece.
Civic freedoms deteriorated dramatically. In 2018, the CIVICUS Monitor rated Serbia’s civic space as narrowed, meaning that fundamental rights were broadly respected. By the end of Vučić’s rule, the rating had collapsed to repressed, meaning that criticising those in power carried severe risks. The state used violence against protests and treated civil society as a security threat, targeting it with spyware and subjecting organisations to raids and police investigations.
The seismic shift began in November 2024 with the collapse of a railway station canopy in Novi Sad, Serbia’s second-largest city. Sixteen people died. The government insisted it was a tragic accident, but the station had only recently been renovated and, with construction contracts shrouded in secrecy, many suspected corners had been cut. For protesters, this was a lethal symbol of the costs of corruption, negligence and impunity. No one has been held accountable.
Students held vigils and mass protests on a scale unseen since 2000, when demonstrations ousted Slobodan Milošević, the infamous authoritarian leader and accused war criminal. This time, their most effective tactic was a months-long education strike in which they blockaded and occupied universities.
As the protest movement grew it connected with existing groups, including environmental and legal aid organisations, independent media and, crucially, academics, university administrators and education unions, who took solidarity strike action. This built wider public support, backed by a ‘students in every village’ campaign that saw students meet with rural communities to ask about what mattered most to them.
State attempts to suppress the movement failed, including mass arrests, violence by security forces and gangs of ruling-party supporters and an extensive campaign of disinformation and smears. Vučić vilified protesters as agents of foreign powers bent on subversion and the government fired education sector employees for taking part in strikes.
Change on the cards
Ultimately, the protests forced Vučić’s hand. Constitutionally barred from seeking a third term as president, he announced an early parliamentary election in June and stood down as president in September, making clear his intention to hold onto power as prime minister. He presumably gambled that a skewed playing field, characterised by intimidation and biased coverage, would let him win again and unleash an even fiercer crackdown.
The gamble failed because of the movement’s discipline and the smart choices it made. Throughout, students resisted opposition parties’ attempts to co-opt them, insisting that deeper change was needed to re-establish the rule of law, free public institutions from political capture and tackle corruption. From its early days, the movement practised internal democracy, taking decisions in university plenums, open assemblies where people debated, learned and decided together. When it decided to field a slate of candidates, it used the same method to select them. Students didn’t put themselves forward, choosing instead public figures untainted by association with established politics and likely to command broad support. Those who’ve won seats include academics, actors, former sports stars and medical professionals.
The result surpassed all predictions. According to projections based on the preliminary count, Student List has around 53 per cent of the vote, which would give it a clear majority of 141 of the National Assembly’s 250 seats. The SNS-led bloc trails on around 39 per cent. The margin was such that Vučić had to concede quickly.
Challenges of power
After the euphoria comes the challenge of moving from protest to power. A movement that has refused to have formal leaders must now unite behind a prime minister. Once the National Assembly convenes, Student List will have 90 days to form a government. Its deliberately broad campaign focused on major questions of national renewal but offered little detail. This strategy papered over political differences among representatives who range from nationalist to more liberal, which can be expected to surface if the incoming government succeeds in restoring the space for normal political debate. There’s also the question of how those elected will relate to the student movement.
As in Hungary, where long-term autocratic leader Viktor Orbán finally fell to electoral defeat in April, the new government will face the difficult task of reorienting state institutions that have bent to the former ruling party’s interests. An early sign of change came when the public broadcaster apologised to viewers for its bias towards the SNS, something that also happened in Hungary. The government will need to repay voters’ faith by rooting out corruption, which will mean overhauling institutions including the judiciary and police. All this will unfold alongside a presidential election that’s due by the end of the year.
Challenges lie ahead, but a population that has rediscovered the power of collective action can face them with confidence. Serbia also offers a vital source of international inspiration. Together with Hungary’s example, it shows there’s nothing permanent about autocratic rule. The world’s many Gen Z-led movements that have self-organised to demand a fairer distribution of economic and political power, and civil society more broadly, can take heart. Serbia has shown that organising and protesting works, and change is possible.
Andrew Firmin is CIVICUS Editor-in-Chief, co-director and writer for CIVICUS Lens and co-author of the State of Civil Society Report.
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