And there they stood, right opposite each other: a large police force versus hundreds of demonstrating students, Wednesday afternoon 8 May 2024 on the bridge for the Oudemanhuispoort in Amsterdam. A demonstrator climbed the police hovel who tried to break through the scattered barricade with loosened street tiles and household goods of the university. In the meantime, chairs and stones and paint bombs were thrown, also from the roof.
One major chaos, to be followed live all day via the TV cameras of the local news channel AT5.
What lessons can you learn from last May’s student protests? The University of Amsterdam (UvA) asked that question at Berenschot consultancy, which made a reconstruction of the severe protests at the university as a result of the outbreak of the war in the Gaza Strip in October 2023.
In the run -up to the riots in May, students and teachers from the UvA came together several times on campus. They demanded that the university would break ties with Israeli institutions. The university refused this, after which the situation escalated and at the beginning of May vandalism was caused for a damage amount of 4.1 million euros.
No de-escalation
Protests on small scale quickly grew into larger demonstrations “on which no effective de-escalating reaction was followed from the UvA,” is the most important conclusion from the Report published this week. “The situation then got further out of hand and with the set crisis organization it was not possible to put an end to the protests and occupations in a non -violent manner.”
The derailment was probably not to avoid, the consultancy writes on the basis of discussions with students, teachers, employees, deans and the Executive Board (CVB) and mutual communication. However, the UvA “made a number of choices” that have influenced the situation.
Berenschot starts the reconstruction on October 15, 2023, when a number of PhD students states in an open letter that the Executive Board trivializes the situation in the Middle East and does not take a clear position. After that, according to the consultancy firm, the university administration took “limited space” for “more dialogue and understanding and a listening ear for the position of some of the students and employees”. This felt demonstrators that “no right” was taken to their concerns, after which the situation gradually escalated.
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Decentralized organization UVA
The UvA board set up a crisis organization, but he was unable to put an end to the growing protest “in a non -violent way”. According to the external researchers, that had to do with the decentralized organization of the university. Incidents were responded to per faculty, so that decision -making started slowly. And the consultation via WhatsApp did not work well either. “Persons were added or removed at a rapid pace, so that no unambiguous line could arise.” To the displeasure of the mayor, who had difficulty reaching the university administration at determining moments.
The communication to the outside was also not flawless. For example, the rector Magnificus kept an interview with News hour That on Thursday evening, one day after the barricade at the Oudemanhuispoort, was broadcast. The aim was to inform the entire UVA community about the position of the UvA board-that the board cannot meet the requirement to break the ties with Israeli institutions. But in the media it went that interview mainly about the issue that the Executive Board had spoken with masked people. As a result, “the rest of the communication message did not come out well”.
In a response to the Berenschot report, the university board has announced that it will discuss the content with the Central Student Council and the Central Works Council. “The report forms an important basis for reflecting and learning from this radical period as an organization.”
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