Facebook Instagram Twitter YouTube

University Occupation in Berlin: Beginning of a New Students’ Movement?

The Social Science Institute in the center of Berlin has been occupied for three weeks. Is this the beginning of a new students’ movement in Germany?

Nathaniel Flakin

February 9, 2017
Facebook Twitter Share

Update: On February 10, Humboldt University announced it would rescind the firing of lecturer Andrej Holm. The occupation was successful!

Nothing has happened at German universities in seven long years. Neoliberal depoliticization has been so effective that even representatives of the bourgeoisie have been heard expressing concern that students are no longer interested in politics.

But things might be changing. On January 18, the Social Science Institute of the Humboldt University, right in the center of Berlin, was occupied by more than 100 students. Their initial demand – #HolmBleibt! – went to the heart of Berlin politics.

On December 8, Berlin’s mayor Michael Müller (SPD) established a new coalition government with the Greens and “Die Linke” (The Left). The Left Party got to pick an undersecretary for construction – they named Andrej Holm.

Holm, a lecturer in sociology at the Humboldt University, is known as a critic of gentrification. When renters’ initiatives protest against the exploding rents in the city, Holm is their preferred expert. Ten years ago, he was actually charged with being a member of a left-wing terrorist group that planted bombs to protest gentrification (the charges were later dropped for lack of evidence).

The boulevard press campaigned against the nomination. Officially, this had nothing to do with Holm’s politics. Holm is from East Germany and when he was 18, he served for four months in the Ministry for State Security, the infamous Stasi, until the regime collapsed. Right-wing politicians claimed this disqualified him from political office. A pretty cheeky demand in a state that was built up by former Nazi career functionaries, when you think about it.

A politician of the neoliberal FDP let the cat out of the bag. The real problem with Holm was that he’s “closer to squatters than investors”, in the words of Sebastian Czaja.

By mid-January, Holm was forced to resign. But on top of that, he was also fired from his position at the Humboldt University – which labor lawyers declare was probably illegal. The demand that “Holm stays!” (#HolmBleibt) is what sent students onto the metaphorical barricades. In the last three weeks, they have organized demonstrations, parties and assemblies with hundreds of people. They have linked up with renters’ initiatives, as well as striking workers in the public sector and at Berlin’s biggest hospital. They have expanded their demands far beyond Holm.

As Yunus Özgür, a member of the student parliament from the Free University of Berlin for the Revolutionary-Communist Youth (RKJ), explains: “We have learned that the people that fired Holm are exactly the same people that defend the interests of the real estate mafia. We have seen that many employees at the university have outsourced and precarious contracts. We have seen how easy it is to fire critical lecturers because there is no democratic participation at the university.”

Protests are also spreading to the Free University – the second of Berlin’s three big university, with about 30,000 students each. On Tuesday, hundreds of students joined discussions at the FU’s Institute for Political Science, with topics ranging from democracy at the university to colonialist and racist content in seminars. The FU recently saw a very similar case to Holm’s: The precariously employed lecturer Eleonora Roldán Mendívil, a critic of colonialism and capitalism, was fired after a right-wing blog accused her of antisemitism, since she opposes the Israeli occupation of Palestine. Her struggle is ongoing.

mexico_pic.jpg

Are we witnessing the first steps of a new student movement in Germany? It’s hard to say. So far, only hundreds of have participated in protests. The last wave of the student movement, the “Education Strike” of 2009-10, saw a quarter of a million out on the streets.

After years of passivity, the ideological hegemony of the bourgeoisie at the universities is as strong as any time in the last half century. So there is no lack of political backwardness: Some students hope that putting the right person in a capitalist government could solve Berlin’s housing crisis. Other students refuse to express solidarity for Eleonora because they agree with the right-wing that any criticism of Israel is anti-semtiic. And most are just waiting to see what happens.

And yet, the protests represent a breath of fresh air. Germany has been shifting to the right for several years – but the tide will turn eventually! The key is for the students to reach out beyond the university, offering and receiving solidarity from students and workers, both in Berlin and internationally.

Facebook Twitter Share

Nathaniel Flakin

Nathaniel is a freelance journalist and historian from Berlin. He is on the editorial board of Left Voice and our German sister site Klasse Gegen Klasse. Nathaniel, also known by the nickname Wladek, has written a biography of Martin Monath, a Trotskyist resistance fighter in France during World War II, which has appeared in German, in English, and in French. He is on the autism spectrum.

Instagram

Europe

Migrants from Northern Africa sit in lines on the Italian island of Lampedusa.

Crisis in Lampedusa: Down with Fortress Europe, Open the Borders!

The way out of the immigration crisis is through the struggle against imperialism. This is a declaration from the European organizations of the Trotskyist Fraction - Fourth International.

Germany Is Threatening to Deport Palestinian Refugees for Their Activism

#StandWithZaid: Zaid Abdulnasser, the coordinator of the Palestine solidarity network Samidoun Germany, is a Palestinian refugee from Syria. The German are threatening to revoke his residence permit due to his political activism.

Tom Krüger

September 18, 2023

Stellantis Workers in France Walk Out to Demand Breaks amid Heat Wave

Workers at a Stellantis plant in France walked out to force management to address their health concerns amid the suffocating heatwave.

Sam Carliner

September 14, 2023

FT-CI Summer Schools in Europe: More than 1,000 Young People and Workers Discuss the Challenges of Building Revolutionary Currents

The Trotskyist Fraction is moving forward with renewed strength toward our task of converging with the most advanced sectors of the working class and the youth who are looking for a real alternative to the madness and injustice of the capitalist system. 

Josefina L. Martínez

September 14, 2023

MOST RECENT

President Biden visits striking UAW workers in Michigan.

Biden’s Picket Line Visit Doesn’t Mean He Is On Our Side

President Biden’s visit to the UAW picket line shows the strength of the strike — and why it should remain independent from him and the Democrats.

Tatiana Cozzarelli

September 27, 2023

Toward a Revolutionary Socialist Network

In this article Warren Montag and Joseph Serrano respond to our call for a network for a working-class party for socialism. 

Warren Montag

September 27, 2023

Scabs Will Not Pass: Defend the UAW Strike With Organized Grassroots Power

The Big Three are escalating their use of scabs. The rank and file are fighting back.

Jason Koslowski

September 27, 2023

China’s Rise, ‘Diminished Dependency,’ and Imperialism in Times of World Disorder

In this broad-ranging interview, originally published in LINKS, Trotskyist Fraction member Esteban Mercatante discusses how recent global shifts in processes of capital accumulation have contributed to China’s rise, the new (and old) mechanisms big powers use to plunder the Global South, and its implications for anti-imperialist and working-class struggles today.

Esteban Mercatante

September 22, 2023