Dutch student protests ignite movement against management of universities

On 24 February 2015, mounted police, live television crews, protestors and crowds of onlookers surrounded a building called the Bungehuis, a six storey art deco style construction that currently houses the University of Amsterdam’s humanities faculty. The building is scheduled to be converted into a luxury hotel and spa complex as part of an international chain of private members’ clubs called Soho House. Only 11 days earlier dozens of students had occupied the Bungehuis in response to a programme of sweeping changes that the university’s administration was apparently unwilling to discuss. The students’ demands for a “new university” included greater democratisation of university governance, greater transparency of the university’s finances, halting plans to restructure and cut a number of departments, a referendum on plans for departmental mergers with other universities, better conditions and protections for temporary staff, and an end to risky financial and property speculation with university funds. The pretext for the cuts and structural changes being opposed is an unprecedented crisis in the university’s finances – including a deficit rumoured to be up to €12m or €13m, according to an internal letter sent by a professor. The university board of directors responded to the Bungehuis protest by initiating a lawsuit against the occupying student seeking a fine of €100,000 per student per day. This prompted an open letter from hundreds of academic staff and a petition signed by over 7,000 people – including internationally renowned scholars such as Judith Butler, Noam Chomsky, David Graeber, David Harvey, Axel Honneth and Saskia Sassen. The scholars urged the board to reconsider their legal and financial threats and expressed sympathy for the students’ demands for democratic accountability and their challenge to the “ongoing financialisation and managerialism that is increasingly coming to dominate academic life”. The day after the police successfully evicted several dozen protesters from the Bungehuis, a mass rally of students took place in the heart of Amsterdam, challenging the university board’s assertion that it was only small and unrepresentative minority of the student population who opposed the plans. The rally culminated in the reappropriation of the Maagdenhuis, the university’s main administrative building, which is still occupied now. In a live televised discussion with Amsterdam’s mayor Eberhard van der Laan on the evening of the occupation, students urged him to use his influence to ask the university board to take concrete steps to listen to them. They called to increase the transparency and accountability of the university decision-making processes and to pause and reconsider their programme of restructuring, cuts and sell-offs. The mayor, however, failed to convince them to vacate the premises. Public support for the protest and the nascent new university movement appears to be high. The Dutch education minister says the protesters “have a point”. National newspapers and broadcasters across the political spectrum have given them sympathetic columns and coverage. Numerous political parties and trade unions have expressed their support. City residents and local organisations have contributed food and blankets for those who are remaining in the building overnight. No doubt part of the reason the occupation is eliciting such a widespread positive response is due to the lasting memory of student protests in the same building in 1969, which led to legislative changes giving students and staff a much greater say in how their universities were run. Professor Rob Hagendijk, a social scientist who recently retired from the University of Amsterdam, argued that there are many parallels between protests in the 1960s and today: The year before the occupation in 1969 there were several reports about the reform of universities, arguing that they should follow a more business-like model with stronger centralised management and that universities should be more functionalised for the economy. If you look at universities now, all of these years later, you can see that this way of structuring universities has effectively been introduced. At the time these reports came out the students were very concerned and demanded greater democratisation and participation for the students in decision-making in the university as a counter to the plans the government had. Student protests in Amsterdam and other Dutch universities in 1969 gave rise to the 1970 University Governance Reorganisation Act which established a much stronger level of student and staff representation in university governance as well as greater democratic oversight and control of university finances. In Hagendijk’s view these democratic safeguards helped to stave off some of the excesses of new public management style reforms driven by increasing efficiency, marketisation and stronger top-down management until the mid-1990s, when the Act was scrapped. He suggests that part of the reason the current student protests are gaining traction more broadly in Dutch society is because they are rejecting and calling for alternatives to market-orientated managerial changes that have taken hold in many areas of life and work, including in hospitals, housing corporations, schools and colleges. While the University of Amsterdam’s protesters’ demands are far from being met, last week the executive board issued a list of “10 starting points” on transparency and democratisation which is being cautiously welcomed as a “U-turn” by university staff. The protesters are now preparing for “a battle over detail” to ensure that their biggest concerns are not eclipsed in forthcoming negotiations. The new university movement looks like it could become a national phenomenon in the Netherlands. The energy and momentum of the Amsterdam protests has provided inspiration for similar groups being established in Delft, Groningen, Leiden, Nijmegen, Rotterdam, Tilburg and Utrecht. Students, teachers and university researchers across the country are expressing support for the protests and discussing ways to challenge the kinds of market-driven reforms that have been so aggressively pursued in the UK – and to develop alternative visions for the role of universities in society. One newspaper argued that the occupation reflects “the great ideological struggle of our time”. Another columnist wrote that the protests could represent “an important turning point” leading to a break with “protracted political apathy and democratic fatigue”. In the coming days the protestors need all of the international support they can muster as negotiations continue. If you want to back their cause you can sign and share their petition, help them to gather public statements of support, like them on Facebook or follow the @hetMaagdenhuis or @RethinkUvA accounts on Twitter. Join the higher education network for more comment, analysis and job opportunities, direct to your inbox. Follow us on Twitter @gdnhighered.