A tragic accident in Novi Sad, caused by corruption and negligence, has sparked widespread student-led protests in Serbia, exposing deep public dissatisfaction with government mismanagement. The movement, unique in its leaderless and ideology-free approach, continues to unite students, workers, and various social groups in a mass uprising against the ruling Serbian Progressive Party (SPP). Despite government attempts to suppress and divide the movement through propaganda, bribes, and intimidation, the protests persist, challenging Serbia’s political system and the authority of President Aleksandar Vučić.
A tragedy that sparked a movement
Student demonstrations in Serbia were triggered by a tragedy made inevitable by years of corruption, neglect and incompetence in state institutions and private companies the government chose to work with. The downfall of a plate that was placed over a roof at a recently reconstructed train station in Novi Sad caused 15 deaths and left many more severely injured. In the immediate aftermath of the tragic event that took place on 1 November 2024, the Serbian public was in a state of shock and outrage. What caused public anger to echo over all the regions and social groups in Serbia was not just how it was made clear that corruption and incompetence had endangered the lives of citizens but also how the government handled the crisis. Serbian Progressive Party representatives and government-influenced media tried to portray the tragedy as an expected, almost natural consequence of modernisation and industrialisation and an overall minor inconvenience that shouldn’t endanger the supposed economic growth. This was a wakening call for social forces considered to be gone from the modern Serbian society, stereotypically known for its collectivist norms and a rebellious past. A nation created in uprisings against foreign invaders, and with a historical experience of being able to replace its tyrannical governments only with a massive popular revolt, rose once again.
The return of student power
A new and surprising historical phenomenon was encountered when a student movement started to give shape to a popular revolt. Through November and December, while public demonstrations were still organised around either massive civil protests or short-term blockades of the roads in silent remembrance of the victims, Serbian students invented a new form of civil unrest. One by one, faculties and high schools nationwide were blocked as students decided to strike. It should also be noted that Serbian Universities have an old institution from the socialist times called “plenum”, which is a general assembly of all the students currently studying at certain institutions and has a seniority in decision-making over the bodies of elected student representatives. However, the institution of “plenum” fell into obscurity after neoliberal reforms in Serbia during the 90s and early 2000s. The role of the students in Serbian politics and society once revered and even glorified by the socialist governments, was gradually brushed aside for a relatively inefficient system of representative bodies with no actual influence, as bonds between ruling parties, academic bureaucracy and opportunistic professors or student representatives grew ever stronger. Subsequently, much like on the eve of the French Revolution, or whenever Romans needed to pass a law without going through the Senate, the older and more representative democratic institution was reassembled. Thus began an experiment with direct democracy with many thousands of participants. This modern phenomenon challenges the existing theoretical framework on the practical problems of introducing a form of direct democracy.
A “faceless” revolt with mass appeal
This student movement is different from past Serbian and Yugoslav student protests. To avoid giving the government a clear target for pressure or propaganda, students chose not to elect leaders who could be influenced or used as symbols to discredit the movement. Similarly, students agreed that their movement would have no official ideology or political agenda to prevent future divisions that the regime could exploit. Despite the attempts of various opposition leaders and political analysts to prove that large groups within the student movement share their beliefs, students have collectively refused to discuss any polarising topic, thus preserving the unity of the movement. What makes this new phenomenon of the “faceless” movement so interesting is the fact that it appeared in Serbia, a country notorious for having the majority of its very diverse social groups deeply divided over issues such as the status of Kosovo, EU integrations or closeness with Russia, the role of the Orthodox church in the society, rights of LGBT groups, etc. Also, university circles in Serbia are still passionately devoted to far-left or far-right ideologies, unlike some of their Western counterparts. At some faculties, one would find it hard to believe that neoliberalism ever became a globally dominant economic model and that great ideological divisions of the 20th century have been shrinking to clashes between left and right-wing centrists or debates over cultural issues. However, the new student movement in Serbia was ready to set all those differences aside to create a force capable of mobilising the masses.
Beyond the students: A movement for all
Despite their later romanticisation, the new “faceless” movement has achieved what past Serbian student protests could not. The student revolt of 1968 could not mobilise peasants, factory workers, and soldiers, which are three key social groups scholars considered crucial for any significant political change in Serbia and former Yugoslavia. On the other hand, despite declining numbers over the decades, these three groups still make up a considerable part of Serbia’s population and hold symbolic political influence. Now, their representatives can be seen marching alongside students in nearly all public demonstrations. An interesting question for future scientific research would be to determine factors that may have influenced the changing image of students in Serbian society. How are the students now, for the first time in recent Serbian history, perceived as protagonists of the interests of ordinary people and not as a privileged social class who gets to have a high education? But for now, we can look at those social factors that we already know and see how the position of those groups mentioned above, peasants, factory workers and soldiers, have changed over time. It was almost impossible to expect that a considerable sway of the working class of former Yugoslavia, which enjoyed a position similar to their Western counterparts during the “welfare state” era, would suddenly rebel against the socialist regime that made their spending power appear stronger by every year, while still allowing for far more political freedom than the population of the Eastern Bloc countries enjoyed. But now, after almost three decades of getting progressively impoverished without witnessing expected leaps in democratisation, numerous Serbian workers are ready to claim that students are “their children“. And thanks to the remaining system of quality public education, many of the students are indeed children of working-class parents, as they were before neoliberal reforms. Yet, now they can see that they are fighting for political freedom as they did in 1968 and defending their homes from constant economic decay.
Student protests in Belgrade, Yugoslavia, 1968. Photo by Stevan Kragujević – Museum of Yugoslavia, CC BY-SA 3.0 https://commons.wikimedia.org/w/index.php?curid=70811558
The 1996–1997 student demonstrations fractured due to divisions among opposition leaders, weakening unity among student groups. Milošević’s regime partly survived because of the students’ ties to opposition parties. Now, almost three decades after that winter marked in popular memory by unprecedented street violence and police brutality, student assemblies decided not to get involved with any opposition parties and leaders. While preserving the unity of the movement, this move also deprives the propaganda machinery of the SPP of the ability to use its most potent strategy, which is to link any new civil resistance with the existing opposition.
The political position of SPP was, until now, bound to appear strong in the eyes of outside observers due to the lack of an alternative popular enough to challenge SPP rule since the opposition was, for most of the previous decade, presented in government-influenced media as being even more privileged, ineffective and elitist then it was in reality. In a country with enormous and constantly growing class disparity, a form of populist propaganda built around exaggeration of the existing social reality was almost destined to be successful. However, the student movement was able to crumble one of the key pillars of SPP power by presenting itself as a part of the popular revolt while distancing from those parties and movements that, on several occasions, tried to use the student uprising to expand their influence outside the wealthiest and most urbanised districts of Belgrade.
Army veterans and bikers escorted the students to protect them from attacks by regime loyalists. Local priests and sports clubs opened their churches and stadiums for students to sleep in, while taxi drivers picked up exhausted marchers and brought them home.
All of the factors above have contributed to the student movement rising from a simple strike to a popular revolt, which became evident with the new phenomenon of “student marches” in January 2025. Choosing to go on foot from one major university centre to another, in a display of unity and solidarity with their peers around the country, Serbian students have caused scenes never before seen in recent history. When students from Belgrade were joined by their colleagues from Kragujevac and Niš in a march towards Novi Sad, a place of the tragic events brought upon by corruption and neglect, they were welcomed in every village as a liberating army. Local families brought food for the students, large street manifestations were organised in many smaller villages and towns, and numerous small gestures of solidarity were made. rmy veterans and bikers escorted the students to protect them from attacks by regime loyalists. Local priests and sports clubs opened their churches and stadiums for students to sleep in, while taxi drivers picked up exhausted marchers and brought them homeLastly, hundreds of thousands joined massive demonstrations held in Novi Sad and Kragujevac, arriving by busses, trains or on foot to welcome student columns after marches that saw young people sleeping in the open on the winter cold and conquering hundreds of miles in days.
Student protests in Novi Sad. Photo: Nikola Dyordyevich
The regime’s response and the uncertain future
However, the hybrid regime of Aleksandar Vučić continues to invent new strategies to divide and disperse the popular revolt. Following suspicious nighttime attacks on blockaded faculties by suspected regime-affiliated hooligans, the SPP government attempted public bribery. They offered students cheaper housing, free public transportation, and other benefits in exchange for ending the strike. Since the student assemblies refused all the offers made by the government, the regime resorted to going back on its propaganda machinery and proclaiming a crusade against “coloured revolution” while painting the students as mercenaries of the foreign powers that were trying to destabilise Serbia. Now, the regime is playing a long game, counting on the poor financial position of the students, most of whom are either in transitional or in actual poverty and thus can’t afford to pay school fees or/and the costs of their stay in major university centres if they lose an academic year due to being on strike. Meanwhile, the student rebellion has sparked a broader popular revolt in Serbia, reviving solidarity in an increasingly fragmented society. As a result, numerous initiatives have emerged to support students in sustaining their fight until their demands are met. Yet, it is still too early to speculate what would become of the student movement because if history had taught us anything, those with more money and power could almost always win prolonged conflicts.
Aleksandar Vučić at the EU-Western Balkans summit.
Photo: European Union
Still, the student movement had already created a significant change in the political life of Serbia, and maybe, as only time would tell, to place a new mechanism of control over the power of executive authorities and future leaders with authoritarian tendencies. Since the beginning of the unrest at Serbian universities and high schools, President Vučić has offered to address the students on numerous occasions, only for his offer to be continuously refused. Whenever asked by the media why they refuse to “talk to the president,” hundreds of students have simply quoted the conclusion of their assemblies, which voted on the issue. This conclusion states that students only demand institutions to do their job. Since public prosecution and judicial authorities are not under the jurisdiction of the president of the republic according to the constitution, they fail to see how the president’s personal involvement could help these institutions start performing their duty—investigating and holding accountable those responsible for the accident in Novi Sad.
This action alone has challenged both the personal authority of the president and the pillars of authoritarian rule, while also questioning the entire political culture of the country. A tradition of rule through informal mechanisms, built around the presumed power of the executive authority with no actual basis in the constitution, is now being put to a historical test. Every government that follows Aleksandar Vučić’s administration will have to confront the possibility that the people may simply choose not to recognize the personal authority of political leaders and instead demand that state institutions perform their duties in accordance with the principles of the rule of law.
