page_title: Student activism
section_title: Eastern Europe and the post-Soviet Union states
hierarchical_section_title: Student activism / By country / Eastern Europe and the post-Soviet Union states
context_page_description: Student activism or campus activism is work by students to cause political, environmental, economic, or social change. Although often focused on schools, curriculum, and educational funding, student groups have influenced greater political events.
  Modern student activist movements vary widely in subject, size, and success, with all kinds of students in all kinds of educational settings participating, including public and private school students; elementary, middle, senior, undergraduate, and graduate students; and all races, socio-economic backgrounds, and political perspectives. Some student protests focus on the internal affairs of a specific institution; others focus on broader issues such as a war or dictatorship. Likewise, some student protests focus on an institution's impact on the world, such as a disinvestment campaign, while others may focus on a regional or national policy's impact on the institution, such as a campaign against government education policy.
context_section_description: During communist rule, students in Eastern Europe were the force behind several of the best-known instances of protest. The chain of events leading to the 1956 Hungarian Revolution was started by peaceful student demonstrations in the streets of Budapest, later attracting workers and other Hungarians. In Czechoslovakia, one of the most known faces of the protests following the Soviet-led invasion that ended the Prague Spring was Jan Palach, a student who committed suicide by setting fire to himself on January 16, 1969. The act triggered a major protest against the occupation.
  Student-dominated youth movements have also played a central role in the "color revolutions" seen in post-communist societies in recent years.
  Of the color revolutions, the Velvet Revolution of 1989 in the Czechoslovak capital of Prague was one of them. Though the Velvet Revolution began as a celebration of International Students Day, the single event quickly turned into a nationwide ordeal aimed at the dissolution of communism. The demonstration had turned violent when police intervened. However, the police attacks garnered nationwide sympathy for the student protesters. Soon enough multiple other protests unraveled in an effort to breakdown the one party communist regime of Czechoslovakia. The series of protests were successful; they broke down the communist regime and implemented the use of democratic elections in 1990, only a few months after the first protest.
  Another example of this was the Serbian Otpor! ("Resistance!" in Serbian), formed in October 1998 as a response to repressive university and media laws that were introduced that year. In the presidential campaign in September 2000, the organisation engineered the "Gotov je" ("He's finished") campaign that galvanized Serbian discontent with Slobodan Milošević, ultimately resulting in his defeat.
  Otpor has inspired other youth movements in Eastern Europe, such as Kmara in Georgia, which played an important role in the Rose Revolution, and Pora in Ukraine, which was key in organising the demonstrations that led to the Orange Revolution. Like Otpor, these organisations have consequently practiced non-violent resistance and used ridiculing humor in opposing authoritarian leaders. Similar movements include KelKel in Kyrgyzstan, Zubr in Belarus and MJAFT! in Albania.
  Opponents of the "color revolutions" have accused the Soros Foundations and/or the United States government of supporting and even planning the revolutions in order to serve western interests. Supporters of the revolutions have argued that these allegations are greatly exaggerated, and that the revolutions were positive events, morally justified, whether or not Western support had an influence on the events.
caption: MJAFT! protest in Albania
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