27 | Student protests in Serbia

The Monkey Dance

This episode was recorded at 11:30 on Tuesday, March 11, 2025. Yesterday (March 10), students blocked access to the state-run Serbian public television headquarters, accusing it of biased coverage. As of this recording, hundreds of students continue to block access to the building. There is a major protest scheduled for Saturday, March 15. Since November of 2024, students in universities across Serbia have been organizing mass protests across the country against the corrupt, autocratic government of Aleksandar Vučić. While the media coverage has focused on the protests themselves, the engine of the student-led movement is a unified, multilateral experiment in absolute democracy that has managed to maintain a flat hierarchy and a single set of demands. Serbian philosopher and anthropologist Aleksandra Knežević joins us to talk about her ongoing work with the movement as both a participant and a researcher. She has been allowed by the students to research the movement, and has been conducting interviews and joining the student meetings as an observer. Guest: Aleksandra Knežević Institute for Philosophy and Social Theory, University of Belgrade Check out Aleksandra's autoethnography of her experience with the movement: An Autoethnographic Account of the Anti-Corruption Student Protests in Serbia 2024/25 Aleksandra also recommends: 1. An academic article by Katarina Beširević on the protests: “Nisi nadležan”: How a Student Movement Dictates Political Change in Serbia (2024/2025) 2. From The Guardian by Adriana Zaharijević: Serbia’s students are showing the world how to restore democratic hope If the links don't work in your podcast player, you can find links to Aleksandra's paper and the other articles in the show notes: https://www.monkeydancepod.com/episodes/episode-27