Student Occupation in Glasgow: An Interview

For over a year, the British government has been cutting funding to public services, including university funding. Naturally, students are frustrated with the situation and do not want to see their education chipped away at because the government and university administrators do not deem certain aspects of it necessary. At Glasgow University in Scotland, this frustration has manifested itself as a student occupation of the Hetherington Research Club.

What follows is an interview, conducted via e-mail, with a student involved in the occupation. She does not speak for the whole occupation, but as an individual. It is a look into the anatomy of a student occupation and an example of what can be done through collective student power.

---

Middlebury Gadfly (MG): First, tell us what you can about the Free Hetherington. What is it? 

Hannah: The Hetherington Research Club (HRC) was, until last year, the postgraduate students' social club at the University of Glasgow. They ran various club nights and pub quizzes, and offered a space for postgraduate students to meet, get a drink, chat and learn form each other. Last year, the university shut it down, saying it was unprofitable and citing financial mismanagement issues. This meant the loss of a valuable space on campus, as although Glasgow Uni has two other student unions, neither offers the same relaxed atmosphere that the HRC did, and are geared more to undergraduates, drinking and club nights than they are to postgrads or to discussion and learning.

The building was occupied by students on the 1^st of February, which means that at the time of doing this interview we're coming up for our one month anniversary in occupation, which is pretty cool! As far as I'm aware, what we're doing is pretty unusual in terms of UK student occupations, although there are numerous other student groups in occupation around the country right now.

Having this building, run autonomously, provides students and staff at Glasgow Uni with a valuable physical base for meeting and organising to fight the savage budget cuts at the universities in Glasgow. Since the 1^st of February, the Free Hetherington has been run by students on donations, and we're open 24 hours a day. We have two people stationed on the door at all times for security reasons and to let people in. We offer free tea and coffee to all comers, and provide two free cooked vegan meals a day, prepared on site by our amazing volunteer chefs and helpers. Every day we run events, from direct action workshops and legal awareness training for demonstrators to life drawing and sewing classes. We even have children's film screenings! Everything at the Free Hetherington is decided at meetings where anyone can come and have their say and we vote on proposals democratically. 

MG: Budget cuts at Glasgow University prompted the occupation, correct? Can you tell our readers what the current situation is?

Hannah: The Tory-Lib Dem coalition government is cutting public services in a way that is just unprecedented in modern British history, and using the financial crisis as an excuse for cuts of an ideological nature. While Scotland isn't seeing the worst of this right now thanks to many of the issues involved being devolved to the Scottish Parliament, we have a general election here in May, which could see changes. As far as the current situation at the University of Glasgow goes, we're seeing extremely serious cuts proposed by senior management, who are proposing a “consultation” which will be overseen by the senior management team themselves before they confirm the drastic and frightening cuts that have been announced.

Currently they are proposing cutting the nursing department entirely, despite it being one of the best in the country with an excellent employment record for graduates. They are also proposing entirely cutting the school of Slavonic Studies, the only course of its kind in Scotland, which would include getting rid of Polish, Czech and Russian. German might also be for the axe. The most extreme proposal for the School of Modern Languages and Cultures (SMLC) would see language provision reduced to just French and Spanish, leaving the West of Scotland entirely without a university which provides a range of language options. They also want to merge archaeology with history, losing jobs. The scrapping of the Department of Adult and Continuing Education is also on the table, and this department has an important role to play in the wider community and as an access route to university for those without traditional academic qualifications. At the same time as they are proposing such drastic cuts in languages – an area in which Glasgow excels – they are investing in the departments which make the most money from non-EU students' fees, namely medicine, business and economics, and new professorships are being advertised in these areas while staff are being laid off elsewhere.

The Free Hetherington provides a space to organise protests against this destruction of our education, and we've had fantastic support from a broad base. Last week around 3000 students marched on the university court where management was meeting to discuss these proposals, the largest student demo Glasgow has seen. There is serious and broad-ranging opposition to the cuts being made and we will keep fighting. This is not just about our own educations; this is about the principle of education for its own sake, and the education of those who will come to Glasgow Uni in the future.

MG: When did the occupation start?

Hannah: On the 1^st of February, a group of students occupied the abandoned building by entering through an unlocked fire door. No criminal damage was caused in entering the building. People have been in the building 24/7 since then.

MG: What are you hoping to achieve through this occupation?

Hannah: We want to see an end to the drastic cuts at Glasgow Uni, and to the government's ideological decimation of our public services. We also want to see the HRC return to being a building for student use, not turned into offices as the University wants. Additionally, though, we are building on the activist community in Glasgow, and providing an important space for people to meet with each other, discuss issues and organise. 

MG: Does a particular political/social ideology dominate the occupation, or is there a wide representation of views and goals?

Hannah: People here come from various political hues, from anarchists across numerous socialist denominations to people who're just opposed to the government's and the university's cuts, and although I think it would be fair to say we're a broadly left-wing group, we're certainly not party-political. Any disagreements are dealt with respectfully. People of any political ideology or none are welcome as long as they're open to respectful discussion. We try to be a respectful, safe space, and have firm policies against racist, sexist or homophobic behaviour.

MG: What is a typical day inside the Hetherington?

Hannah: It depends on the day! Those who've slept over wake up in the morning and put away communal bedding so the hall can be used for workshops and meetings. Coffee and tea is always going on in the bar downstairs (we don't serve alcohol, but you can BYOB!) and people will be popping in and out on their way to and from class, both regular users of the building and new people coming in to check it out. Someone will go out to get the papers so we can have them around for people to read. Some days meetings will be happening upstairs, for a variety of groups as anyone can book the space for free.

Throughout the day two people will always be on the door, in two-hour shifts. No one likes doing the 3-5am or the 5-7am, but someone always does! Lunchtime will come around and the chefs will bring up something tasty that anyone who wants can come in and eat, so we'll take some out to whoever's on the door. We also always have someone with medical and first aid training in the building, 24/7, who can often be found in the hallway by the medic station, and can otherwise be spotted by their fluorescent medic jacket!

In the evening we're usually a little busier. At least three nights a week we have an occupation meeting, where we gather to discuss issues and vote on things to do with the day-to-day running of the space. Dinner happens at various times whenever it's ready, and is always free, vegan-friendly and delicious! 

Throughout the evening people will come in to hang out and chat, or to attend a poetry open mic night or a pub quiz. Often people are up late in the hallway hanging out with the people on the door, singing and playing guitar or just chatting or knitting. It's a very friendly and open space, but also a place where people care and are passionate about things.

MG: Is it just students, or is the larger community encouraged to engage?

Hannah: The building is used by staff and both under- and postgrad students, and lecturers from the university have even come down to deliver free, open lectures. However, it's not exclusive to people from the university, and anyone is welcome to come in to attend events or just to check it out. The only exception is that we're not prepared to admit drunk or confrontational people who turn up the door. Also, obviously, police in uniform and the university security guards are not allowed into the building, although we do take the security guards cups of tea and coffee when they're outside, and we maintain a very good relationship with them. 

MG: What about administrators? Or police? Has there been any sort of conflict with those who are against you? If so, how did you handle it?

Hannah: We have been largely left alone in the building; I think the management was initially thinking we would get bored and leave quickly. Last week, the principal's PR man sent out an email to the entire staff and student body that made some pretty libelous and untrue statements about the occupation, asking us to end it. It should be noted that this mass email is the only communication we've ever had from senior management, who have never contacted the occupation directly and chose instead to make accusations and misrepresentations to a wide audience, while implying that they had had contact with us. We've released a reply, but we're being denied the right to send it out to the same mass audience that the principle was able to access, so we're trying to spread the word via Facebook and other social media. 

We have still not been directly asked to leave, and at the time of this interview we are attempting to set up a meeting with senior management to discuss our concerns.

MG: Is there anything else you’d like to share?

Hannah: For anyone who thinks of student activists as angry, hateful, violent people (and let me be clear – many people do think of us that way) the Free Hetherington is the opposite of that. We're a community space, for learning and discussion, and for fighting against the cuts, which will affect everyone at the University of Glasgow. It is an open place, where I've learned a lot and had my mind opened. We're providing a valuable service to the university and wider community, and it's just the happiest, most stimulating and encouraging place I've ever been lucky enough to spend time. I've met so many different people from around the world and from all walks of life, but everyone's voice has equal power within these walls. The people really do have power. Stand up and fight for what's important, and don't let governments and businessmen take it away.

----

For more information about the Free Hetherington, you can visit their website here:

http://freehetherington.wordpress.com/

or their Facebook page here: http://www.facebook.com/FreeHetherington

Solidarity from an american anarchist.

t h e   g a d f l y

*UPDATE* On 22 March 2011, the occupiers at The Free Hetherington were evicted by the police. The police gave a girl a concussion and refused her water and medical attention. Click the links above to find out more information as it is available.

Exploding cigar

This is from The Daily, Rupert Murdock's online only newspaper.

http://www.thedaily.com/page/2011/02/18/021811-opinions-oped-cuba-symmes-1-3/ 

Enjoy! 

Exploding cigar

Shortages and corruption make Havana regime vulnerable

By Patrick Symmes Friday, February 18, 2011

Coffee is about to have less coffee in it, the Cuban government announced this month. It will now be adulterated with some as-yet-undetermined vegetable matter, stretching the country's meager supply of joe a little further.

All Cubans are issued a single small packet of coffee every month, as part of the state ration system, the cornerstone of government economic control. The richest coffee grown on the island is roasted dark, labeled for export and sold for hard currency in dollar stores few Cubans can afford. The lesser stuff, a brown powder sold under the Hola brand name, is rationed out, and is the only coffee most Cubans ever taste. Now it will be diluted, perhaps with ground nuts, soybean leaves or, as rumor had it during my visit to Cuba last year, ground twigs.

Coffee is a good measure of Cuban identity, one of the few pleasures that was never taken away by the revolution. A hot, sweet jolt, it is not just a stimulant, but a vital drink that controls appetite on an island where meals are infrequent.

The coffee crisis encapsulates all that is wrong with Cuba: theft, hunger, black markets, bad food and a leader who cannot produce beans but says twig-sipping is patriotic. Yet the Cuban Revolution goes on after half a century, unchallenged internally, because it holds not just the police truncheon, but also the trust of some portion of the population. Supporters are a minority, but not a small one.

Taking away the coffee is part of a deeper trend, however — one more failure at a moment when the cost of stagnation, one-party rule and endlessly accumulating small insults are being recalculated worldwide. Burma's generals must be nervous. Central Asian dictators are sniffing for smoke from Tahrir Square. And in Havana, the Cuban Revolution must know, deep in its old bones, that it is too weak to withstand a wave of popular unrest like that coursing through Egypt.

Today the Cuban economy is nonexistent or stagnant, the young are educated, broke and frustrated, and after 50 years of one-party rule, stealing and corruption have become aspects of everyday life. Sound familiar?

The Cuban state totters on the edge of bankruptcy. A million Cubans will be laid off, Havana says, but there are no jobs and business is effectively illegal. Soap, potatoes and peas have all been removed from the minimal rations that keep Cubans alive. Seventy percent of all food is imported. If the government goes broke, as seems increasingly likely, people will go hungry, and crime and corruption will increase. In such tense conditions, the bond between any given people and a once-revolutionary government can break quickly.

Adaptation is the stepchild of necessity. Havana is already full of foreign corporations (European and Canadian, primarily) involved in tourism or in the massive import trade necessary to keep a country alive when it cannot feed itself. With foreign entities handling hundreds of millions of dollars and most of the valuable goods in Cuba, some islanders inevitably get their fingers in the pie.

The average salary in the country is less than $20 a month, and corruption has long been endemic among the lower classes, with stealing from state employers the main mechanism. But now corruption is also appearing at the highest levels of society. In 2009, two of Cuba's senior leaders, Foreign Minister Felipe Perez Roque and Vice President Carlos Lage, were detained, humiliated at show trials and fired from the regime. Their offense appears to have been a luxurious, rum-fueled vacation with a wealthy Spanish lobbyist. In Cuba, political ambition and rivalry have always been involved in such purges. What is new is the certainty that, as the economy slips out of the regime's hands, large-scale financial corruption will be involved too.

Cubans mention the coming of corruption with certainty and fear: Top officials are already getting away with enriched lifestyles, and when this does become visible — larger houses, better cars and immunity from the police — then all bets are off. The regime fears financial corruption for a reason: It will break its bond with the Cuban public, a half-century-long narrative of all Cubans sacrificing equally. If some aren't sacrificing at all, that stings. If those people are high officials, it isn't a sting, it's a terminal disease. Hypocrisy was the downfall of Hosni Mubarak; the Cuban Communist Party could go the same way.

Most likely, it will be years before Cuban society confronts the crisis that unemployment, corruption and inequality will bring. But it starts now: A million Cubans will lose their state jobs before 2011 is over, simply because there is no way to pay them, nor any work for them to do. Left to their own devices, Cubans may develop successful ways of working, earning a living in one of the few narrow fields of self-employment allowed or on the traditional black market. Others will find new opportunities — if Cuba carries out a plan to provide raw materials and legalize the hiring of workers, many Cubans will become free of their total dependency on the state. However this economic future plays out, there is one certainty: Some will fall behind as others rise ahead, and in that gulf there is room for change.

What’s the American thing to do? Obama has embraced a Goldilocks policy, neither too hot nor too cold. He has increased cultural contact and eased restrictions on financial transactions. Both policies work against the Cuban government, disarming its propaganda and giving ordinary people some independence from the regime. Continuing the huge cash deals of the George W. Bush era for agricultural products — American exports of rice, wheat, apples and frozen poultry to Cuba have added up to $800 million in certain years — feeds the people while bankrupting the tyrannical state.

As for the faithful — the 7 percent of Cubans who are in "the Party" — they could try to hold tight. But the big bosses in Havana are already trying on their business suits, and today you can get an MBA at the University of Havana. The revolution has run out of patrons, and so business, with all its corruptions, is next. The new corruption will look very sour, very soon.

With such tinder, it takes only a spark: the capsizing of a fugitive boat, the immolation of a protester, the police revealed as criminals on viral video. Today's wave of popular unrest will be felt far from the Middle East.

TH(E) gadfly

Response to "How Nonviolence Protects the State by Peter Gelderloos"

This wouldn't fit in the comment box so I'm putting it up as a post...

--This critique is in reference to use of violent protest within the United States. I think that it may serve a very different and more effective role in other parts of the world--

This looks like a very good read. At face value, it seems to me that it makes some fairly strong arguments against the use of nonviolent protest. I would say, though, that a similar book could probably be written about how violent protest protects the state.

Violent protest seems to me to be fairly ineffective. For example, I would actually argue that the Black Panthers actually aided more in ending civil rights than being the unrecognized threat that brought about change. By the way, the Civil Rights Act of 1964 was passed two years before the formation of the Black Panthers in 1966. (I do think the Black Panthers had a lot to do with integration in police departments though)

Violent protest is racist. You don't think all those middle-class white kids wearing black bandanas, destroying property and fighting police (getting beat up by police) are not an exclusive and privileged group of people that perpetuate the systems of racism? There just like those middle-class white kids wearing peace signs, carrying signs and running from police: white, exclusive and privileged. I would say that the ones using violence are exploiting their privileges even more in certain ways. They feel it is their right to destroy the property of others without permission, and yes, it is usually a lot more than just a starbucks or a bank. They fuck up whole sections of cities, including lot's of private property belonging to everyday folk, and then just leave. Not to mention they have the privilege of being white if the time comes to go to court making it much easier to rationalize using violence (but usually they just hold you and let you go when the protests end).

"How can someone who has never felt the brunt of racism tell someone in Oakland, for instance, who has to deal with racist police, to just turn the other cheek when the cops will not hesitate to shoot and kill even unarmed citizens?"

How could they tell them to do anything violent? They don't understand the situation because they are white. Spreading the idea that violence is going to solve a situation you don't understand is just as counter-productive. Also, not just white folks preach nonviolence. The Civil Rights movement is an example of how many people of color were able to use "nonviolence" and that it wasn't only white folks preaching it (in fact most of the people involved in "nonviolent" protest were African American).

I would say that violent is statist as well. First, you are using a force that you deem illegitimate for the state to use. By using violence, you are legitimizing it as a tactic, for the state as well. Also, because you use it, they are allowed to respond to it with more violence. Thus, in the news the police are often portrayed as trying to maintain order against the illegitimate users of violence (protestors). Furthermore, it helps create a state of fear that the government and media effectively use to further strengthen their means of control. Not to mention, all those sweet guns, armor, smoke grenades and armored vehicles police departments get in preparation for big protests. It's not like those things are cycled throughout the country. Each department gets its own batch of brand new, dangerous shit.
A slightly different example is 9/11. I would deem it one of the most effective displays of violent protest in history (in terms of being seen). What did it do for the state? Oh, biggest defense budgets ever at the time they were signed, the Patriot Act, two wars, and a huge rise in patriotism and government support in the U.S. On top of that, a surge in world support for the U.S., a brutally oppresive government acting in all parts of the world (fortunately, that came to a quick end with Iraq). Oh, and way more racism against the Middle East as a whole. (i suppose it might be fair to argue about who planned the attacks...)

"In the chapter 'Nonviolence is tactically & strategically inferior', Gelderloos reiterates that nonviolence can only get a movement to a specific point, but to go beyond it and overthrow capitalism and all forms of oppression, they will need to escalate their methods."

I would say that statement is true for violent protest as well. To me, traditional protest (aka on the streets protest) "can only get a movement to a specific point, but to go beyond it and overthrow capitalism and all forms of oppression, they will need to escalate their methods." Violence isn't the thing we need to escalate.

I am not trying to say that violence is completely ineffective or that there isn't a place for it. Just that it also bears many of the same implications about aiding the state that "nonviolent" protest does as well. I would say I am pro "diversity of tactics" and a huge part of that is trying to find new forms of protest that are not traditional marches and protests, both violent and nonviolent. I fear the state has a bit too much control over us for these traditions to still be truly effective.

the GADFL(Y)

flyers

Feel free to print them out and post them. E-mail them. Reblog them. Do what you need to, but get the word out.

revival! revival! REVIVAL!

Hey all

This has been pretty dormant. But we're working on changing that. We're working on some new posts and generating some interested and interesting writers.

Are you interested in writing for the GADFLY? e-mail us. middlebury.gadfly [at] gmail [dot] com.

Politics. Art. Culture. Sexuality. Gender. Economics. Campus. Local. Global. we want your articles.


-the GADFLY