Government pressure on the university: A scapegoat for professors

It started with verbal threats, by puncturing car tires, "potatoes” in the bank account, by making lists of disobedients, so it came to physical attack and apprehension and intimidation that the academic year will not be completed.

These are the ways in which the government has been trying to deal with the daring rectors, deans, professors and, above all, their students, who have been blocking the faculties for almost five full months in recent weeks.

All these are desperate attempts by the authorities to suppress the rebellion that reigns in Serbia, say the interlocutors of "Vremen".

The rebellion cannot be suppressed.

That rebellion is unquenchable, they agree.

Zoran Dimić, a professor at the Faculty of Philosophy in Niš, tells "Vreme" that the threats were expected.

"Unfortunately, I have to say so, considering everything the government has done so far. It was to be expected that it would try to put additional pressure on the professors, probably thinking that they can influence the students in order to stop the blockades. I think it's a desperate attempt," says Dimić.

Despite all the pressures of the authorities, she believes that her intention to stop the blockades will not succeed.

"It is obvious that this momentum of rebellion has reached such proportions that it is no longer possible to extinguish it," says Dimić.

He points out that the rebellion did not cover all parts of society as a problem.

"That is the key problem of the current situation. High school students, students, school teachers, faculty professors and here and there some other groups got involved, we saw lawyers, farmers, but I am afraid that without the involvement of all other parts of society and unions, we will not reach the goal, which is the realization of student demands. Perhaps the civil assemblies are a way to involve all other parts of society in order to put additional pressure on the government. I am afraid that without this additional pressure, the government will not realize that it is not able to control crisis", says Dimić.

What are the pressure limits?

His colleague from the same faculty in Novi Sad, Dragan Prole, says that everyone who resists is under pressure.

"The culture of democratic dialogue is a foreign word in this country and anyone who gives any voice and speaks in a way that is not close to the ruling elite, is under pressure and tries to force himself into some kind of ruling matrix," says Prole.

However, this is neither the first nor the most drastic case of pressure on a university known from cultural history, not only in Serbia, but also globally.

"You shouldn't be naive on that side and expect that teachers at the university will have a mandarin position. A certain type of pressure is both expected and legitimate, the only question is what are the limits of pressure. One is insults, verbal judgments, and the other is when it turns into physical violence. We, on the other hand, have no other language but to reject any kind of violence and to try to return things to normal flows," says Prole.

Will the "potato" stop the blockades?

In a desperate attempt to stop the blockades, the state denied university professors their salaries, and according to the announcement of Serbian President Aleksandar Vučić, they received "potatoes".

"Vremen" interlocutors say that a certain number of professors will certainly give in under that pressure.

"I believe that a number of colleagues will give in because of their earnings. I understand people who have problems, who are in debt, have small children, often their spouses work at faculties. I believe that a small number of people will start to think differently under that burden. However, I think that the scale of the rebellion and crisis is so great that there is no going back to the old ways," says Professor Dimić.

He adds that he has no concrete proof that the professors will not give in, but he concludes based on conversations with colleagues.

"I can only guess based on the mood among university professors, I think it's impossible for the rebellion to break. It's impossible for the blockade decision to change," he says.

Dragan Prole hopes that the professors will not give in, because the goal they are fighting for is noble, in the general interest and in the interest of the entire country.

However, it also bears witness to different opinions.

"This is what should give strength to everyone. What defeats me personally is that as soon as some do not receive a part of their salary, they are immediately ready to change their attitude and way of thinking. It is foreign to me, because our ancestors sacrificed much more for their country than a part of their salary", says Prole.

Harassment of professors

In an attempt to suppress the crisis, the government uses different methods. Thus, under multi-layered, months-long pressures, many teachers in primary and secondary schools were forced to return to the classrooms and end blockades and strikes. Government representatives and the regime's media attacked them as if they were committing heresy, and now they have moved on to university professors.

In the Middle Ages, a witch's goat was used for those accused of witchcraft and heresy. The victim was placed on top of the device, which led to penetration into the flesh and permanent damage to the genitals. Often, the victim's feet were weighed down with weights, and embers or fire were placed underneath so that they would not admit to blasphemy.

This attitude towards dissenters is, of course, not comparable to today's methods, but it is a fact that state institutions are misused for the illegal torture of people who raise their voices against injustice.

For example, the dean of the Faculty of Economics, Žakline Sojanović, was questioned urgently by the police, in Niš, after several days of public name-calling, the dean Natalija Jovanović was physically attacked, the rector, Vladan Đokić, is verbally abused every day in the regime's tabloids and national television channels... The President of the Republic talks about a "criminal professor's clan".

Professor Dimić describes all this as "spiritual and mental torture" and says that it is creepy that this is being done.

"Such a practice towards universities, especially on the soil of Europe, was long abandoned. Since some 200 years ago there was a radical change in the nature of universities, in the nature of university teaching, universities were completely integrated into democratic society and became part of civil culture, part of civil society. This kind of violence, not only mental and spiritual, but unfortunately, it turned out, also physical, against the people who are part of the university, is uncivilized, it is a regression of society."

And the problem here is not only the university, but also society, which is returning to a pre-political, pre-civil state.

"It shows in an obvious way the nature of this government, that it does not care at all about the achievements of civilization, about the nature of republicanism, civil society, and even the university, but only cares about its own interest," says Dimić.

Dragan Prole recalls drastic cases of pressure on university professors known throughout history.

"The most drastic cases are related to the strongest countries. There is the McCarthy era in the United States, the bastion of democracy, where all left-leaning professors were literally fired from the faculty, in order to introduce a kind of quasi-philosophy called analytical philosophy, which is completely benign and uninteresting to the average person, which is in its infancy in Belgrade."

In the east, things were even more difficult for those who did not agree with the ruling matrices.

"In China or the Soviet Union, we had cases that were more dramatic. In the US, they were fired, and here they got gulags," says Prole.

Returning the university to the Middle Ages

The Ministry of Education, in its technical mandate, recently adopted a regulation on the number of hours of teaching and scientific research work. Instead of 20 hours of teaching and the same amount of scientific and research work, the new regulation foresees 35 hours of teaching and only five hours of scientific and research work per week.

Professor Dimić comments on this move as "returning the university to the pre-modern era".

"I got my doctorate on the idea of ​​a university. The essential promotion between teaching and research happened in the middle of the 19th century precisely because university teaching fell into a crisis, it became boring because the professors taught on the basis of old textbooks, some of which were from the Middle Ages. The change in the middle of the 19th century in Germany happened precisely because the faculties and universities would come out of the crisis and the teaching, i.e. the subjects, would become interesting for students," explains Dimić.

According to the interlocutor of "Vremena", the decision was made at that time for professors to hold lectures based on the research they conduct themselves, and that made the faculties relevant. Not only did teaching become interesting for students, but the faculties integrated themselves into society's needs for progress, for science, the economy's needs for progress, and the state administration's needs for competent personnel.

"This is the return of the university to a pre-modern state. They (the ruling structure) are returning us to a medieval university set," concludes Dimić. "It's completely uncivilized and they clearly don't understand what they're doing."