Doomed to fail? Why success was almost not an option in the 2020 protests in Belarus

ABSTRACT

This essay analyses the New Protest Movement in Belarus, strongly manifested after the 9 August 2020 Presidential elections. The Belarusian protests, which initially looked like a serious threat to Lukashenko’s power, have lost eventually their thrust and energy. I argue that the main reasons for the failure of these protests consisted of, first, an underestimation of the real rating of Lukashenko, second, the constrained participation of certain social groups (for instance, industrial and agricultural workers mainly ignored these protests), third, a high degree of consolidation of governmental institutions, and, finally, the loyalty of the police and military to the Belarusian President. In addition, many people were alienated by the protests’ symbols and were scared by harsh oppressive measures, taken by the authorities. Although the 2020 protests did not succeed in removing Lukashenko, or changing his internal or external policies, they revealed an increasing degree of mutual hatred and distrust among different layers of Belarusian society. The atmosphere of fear and threat has become intense as never before, but the people’s desire to change the course of developments has also been on the rise, especially among the younger generation of Belarusians.

KEYWORDS:

• Belarus
• Lukashenko
• Presidential elections
• protests

Disclosure statement

No potential conflict of interest was reported by the author(s).

Notes

1. Svetlana Tikhanovskaya, a Presidential candidate (in exile in Lithuania since August), declared that from 26 October there would be “a national strike at all companies, blocking all roads, causing rapid sales decreases in state shops” (Mishutin 2020).

2. In spring 2020, Lukashenko, unlike the leaders of neighbouring countries, refrained from declaring a lockdown, and also said that he regards coronavirus as “no more than a psychosis”.

3. A national of Belarus, who wishes to run for the post of President, has to collect at least 100,000 signatures in his/her support.

4. Korshunov resigned from the post of director in September, 2020.

5. Indeed, Lukashenko’s approval rating of 3%, claimed in some Internet polls, was very far from reality. However, it was widely publicized in the opposition mass-media.

6. Lukashenko was particularly critical of Ukraine’s perspectives, specifying that he had always been supportive of Ukrainian territorial integrity. Indeed, his perception of Russia’s activities in Ukraine was often not as positive as one might expect from a close ally of Moscow (see Mudrov 2020).

7. Giving a speech on 17 August at a meeting with employees of the Minsk Plant of Wheeled Tractors (MZKT), Lukashenko said, commenting on suggestions for new fair elections, that “We have conducted [these]elections. Unless you kill me, there can be no other elections” (Poliakova 2020).

8. Some lecturers went on strike and cancelled their classes; some students stopped going to classes or began to assemble in their universities, singing the songs of the protests. In some cases, like Polotsk State University, several students and lecturers issued public video statements. However, the number of individuals participating in these activities was low – only a tiny fraction of the total number of students and teaching staff. As of early November, 138 students had been expelled from Belarusian universities, and 15 lecturers sacked for their participation in the protests. In mid-November Lukashenko said that the expelled students could be returned to their universities “under guarantees” (News.mail.ru 2020).

9. The Coordination Council for the Organizing of the Process of Overcoming Political Crisis was established in Belarus in mid-August, at Tikhanovskaya’s initiative, for “the transition of power”. Lukashenko said that the formation of this Council could be regarded as an attempt to “seize power”. All seven members of the Presidium of the Coordination Council were either arrested or left Belarus.

10. The EU’s share in Belarusian exports was 30% in 2018 and 25.5% in 2019 (Ministry of Foreign Affairs of the Republic of Belarus 2020).

11. In October, 2020 the Russian President Vladimir Putin declared that Russia would not interfere in the events in Belarus, and also specified that “Belarusians should be given opportunity to deal for themselves with this situation, to take the necessary decisions” (Izvestiya 2020).

12. Archpriest Sergiy Lepin left the post of press-secretary of the Belarusian Orthodox Church in late November.

13. For instance, in the Minsk tube system an older man struck with an electric shocker, a younger man who had tried to stick a protest symbol to the train door (see Tut.by 2020).

Additional information

Funding

This work was supported by the Foundation for Baltic and East European Studies (Östersjöstiftelsen) [61/2017].

Notes on contributors

Sergei A. Mudrov

Sergei A. Mudrov is currently Associate Professor at the Department of Social Communications of the Polotsk State University, Belarus. He holds PhD from the University of Salford, MAs from the Universities of Maastricht and Warwick, and BTh from Minsk Theological Seminary. S.Mudrov is an author of four books and more than 30 articles, published in English, Russian, Polish and Belarusian languages. His most recent books include “Christian Churches in European Integration” (Abingdon & New York: Routledge, 2016) and “Orthodox Church in Europe: from Reykjavik to Tallinn” (Minsk: Medial, 2018).