Silencing the future: Why students are the first targets of authoritarianism

By Bhabani Shankar Nayak 

Students have long stood at the forefront of society’s most transformative struggles. From challenging feudal hierarchies to opposing colonialism, apartheid, Zionism, capitalism, and imperialism, student movements have often served as the moral compass of civil society. Whether in anti-war protests or battles for gender, racial, and sexual equity, students have consistently been pivotal agents of change. One cannot name a successful social revolution without recognising the catalytic role played by students.

More than mere protestors, students offer radical alternatives to the status quo and form a crucial line of defense for liberal, secular, and constitutional democracies—foundations that are increasingly under siege. The ruling classes have always feared students, rightly perceiving them as persistent adversaries who refuse to be domesticated or silenced. In today's world—whether in Trump’s America, Starmer’s Britain, Modi’s India, Netanyahu’s Israel, or beyond—students continue to be targeted precisely because they dare to resist.

These attacks are not new. Historically, centers of learning have always posed a threat to those in power. Emancipatory knowledge is inherently subversive to authoritarian control. That is why ruling elites attempt to colonise classrooms, control curricula, and sanitise scholarship. From medieval times to modern neoliberal regimes, the objective has remained unchanged: dismantle spaces of critical thinking and re-engineer them to serve hegemonic interests.

The tools of suppression are many. Privatisation and commercialisation hollow out academic institutions, turning education into a marketplace commodity. Depoliticisation discourages critical inquiry. Physical and financial assaults aim to weaken student organisations and suppress dissent. In tandem, these strategies militarise campuses under the garb of nationalism, religion, or regional loyalty, eroding democratic values and suppressing citizenship rights.

Yet, despite relentless attempts to delegitimise their activism, students persist. Their radical spirit endures, fuelled by a legacy of resistance and a collective memory of struggle. Both ruling and non-ruling elites have failed to quash the progressive ideals that thrive within student communities. The stubbornness of student resistance reflects the resilience of hope—a hope rooted in reason, secularism, and science.

Around the world today, governments are increasingly deploying security forces to contain student uprisings and instituting policies that throttle institutional autonomy. These actions reveal an acute anxiety among ruling classes who understand that the fate of our educational institutions is intimately tied to the fate of our democracies.

This is why progressive forces must stand in unflinching solidarity with students. Defending their right to dissent is not just about protecting the campus—it’s about safeguarding the future of democracy itself. As ruling elites shape education to perpetuate inequality and enforce compliance, students and educators must reclaim the politics of knowledge. Knowledge should liberate, not domesticate. It should transform—not maintain—the exploitative conditions that produce poverty and marginalisation.

What we need is a renewed commitment to diverse, democratic, and decolonial traditions of knowledge. Classrooms must be reclaimed as sites of struggle—spaces where students and teachers co-create a vision of peace, justice, and egalitarian prosperity. History is not just a passive witness to student revolts; it is their living archive, testifying to their sacrifices and celebrating their victories.

In this moment of mounting repression, let us honour that legacy. Let us rekindle the flame of student revolt—not merely as resistance, but as a vision for a better world.