‘Times have changed’: A brief history of student activism at Stanford and Cal 

Student activism has a rich history at both Stanford and UC Berkeley. Professors at both schools noted that student activism has gotten more divisive since its genesis in the 1960s.

In recent times, the Israel-Gaza conflict resulted in a rise of protests, marches and advocacy at both universities in the past year. At Berkeley, protesters established a pro-Palestinian encampment outside of Sproul Hall, which came to an end after three weeks. While the encampment was willingly called off by the organizers themselves, Cal State, which governs Berkeley and other UCs, announced that they would begin banning encampments and other “unauthorized structures.”

Protesters at Stanford also hosted an encampment, but unlike Berkeley, it was removed by the University instead of the organizers. This removal came after protesters barricaded themselves inside Building 10, which houses the President’s office, and were subsequently arrested.

“A large number of students, larger than any time since I’ve been in Stanford, were politically aware of how significant [the war in Gaza] was and felt very strongly about their positions,” said Stanford political science professor David Laitin.

Stanford and Berkeley both have abundant histories of student activism. There seems to have been more student activism at Berkeley, as noted by Laitin, who was a student at Berkeley in the late 1960s and took part in a march to the Oakland Induction Center in 1967 in protest of the Vietnam War. 

According to Laitin, key differences in student activism movements between the two campuses are “based somewhat on geography.” Because Berkeley is located in a politically active city, protests inevitably spread into the surrounding areas whereas in Stanford, protests are more “geographically contained” on campus. He specifically said that many sit-ins and demonstrations begin at Sproul Plaza and move south into the city. 

“The Berkeley political movements looked outward,” Laitin said. Meanwhile, at Stanford, “you could spend your whole day [on campus] and not see activism.”

In many states, Stanford being a private institution and Berkeley being public would change the way the first amendment applies to each school. California’s Leonard Law, however, extends many first amendment protections to private universities as well

Under the Leonard Law, university administrations are permitted to enforce reasonable restrictions on the time, place and manner of the student’s speech. Activists at Stanford have criticized Stanford’s free speech guidelines, which were updated this fall.

Professors shared big differences in how political activism was conducted back in the 1960s and today. Laitin noted that students were united in their opposition to the Vietnam War back then, whereas today there is a bigger split between those who are pro-Israel and those who are pro-Palestine. 

Berkeley political science and law professor Kinch Hoekstra said that the Israel-Gaza conflict was a cause “that did not unite the student body,” a division he believes to mirror the national situation. 

Meanwhile, Aaron Edlin J.D. ’93, a professor of law and economics at Berkeley, said that students these days have different perceptions of consequences.  

“When I protested for divestiture from South Africa as part of the anti-apartheid movement in college, we expected to be arrested and prosecuted and were. We did not shirk from consequences but bore them proudly,” Edling said. “Today, too many students think they should be able to violate university rules with impunity and no consequences because they believe their cause is righteous.”

Hoekstra agreed that the Israel-Gaza protests were “passionate,” but believes that these protests were “within the bounds of the campus norms.”

Current political sit-ins and protests don’t stand alone, but are instead rooted in strong activism that originated in the 1960s. 1964 saw the birth of the Free Speech Movement in Berkeley when thousands of students protested the university’s restrictions on political activity on campus. 

This led to Berkeley, and later more universities across the United States, lifting restrictions on student speech. For the first time, political organization was permitted on campus and political organizations now had the right to hold rallies.

Berkeley also became a central hub for the anti-Vietnam War movement during the 1960s. Groups including the Congress on Racial Equality, Students for a Democratic Society and the Radical Student Union stood against the war, hosting sit-ins and demonstrations. Much of this grew out of the mobilization from the Free Speech Movement. UC Berkeley organized a teach-in event which attracted 30,000 people and “Stop the Draft” Week involved a four-day protest with 10,000 demonstrators. 

Similarly, anti-Vietnam War demonstrations took shape at Stanford, reaching historic numbers of mobilization as students protested against the U.S. involvement in the Vietnam War. In 1969, The April Third Movement (A3M) organized a nine-day sit-in, and 8,000 people took part in the Vietnam Moratorium calling for an immediate end to the war, marking Stanford’s largest political gathering in history.

These protests took shape at Stanford in tandem with a wave of speeches and protests involving Civil Rights issues. In 1964 and 1967, Martin Luther King Jr. gave speeches at Stanford addressing racism and equality, and his impact on the University continued even after his assassination in 1968. Following his passing, members of Stanford’s Black Student Union (BSU) demanded changes to policies and programs that would increase enrollment and inclusivity for Black students and faculty.

Another notable era of protest began again in 1985 in wake of South African apartheid. Thousands of Berkeley students took to protest and hosted a sit-in in Sproul Plaza and renamed the plaza “Biko Plaza” in honor of the killed South African activist Steve Biko. Police subsequently arrested 158 protestors which triggered 10,000 students to boycott class and celebrities such as Kurt Vonnegut came to Berkeley to show support.

Following the protests, in July 1986, Berkeley divested $3.1 billion from companies in business with South Africa’s apartheid government — the largest university divestment in U.S. history at that time. Nelson Mandela called Berkeley students and faculty his “blood brothers and sisters.” 

Stanford fell short of this feat, even though students organized large and persistent protests vying for Stanford to divest from South Africa’s apartheid regime. In 1977, over 1,000 students organized a sit-in protest to object to Stanford’s decision to not divest from the South African government. These protests continued into the 1980s, in part organized by Stanford out of South Africa (SoSA), a student-led anti-apartheid movement. 

After a 1985 announcement from the University’s Board of Trustees claiming that Stanford would not divest, students laid down behind board members’ cars and parked their cars to block board members from their homes.

Even though the University never divested, they threatened to sell their holding of over $4 million of Motorola Inc. stocks if the company continued to sell to South African police or government, which caused the company to stop.

The Daily has reached out to both universities for comment.

While the Israel-Gaza conflict brought forth many protests, Laitin noted that there seems to be a general decline in student activism as a whole: “Times have changed.”

“Students are more into STEM than they are into the subjects which are more oriented towards taking political stands,” Laitin said. “Students are worried about their careers and the implications of political activism [for those careers]… It’s a very different cultural moment in our country.”

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