Brussels Student Protests Erupt Over Rising Education Costs

On Saturday, October 17, several hundred mostly young people poured into the streets of central Brussels, and by midday the demonstration had turned into a running confrontation with police. Officers fired tear gas and aimed water cannons at the crowd near Brussels-Midi station, while some protesters built barricades from construction fencing and overturned a car, according to a Reuters witness.

The Brussels student protests began as a march against rising education costs. Belgian student groups say they are protesting reforms they fear will make higher education less accessible, and the unrest is partly inspired by the student demonstrations in neighboring France.

How the Brussels student protests turned violent

In the morning, around one hundred students, teachers and trade union activists gathered near Brussels Central Station. The demonstration was initially unauthorized, but protesters later received permission to march toward Brussels-Midi. Police deployed in large numbers and stopped and searched several people, according to RTBF, the Belgian public broadcaster. The gathering came just over a week after clashes between police and students on the sidelines of an October 9 trade union demonstration, and demonstrators chanted slogans against police repression and the federal government's policies.

Tensions escalated around half past twelve near the station. Demonstrators erected a barricade and threw projectiles at officers, who responded with water cannon and tear gas before charging toward the crowd. Interior Minister Bernard Quintin wrote on X that "what is unfolding in Brussels is no longer mere protest" and that "all necessary means will be used to restore order in the face of the rioters". Many demonstrators wore masks and chanted anti-fascist slogans, Reuters reported.

That October 17 march was not the first flashpoint of the Brussels student protests. On October 9, hundreds of students joined union members in a national strike against planned government budget cuts. Around thirty thousand people marched peacefully, but clashes broke out near Brussels Central Station, where masked protesters threw rocks and other objects at police and firefighters put out fires, including on buses. Police said they detained twenty-one people that day, including thirteen minors. Some of the demonstrators carried placards saying they had skipped class to defend class, while others read "Education is a right, not a privilege", Reuters reported.

What the students are demanding

The grievances driving the Brussels student protests read like a ledger of everything that makes being a young person in Belgium expensive right now. Students are raising concerns about education funding, tuition fees, overcrowded classrooms and limited access to study materials. In Liège, around two hundred fifty people, most of them young, gathered outside Liège-Guillemins station and marched peacefully toward the city center, Belga news agency reported. Workers and parents joined the procession, and the marchers raised concerns about public transport costs, working conditions and social inequality.

Students described financial pressures that force young people to combine work with their studies, and some drop out of education entirely as a result. Some participants also expressed solidarity with the French mobilization against rising living costs, according to Belga. The anger driving the Brussels student protests was already on display on October 9, when hundreds of students joined the national strike against budget cuts.

A wave sweeping young Europeans

Belgium is not an outlier. The Brussels student protests belong to a wave of youth-led education revolts across Europe this month. In France, student blockades shut down thousands of high schools over teacher shortages and deteriorating school conditions, as our earlier reporting on the French student uprising described. In Italy, thousands of students poured into the streets of Rome, Milan and Turin on October 16 for No Meloni Day, marching under the chant "Money for schools, not war", according to our earlier reporting. The Italian movement began on October 5 with school occupations under the slogan "Let's do as in France", a direct nod to the French protests. In Albania, students hurled bricks and concrete blocks at the country's Education Ministry on October 13 while police answered with tear gas and water cannons, according to Reuters and our earlier report on the Tirana protest.

Whether the Belgian government answers with concessions or with force is still open. The student groups behind the Brussels student protests show no sign of backing down after two rounds of street clashes, and the October 17 march was itself a follow-up to the October 9 strike. For now, the young people filling the streets of Brussels have made their position plain: education is a right, not a privilege, and they expect their government to treat it that way. The full Reuters account of the Brussels clashes and the RTBF and Belga reporting on the Belgian protests document how quickly the day turned.