The Gentle Revolution – An Irishman’s Diary on UCD and student protest

There are a couple of anniversaries looming in the next year or so that relate to significant events and developments in the sphere of education. One of them is the 50th anniversary of the move by University College Dublin from Earlsfort Terrace in the heart of the city to the suburban Belfield campus.

From what I hear that is going to be remembered in an appropriate manner. But there is another episode, closely related to the Belfield transition, which also deserves to be recalled. I refer to the Gentle Revolution, as it became known, which was in part inspired by concerns over the Belfield move, especially the issue of library facilities. This culminated in a temporary occupation by rebellious students of the UCD administration block at “The Terrace”, in the building which has since become the National Concert Hall.

It was a time of great upheaval in third-level education. Nearby Trinity College, for example, also had its share of disturbances. The night before the UCD occupation saw a remarkable incident at Trinity, where the minister for education, the late Brian Lenihan snr, had to both enter and leave a meeting through a window. The doorway of the Graduates Memorial Building (GMB), where he had been scheduled to speak, was blocked by protesters who were angered by his recent closure of the National College of Art due to a student boycott of lectures. On the same evening, the UCD move to Belfield was the subject of a “teach-in”, as they used to be called, in the Great Hall at Earlsfort Terrace. The president, registrar and secretary of the college addressed the gathering and then left at 10.30pm. Many of the students were unaware this had been arranged in advance and there was considerable annoyance over what was seen as a “walk-out”.

The rebellious mood at the time was precipitated in part by the events of May 1968 in Paris

At lunchtime next day, February 26th, 1969, an impromptu meeting organised by Students for Democratic Action (SDA) in the Physics Theatre voted for an immediate takeover of the administrative corridor of the college. The occupiers, who numbered about 140, issued two demands: that a staff-student commission be established to decide on the move to Belfield and that the governing body and the academic council be replaced by staff-student bodies based on 50/50 representation.

Up, up and away over Galway Bay

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Martyn Turner

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I was a second-year arts student in UCD but, due to a prior commitment, missed the SDA meeting. However, I joined the occupiers later in the afternoon and ended up staying overnight.

We were all very excited, but also fiercely committed to the cause of educational reform and, indeed, wider social change. The rebellious mood at the time was precipitated in part by the events of May 1968 in Paris where student protests over their conditions developed into a situation where the entire basis of French society seemed on the cusp of fundamental change.

Maybe the same could happen in Ireland, we told ourselves. Already, students in the North had made world headlines arising from the People’s Democracy march from Belfast to Derry which we naively thought was heralding a new era of radical politics.

The UCD occupation did not lead to a wider social upheaval, partly because the authorities wisely refrained from calling in the Garda Síochána to force the protesters out of “The Liberated Zone”.

On the evening of Day Two, a meeting of some 3,000 students expressed support for the occupation but asked the SDA to suspend it while the demands for structural reform were presented to the governing body.

The more radical among us were disappointed that our dreams of broader social change were not winning support

A further mass meeting would be held in a week “to consider the appropriate action to be taken following the response of the authorities to these demands”.

An emergency meeting of the governing body issued a statement that it did not have the power to implement this kind of restructuring.

At the subsequent mass student meeting, it was agreed to seek legislation to this effect. The gathering also voted to suspend lectures and classes to allow for discussion on the structures of the college and the values they reflected, as well as the function of the university in relation to “the needs and interests of the Irish people”.

The more radical among us were disappointed that our dreams of broader social change were not winning support, although there was a remarkable series of discussions in the college over several days. It wasn’t a new dawn but things would never be quite the same again; any other survivors keen to mark the anniversary should contact me at Ddebre1@aol.com