Explaining the Mass Protests in Belarus in 2020: What Role Did Civil Society Play?

Bindman, Eleanor ORCID: https://orcid.org/0000-0002-4929-050X and Chulitskaya, Tatsiana (2025) Explaining the Mass Protests in Belarus in 2020: What Role Did Civil Society Play? Democratization. ISSN 1351-0347

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Abstract

This article explores the role of civil society organizations (CSOs) in the mass protests in Belarus following the presidential elections there in August 2020. We argue that CSOs which had existed under Lukashenka's authoritarian regime before 2020 and focused on a largely non-political agenda played a more limited role in these protests. We examine the grassroots CSOs which sprang up in the country in response to the COVID crisis in the spring of 2020 and in the run-up to the presidential elections that summer and gave those who joined them crucial experience of organizing and networking. We explore the role of informal community initiatives which formed once the protests had started and helped to sustain them afterwards. Using data from interviews with exiled Belarusians in three countries in 2023, we find that this wide variety of CSOs had an important but mixed impact in terms of mobilizing opposition to Lukashenka's regime during the main protest period, with many expressing explicit political goals and becoming indistinguishable from the wider protest movement, while others continued with “business as usual.” After severe state repression began in late 2020, many organizations were forced into exile abroad where they have attempted to build capacity ever since.