At IOP Forum, Legacy Protest Leaders Say Younger Protesters Need to Take More Risks in Era of Retribution

Gloria J. Browne-Marshall, a constitutional law professor at John Jay College of Criminal Justice, said protesters need to brace themselves for potential legal consequences at an Institute of Politics forum on Thursday night.

Addressing the Trump administration’s decision to detain several international students for expressing pro-Palestine views, Browne-Marshall — a former IOP Resident Fellow — argued that activists should anticipate and prepare for retribution.

“You have to figure out how to alleviate some of the consequences,” Browne-Marshall said in an interview after the event. “Do you have the immigration attorney there, ready, waiting, trained? Do you have the bail money ready, waiting to be used?”

Browne-Marshall, an active anti-Trump protest leader who has a forthcoming book tracing the history of protests, appeared alongside HKS professor and former NAACP President Cornell William Brooks. The event was moderated by HKS Academic Dean Erica Chenoweth, an expert on political resistance.

During the event, Browne-Marshall issued a sweeping critique of modern protests, claiming they lacked the vision and backbone needed to withstand pushback.

“So many people think somebody else is supposed to do the protesting,” Browne-Marshall said. “‘Someone else is supposed to do the work, and I’m going to live my life, because I don’t want to do that. I don’t want to be outside in the cold. I don’t want to risk my scholarship. I don’t want to risk being arrested.’”

“But who’s supposed to take the risk then?” she added.

Chenoweth, who directs the Nonviolent Action Lab at HKS, said the leaders of historic protest movements were able to think “through the end game.” Today, Browne-Marshall said, young activists expect protest efforts to be “one and done.”

“The concern for an effective protest is faith in the process,” Browne-Marshall said. “You think, ‘Well, it didn’t change the world, so I’m going home now.’”

But Brooks shifted some of the blame away from young protesters, arguing that student activists were being left out to dry by the public — endangering their lives and careers “inconspicuously.”

“Martin Luther King is killed, and everybody knows it. Malcolm is assassinated, everybody knows it,” he said. “What about young leaders who are doxxed and who suffer professional retribution?”

Speaking directly to Harvard and similar institutions, Brooks challenged professors to mentor young leaders, calling for an intergenerational movement.

“We need places like Harvard to support young leaders,” Brooks said. “If we can train every new member of Congress, we can support young leaders.”

Though Brooks said he had been arrested multiple times while a professor at Harvard, he said other faculty could contribute to movements by offering advice and support without being on the front lines.

Browne-Marshall agreed that individual education could be a form of resistance in a political climate that threatens academic freedom, but added that modern protests also lack a collective spirit and enthusiasm.

“The music is missing from protest today,” she said. “Where’s the music? Where’s the fun? Where’s the standing shoulder to shoulder together in a common cause?”

—Staff writer Elise A. Spenner can be reached at elise.spenner@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X at @EliseSpenner.

— Staff writer Tanya J. Vidhun can be reached at tanya.vidhun@thecrimson.com. Follow her on X @tanyavidhun.