EAST Center research fellow Andrei Yeliseyeu’s analysis on social protests in Belarus in February and March 2017 is named of the best op-eds published by the Transitions Online in 2017. The op-ed titled Standing up for “Parasites” explains the questionable objectives of the scandalous decree imposing a tax on unemployed and the reasons of wide-spread discontent of Belarusians, and reviews the categories of population falling under the decree.
The February-March protests’ importance as a social phenomenon in present-day Belarus comes for a number of reasons. Firstly, the protests spread at the regional level, and involved people who had never taken part in opposition rallies before, thus going beyond the traditional electoral base of the opposition. Secondly, the rallies proved the ability of Belarusians to organize themselves through social media – mainly VKontakte, the Russian version of Facebook.
To see the interactive map of social protests in Belarus, by EAST Center.
