Canadians and Americans alike have been following headlines and stories of pro-Palestinian campus protests in recent weeks. While students (and faculty) demonstrate and form encampments from McGill University in Montreal to Columbia University in New York City, the Israel-Hamas War rages on.
In the final part in a three-part series canvassing Canadian opinion on protesting, data from the non-profit Angus Reid Institute finds most Canadians believe pro-Palestinians protesters can generate attention for the plight of Gazans - two-thirds (66%) say protest movements are effective at raising awareness of an issue - there is doubt they will affect the policies and partnerships with Israel of their university administrations or governments. Two-in-five believe (42%) protests are effective at making institutions change their position, half (49%) disagree.
Even fewer believe that protests generally move people from one side of an issue to the other. Seven-in-10 (69%) say protests are ineffective at "changing the views of those who initially disagree".
Meanwhile, as university campuses across the country deal with the fallout of these aforementioned pro-Palestinian encampments, the tactics of protesters are under intense scrutiny. Even for causes they support, Canadians say blocking major infrastructure is unacceptable. At least two-thirds say protesters should not block border crossings (69%), bridges or railways (71%), or stop traffic in major cities (64%). However, Canadians who have protested in the past six months, and Canadians who identify as Indigenous, are much more likely to believe these are acceptable tactics than others.
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