The pro-Palestinian campus encampments of spring 2024 presented striking images of power and vulnerability. Power, because even when short in duration, the encampments engaged in performative acts of collective expression, occupying university property to leverage their messages and demands. Vulnerable, at the same time, because protesters were subject to university authority, the universities' rights as property owners, and the law of trespass, which could be and was used to end encampments.
From the start, the protest camps were there on borrowed time.
In Toronto, Occupy U of T began on May 1 and maintained a camp until July 2, when the Ontario Superior Court granted the University of Toronto an injunction ordering occupants to leave the site at King's College Circle. It was not because the encampment was disruptive or disorderly; to the contrary, the court in University of Toronto v. Doe et al. found that the demonstration was peaceful.
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