Live from Göttingen: “Gen Z regulates” – youth protest on the station forecourt

LIVE TICKER · Göttingen, Saturday, October 31, 2026.Today, Generation Z is taking to the streets nationwide – including in Göttingen. From 2 p.m. the protest will gather on the station forecourt - not at the Gänseliesel as originally announced. We are on site and continually updating this report. New entries are at the top of the ticker.

Live ticker

11:23 a.m–Meeting point changed:The demo doesn't start at the Gänseliesel, but at theStation forecourt. Start remains at 2 p.m.

11:20 a.m– Preliminary report: 1,850 people have now agreed to come to Göttingen on genz-regelt.de. This puts the city in 20th place nationwide. On Thursday, according to StadtRadio Göttingen, there were still “around 360”. We will be on site from the start of the demo and report from there.

What is it about?

“Gen Z regulates” is a nationwide youth initiative that has called for a joint day of protest in more than 30 cities on October 31st. She sees herself as part of the youth protests that are already underway in France, Belgium and Spain. The call is a reckoning with the austerity measures: savings are being made in education, social affairs, culture and health. Addiction clinics for young people are closing, psychotherapy is no longer accessible for many, and at the same time billions are being invested in armament.

The requirements at a glance:

• Investments in education, social security, health and affordable living instead of cuts for the younger generation
• No to conscription and military service: “We should be trained for wars that we never had a say in”
• a fair distribution of the burden, instead of large corporations continuing to profit while the cuts fall “on our backs”.
• no further expansion of the surveillance apparatus
• Co-determination when decisions are made about the future of young people

The initiative describes itself as non-partisan. According to his own statement, October 31st will be “just the beginning”.

How many are coming?

According to t-online, more than 160,000 people nationwide have registered online. The largest numbers reported on Friday were Cologne (over 14,000), Frankfurt (around 13,000) and Berlin (over 10,000). In Bremen, registration with the assembly authority grew from the original 70 to 4,000 people. There are 1,850 commitments in Göttingen. Online confirmations are not a number of participants: how many actually show up only becomes clear on the street.

Headwind

Not everyone supports the call. The Lower Saxony State Student Council distances itself from the protests: It is unclear who is behind the initiative and who is organizing the demonstrations. The former federal spokesman resigned after warning against political capture. The Office for the Protection of the Constitution, in turn, warns of “left-wing extremists” who could take advantage of the youth protests and specifically names the Interventionist Left in Bremen. The fact that authorities suspect young people's protests against cuts and conscription in advance of extremism says more about the authorities than about the youth. The police in Hanover say they see “no serious announcements” of riots.

Meeting point

Göttingen, station forecourt, Saturday, October 31st, from 2 p.m.(Originally the Gänseliesel was announced.) Come by. We'll keep you updated here.

Sources: genz-regelt.de(Confirmations Göttingen, as of Saturday morning) ·StadtRadio Göttingen, October 29th·Call (DemocratTEAM)·t-online Cologne·buten and within·t-online Hanover