Emergence and Decline of a Protest Movement: The Anti-Deportation Campaign for Afghan Asylum Seekers in Belgium

For several months in 2013 and 2014, a group of failed Afghan asylum seekers in Brussels became a constant focus of Belgian media and public attention. Through a combination of factors, they succeeded in highlighting the precarious situation of their group in a manner that garnered unprecedented levels of public support, although they ultimately failed to deliver their primary political goal—a moratorium on deportations to Afghanistan. This article analyses the specific combination of factors underlying the short-lived success of this social protest movement and the group dynamics that propelled it to national prominence.