Anyone who has spoken to me regarding University of Regina student politics is likely aware of my distaste of slates in URSU Elections. Recently, I published my thoughts regarding slates on Twitter where some felt the need to defend them.
This blog post is my attempt to convince UofR students that there is little-to-no practical value of having these "political parties" involved in our students' unions elections, other than getting people elected for the sake of getting elected. I will be using tweets that were directed at me to either prove my point, or make a counter point on why slates are bad.
First, we'll start with the "Pro-Slate" Side. There are certain arguments that keep recurring in this debate. here are some of them:
Slates make it easier to get things accomplished on the board. Without them, board members would just fight/banter and not get anything done.
@nickfaye running a slate also eases the path in making decisions. Like on the board with elected slate members with shared views
— Nathan Sgrazzutti (@NSgrazz) March 5, 2013
@nickfaye @nsgrazz the individual executives would fight, banter, and argue for an entire year and achieve nothing
— TylerWillox (@tylerwillox) March 5, 2013
So to summarize this commonly shared argument, some believe that "it is good to have everyone thinking the same thing and on the same side (slate), so that URSU can get more things done with less people raising concerns".
First off, the structure of most boards/unions are not "slate based". City Hall is an example of an organization that is able to function without the presence of slates, living proof that democracy can function and thrive without political parties. I don't buy the argument that intellectual and knowledgeable University Students elected to represent the best interest of their faculty, fellow students, and university require a slate in order to work together and do the job they were elected to do. Counter to the above argument, URSU most certainly would be able to function without them.
While it's true that Provincial and Federal Governments are elected based on a poltical partisan system, a single party is elected with a majority (with the exception of a minority or coalition government) and is responsible for making decisions. If a slate gets the majority of their members elected in URSU, they don't "win" the election. Union representatives are still required to work with members of every slate and standing, the structure and rules of the students' union are completely different. They are two completely different electoral/governing structures, and any parallels made between the two are irrelevant in this particular case.
My second point is that having everyone with similar or shared views may contribute to "groupthink", and could actually hurt URSU. Debate is a healthy component of democracy, and it shouldn't be limited, provided it is reasonable and constructive in order to accomplish things more efficiently (a concept our Federal Government doesn't seem to grasp). If too many candidates are elected with the same viewpoints, URSU runs the risk of lacking a healthy variety of perspectives and opinions to make informed decisions. Students' concerns may be neglected in the aftermath of their representatives pursuing a goal or viewpoint that their slate believes in. Not saying that this happens all the time, but it is a very real consequence of having a board made up of members holding very similar viewpoints.
Members elected from slates have done a good job of governing URSU in the past.
@nickfaye @nsgrazz our slate improved URSU's brand to the university, stabilized the owl from $194,000 deficit, and saw some of the largest
— TylerWillox (@tylerwillox) March 5, 2013
@nickfaye @nsgrazz voting #s in the history of URSU
— TylerWillox (@tylerwillox) March 5, 2013
While it is true that the slate mentioned above had a successful year in running URSU, it is difficult to attribute the success solely to the presence of a slate. It is likely a credit to the quality and popularity (voting #'s, engagement) of the candidates that were elected that year. It is the quality of the people elected that should be voted on, as it is the individual that URSU will benefit from, not the slate. It just so happened that the slate members elected were perceived as being/were quality candidates, which isn't always the case.
My point here is that many not-as-competent/inferior candidates are often elected over students who are more qualified/better candidates simply because they are not on a slate.
Take the following scenario: Candidates on slates encourage all of their friends to vote for them and their other slate members. These people are likely to mindlessly vote for everyone on their friend's slate instead of taking a small portion of time (literally 10 minutes) to learn about other candidates and be an informed student voter. Many of the students that are doing this may have good intentions. They simply are trying to ensure the success of their friend's "team". However, these voting patterns put other slate-less candidates that are often more qualified and capable at a disadvantage. Usually, this situation results in two possible outcomes for the slate-less candidate: A) the potentially more-qualified candidate loses the election solely based on the fact that they didn't receive the slate votes from the friends of the other slate members or B) the slate-less candidate creates another useless slate for the sake of improving their chances. This situation has played out multiple times over the years, and unless the candidate is foolish or stubborn (as I was in last years election), students usually choose option B resulting in more silly political slates designing goofy/lame shirts and playing more loud music in the Riddell Centre. My point here is that candidates seem to be creating slates for the sole purpose of helping them get elected, and really good candidates that may deserve to be on the council could get left behind.
My last point is that in some cases, petty political grudges between slate rivals during previous elections and terms may encourage elected board members to sabotage progress made by past "slate governments". Using Mr. Willox's example in the tweet, much of the progress and success that was realized by URSU that year was wiped out by the following year's slate. For example, the Owl was completely neglected and lost a healthy amount of money after posting strong profits the year before. It's fair to assume that this may have had something to do with the good relationship that the previous council (whose president belonged to a slate the ran against the would be President of the other slate) with the organization. In my opinion and observation, it seemed like the neglect was rooted in spite towards the previous slate. Petty political differences and resentment stemming from slate disagreements such as this happen all of the time, and they impede URSU's progress. Without slates, the risk of these types of petty political grudges is mitigated, which in turn would lead to more stable and steady progress for the students' union.
Slates provide URSU with an agenda to follow throughout the year.
Most times, student issues and agendas are (or should be pretty much be) common long term goals such as lobbying the University and Government for lower tuition, increased funding, parking, day care, transit, etc. The problem is that slates always feel pressured to make a long list of promises to student voters around elections, as parties do in Federal/Provincial elections. Normally this is all fine and dandy, except for when the elected slate members start feeling pressure to deliver on all of their promises when they run out of time.
One year is not a lot of time, and what often winds up happening is that an URSU comprised of slate members spread themselves too thin to properly deliver and address issues they promised to student voters. Instead of doing one or two things really really well, they over extend themselves and wind up doing a poor job on five or six things. Often times, more pressing/time sensitive issues arise in the course of the year, and these are given a backseat to slate campaign promises. Slates encourage our representatives to "promise the moon" at election time, instead of being real, swiftly reacting to change, and creating manageable/attainable goals.
Slates encourage people to run in elections. Without them, people wouldn't run.
@nickfaye Some people like running WITH other people. Remove slates and people who runWITH others don't run, and 10 positions go unfilled.
— Mike Young (@MikeAndrewYoung) March 5, 2013
This is a foolish argument. If this is really the case and we can't find people to run, then maybe we need to progressively change the way that URSU is elected instead of using slates as a band-aid solution to attracting students to run and vote in the elections.
In Conclusion...
This is not a debate over whether or not URSU can function with slates playing a key role in elections. The union will get elected this year, as it has in other years, and it will function fine with or without the presence of slates. The debate here is if removing slates would increase the quality of our elections and council.
Here are some questions I ask you to consider: Is allowing slates providing our students with the best electoral format, and encouraging them to take an active interest in their candidates? Are some of URSU's strongest leaders being overlooked or pressured into making new slates solely for the purpose of increasing their chances at being elected? Do slates really provide us with enough value to keep them around?
Personally, I don't think that there is enough value in keeping slates in URSU's electoral system. I believe that URSU would function perfectly fine without them, and that members would still work together to improve every student's experience at our university. I believe that students would be encouraged to take a more active role in learning about individual candidates, instead of mindlessly voting for every candidate on a friend's slate. I believe that the frequency of disturbances caused by petty political grudges would diminish, and that URSU would function better with less turbulent regime changes. I believe that councils would create better/real/more attainable goals, and address more pressing issues as they arise.
I believe that for these many reasons, that the time has come to put an end to slate based student politics at the University of Regina.
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