YESTERDAY'S E-MAIL brought in the first batch of requests. Then the Newcomb lunch line surveys began. Yes, it's election season at the University, and the go-getters who have slaved away for two or three years on the various councils now get their shot at the big time as committee chairs or school representatives. Our University's annual encounter with student electoral politics always raises many questions, including one of accountability -- specifically how accountable (or unaccountable) our student government, and other committees such as Honor and the University Judiciary Committee, are to those who put them in power.
Candidates who win elections generally pledge something to the voter, something tangible, like CIO benefits, or something intangible, like Single Sanction reform. In the University's elections, candidates promise to do things for the student body, who in turn vote for whichever candidate is right in his own eyes. Students vote with the expectation that the promises made during the election will be carried out, or, at the very least, those they elect will make a serious and genuine effort to accomplish those goals.
The problem is, compared to other representative governments, the student can exercise little control over his or her representative, especially at the highest levels. Let us compare, for example, University student government to that of the United States. In some ways they are the same: candidates run based on promises made to the voter. The difference, however, lies in the mechanisms for control the voter holds. Generally, politicians at the national level seek to stay in office longer than a single term. Therefore, during their tenure, they must make good on promises made and goals set if they wish to be re-elected.
This is not the case at the University. In most cases, those running for high office as student officials are third years, meaning they can only serve for one year before graduating. It is unusual for a student official to seek to serve two consecutive terms in an elevated office, simply because it usually takes two or more years to get there. Thus, student leaders lack the incentive to get re-elected year after year to a position such as Student Council president. This eliminates the most important check voters have on their elected officials: if they disapprove of the job they have done, they simply do not vote for them again.
Realizing that this check applies to positions such as class presidents, who can and sometimes do run over and over again, as well as for representative positions on Student Council, Honor and UJC, how can students keep their representatives accountable to the will of the student body? The first recourse, of course, is to contact them directly. All the main governing bodies provide the means for this on their respective Web sites. If a student has a complaint, he has several means at his disposal to have it addressed: via e-mail, a phone call or a personal visit to a representative of the council. This is fairly easy, as Student Council members hold regular office hours, and the council holds an open meeting every Tuesday night at Newcomb. Honor and UJC have similar options and are easy to contact.
The remaining problem is that even once grievances have been expressed or suggestions offered, there is no guarantee the governing bodies will act on them. This is why there needs to be some way of evaluating representatives in an effective way. Perhaps the best way would be something similar to the"approval ratings" so prevalent in American politics. The governing bodies, such as Student Council, Honor and UJC, could conduct semi-annual polls -- say, one at the end of the spring semester as terms of office are well underway, and then one again in October of the following semester. Surveys of all kinds are frequently conducted at the University but not ones that evaluate elected student officials. A concrete number applied to a committee would give its members an idea of where they stand with the University community, as well as an incentive to improve, to save their legacy if nothing else.
Legacy can be a powerful motivator; it ought to be applied to our student representatives as a tangible way students can keep their representatives accountable.
Robby Colby's column appears Thursdays in The Cavalier Daily. He can be reached at rcolby@cavalierdaily.com.
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