Student government members will have the opportunity Tuesday
night to vote on substantive changes that will make their body more
accessible to and more representative of undergraduate
students.
But if the Undergraduate Students Association Council fails to
pass the senate proposal, students should support the anticipated
referendum vote, as the proposed changes to the system have the
potential to benefit students in ways the antiquated council system
has not been.
The senate proposal advocates morphing the current 13-member
council into a government made up of a 20-member senate, five
executive positions and some non-voting commissioners, who are all
elected by a system of proportional voting.
Undergraduate student government at UCLA has been dominated for
years by the same entrenched student groups, who publicly espouse
good intentions but in reality only advocate for themselves and
their constituencies. Even this year, with a major power shift in
student government, the concept of self-serving government is still
USAC’s underlying theme.
The proposed senate system may not be a panacea for the council
system’s deep-rooted problems, but it provides the
opportunities for greater representation to students and for
independent candidates and small slates to gain senate seats.
The senate would also ease much of the general apathy students
display toward student government and its various actions.
By bringing down the threshold of votes needed to win a seat,
constituencies as small as a single residential hall or large
student group could potentially elect their own candidate.
Providing students who are underrepresented in the current
system with a direct avenue to student leaders will increase the
utility of the body to them and their needs.
Making student government more accessible and bringing in new
types of leadership will also revive interest in a body that, no
matter whether students are paying attention, exercises great power
over the budgets of student groups and spends student fees
advocating positions on social and political issues as they see
fit.
While proportional voting will not eliminate the existence of
slates, it will lessen their influence. A mobilized voter bloc
representing just over half of the voting student body, under the
senate system, would get just over half of the elected seats. In
the current majoritarian system, a winning slate can take all
offices, even if it carries just over half the vote.
Those who wish to keep student government as it is support their
opposition by citing organizational problems the transition may
pose, saying student government will have to fund more officer
stipends and that it will be difficult to reallocate office space.
But such minor difficulties are insufficient reasoning for blocking
positive change.
Naysayers also throw around the term “bureaucracy,”
saying it would be a waste of time for executive officers and
commissioners to lobby senators. However, the current council
system has no such checks and balances, and leaders would be more
accountable to students if they occasionally had to persuade others
that their actions and spending are justified.
And with the senate proposal unlikely to pass the council, it
falls into students’ hands to support a more accountable,
accessible government that will better serve them and their
peers.