Op-Ed: The collapse of student democracy

How the ANSWER controversy exposed the failings of Associated Students

Charles Young / Op-Ed Contributor / The USD Vista

I am the former Associated Students (AS) Chair of Student Organizations and Senator for the Alcalá Vistas. On the 28th of February, The Vista newspaper published a Campus Update highlighting my presentation to AS Senate regarding the USD ANSWER Coalition. The issue sparked a controversy which exposed the true colors of Associated Students – a government which can now only be referred to as illegitimate. 

The senate voted to allow the presentation of my case against the group’s registration. This was granted after the senate was informed of its content, and after the AS President urged them to not discuss this important campus concern.

It was never my intention for members of the group to feel harmed and targeted by my actions. The feelings of all those involved are important; however, I wish to ensure the facts, and my true intentions, are not overlooked. One must acknowledge what I actually said; the opinions of the national ANSWER Coalition are not necessarily representative of the USD group and its members.

I am not against the group’s struggle to raise the concerns of Palestine, or to end war and racism; in fact, I encouraged groups on campus to take up those very causes during my presentation. I am against a club whose national affiliation makes our Jewish community on campus feel unsafe. Simon Wiesenthal, a survivor of the world’s most horrific act of antisemitism, said that, “For evil to flourish, it only requires good men to do nothing.” Inaction would have been irresponsible in the face of the group’s attempted registration.

For standing alongside both the Jewish Student Union and the greater San Diego Jewish community, and for informing the senate of my concerns, I was unconstitutionally deprived of office by the AS Executive Board on Feb. 28. I challenged it that day to the senate, who overruled the decision of the Acting Speaker and reaffirmed my right to vote – an honor granted to me by my constituents during the 2018 Spring AS Elections. By voting in favor of my challenge, the senate effectively confirmed that the AS Executive Board had disregarded our constitution’s explicit instructions. 

At the following meeting, Associated Students, with complete disdain for their governing documents, again pushed to remove me from office. They succeeded after blatantly ignoring the calls to refute their decision by senators who opposed their agenda, refusing to count my vote, rejecting the decision of the Parliamentarian – who is the ultimate authority on the constitution – and disregarding senators who read verbatim from our governing documents. 

This issue puts on full display the systematic erosion of our representative government. With my removal, the senate is now overwhelmingly an appointed body. Of AS Senate’s 30 voting members, 15 seats are held by individuals who have never stood for election, 3 seats remain open to appointments, and a mere 12 members were elected by the students they serve. Effectively, the appointees of the AS President can set the agenda and approve legislation, even if every elected senator opposes it. Duly elected members have called for special elections so that students can select their own representatives, however such pleas have fallen on deaf ears. The students of this university no longer have a say in their government. 

Democratic representative governments are founded upon two key principles: the ability of the people to elect their representatives, and the consent of the people to be governed under a set of commonly agreed upon foundational rules. Associated Students has broken both of these tenets. With a majority of its members being appointed, AS government has prevented the students from being able to elect their own representatives. They have clearly shown that they have no intentions of following their fundamental rules, as found in the constitution, that were approved by a vote of the university’s student body. By breaking these principles, Associated Students has displayed itself to be an illegitimate government.

We entrust this body with nearly $1.5 million annually, and empower them to make some of the most important decisions facing this university, such as providing input on the core curriculum, setting the budget, and representing student concerns. 

Why do we look the other way as our voices are stripped from us?