A Review of the Election Excitement

There has been a surprising turn of events over the weekend! We're now going to be voting for our 3rd CSC even though there are only as many candidates as there are positions. Apparently, a few students have petitioned a "vote of no confidence" against the entire candidature. Prior to that, there was an informal voting on facebook to find if there was general consensus in Tembusu regarding this motion. That, was what I (and I'm sure everybody else) found most exciting. I can confidently say this is the first super serious discussion our facebook group has seen all semester. It's quite heartening to see how invested the participants were towards what they felt was best for the college.

So all that excitement aside, I hope to do a review of the discussion that pursued just yesterday in this post. Before which, let me introduce the main actors:

The candidature: There are eleven of them, running for eleven positions in the 3rd College Students' Committee. In no particular order, they are Stephanie Wong, Noor Hanisah, Lee Chee Yann, Haniel Soh, Jared Koh, Jeremy Tan, Michael Ivan, Lee Na Ryung, Stewart Huang, Tay Jing Xuan, and Park Sunwoo.

The debaters: Yes, I am distinguishing between those who debated the topic and those who didn't. I don't want to assume that the view on this matter are distinct partisan. I shall name the two camps pro-voters and anti-voters.

The silent masses: These people either stayed out of or missed the great political discussion yesterday. They are important because the debaters conceptualize the rest of the college slightly differently, and this has impact on their rhetoric.

Pro-vote
These people strongly believe that it is in Tembusu's interest to have an election on two main bases: 1) an election will legitimize the CSC's position and authority in the college and 2) residents ought to be able to exercise their democratic right to vote.

Pro-voters see the silent masses as possibly too shy to air their views, hence an anonymous vote as an expression of their approval (or otherwise) is only fair to the masses (2). In having an election where every resident (shy or not) gets to vote, the induction of the 3rd CSC is then legitimized by approval from the masses. This will formalize a sense of respect for the committee (1).

In order to exercise this right to vote, pro-voters have petitioned a "vote of no confidence" against the entire candidature. The induction of the eleven candidates into the CSC by virtue of having as many positions as their are candidates is thus negated. The electorate can then vote the candidature into their positions by a "vote of confidence".

Anti-vote
These people believe that the voting process in unnecessary, also on two main bases: 1) the candidature have gained their (the colleges'?) approval and 2) the candidature haven't had the chance to prove themselves in action to justify a "vote of no confidence".

Anti-voters stick to a traditional definition of "vote of no confidence", which is the voting out of a leader who has performed unsatisfactorily. Hinging on this, the anti-voters argue that the candidate have nothing to be unsatisfied about because they have yet to perform any task for them to be evaluated on (2). If anything, the candidates have convinced them (and implicitly, the silent masses) of their desire to serve the college in  their campaigns and dialogue sessions (1).

Also, the fact that there are only as many candidates as there are positions in the committee show there is no alternative to vote in, so an election is redundant.


Personally, I don't have much to say on the issue of voting. I am inclined not to vote at all, because like the anti-vote camp, I don't see the need to. But I respect the view of the pro-voters too. The main concern now is whether or not this election will hurt the standing of the 3rd CSC. One worry is that not all eleven of them will get elected in. In which case, they will have to co-opt the vacant positions... which is quite silly because that will be having a full CSC without everyone being recognized as part of the committee.

I'm also not sure how the confidence of the candidature has been affected by all this. Two candidates (Haniel and Stephanie) have since restated their stance towards serving the college, I suppose as a signal that they will not be fazed by the election. Good for them.

One point to note though was how the pro-voters had the same hope that all eleven of them would be instated as the CSC. Many of them insisted that the "vote of no confidence" had nothing to do with anyone's disapproval of the candidature; rather, it was meant to be a pure expression of their right to vote. Which is what I found most intriguing in this entire debate. If you were to think of legitimacy of authority in terms of consensus from the governed population, then technically the current candidature have already won what 'legitimacy' they can garner. No one is arguing that the candidates are actually lacking in any way. Both pro-voters and anti-voters agree that the candidates are, in a sense, worthy of their future position.

This means issue of legitimacy has nothing to do with the CSC's authority. It doesn't make a difference if the CSC is legitimately elected in or not, since the college already acknowledges their capacity as the future CSC. The legitimacy that the pro-voters are truly seeking is of their own approval of the committee. Voting, to them, is a symbolic action that allows them to formally express their approval of the new student's committee. Thus, the consensus made (which is in effect the handing over of the student collective's decisional power) is what gets legitimized, not the authority of the CSC.

The question of the future CSC's legitimacy will have have to be answered by their actions when they finally do start office. That will be the true test of their legitimacy: to win and maintain the compliance/ cooperation of the student body in order to improve the way we live and learn in this community. They will be judged by the events and activities they organize together, by the way they work as a team and how they balance the (conflicting) interests of a diversified populace.

What this means for the coming elections is that there's no telling how competent these guys are until we let them try, which was implicit point made by the anti-voters. With no competition for positions in the committee, we've simply got to take this candidature in and trust they'll do their best. So make sure you vote for all of them, you pro-voting monkeys.

If there are any last words, I really hope that the candidature do not take this issue of voting to heart, because it hardly has anything to do with what their true legitimacy as an authority at the moment. Let the voters have their vote, then let's all move on from there. To the eleven brave souls, I wish you all the best.