By Wendy Robertson and Sarah Stephen
This is the third article in a discussion between Resistance and Left Alliance about the approach the left should take to structural reform of the National Union of Students. It is a response to Left Alliance's letter to Resistance published in Green Left #257.
The central disagreement is about what NUS should be. The possibilities are: a "student parliament" that "represents" students, or an organisation of action that fights for the interests of students.
At the moment, the balance of forces in the union is unfavourable to the left, with Labor students controlling most branches and the National Executive. Resistance believes that to change the balance of forces, we need to create a campaigning and participatory union, as opposed to a body that simply seeks to "represent" students.
Left Alliance argues that the best way to ensure that the union is controlled by its members is through proportional representation. This includes opposition to Resistance's proposals to increase the weight of the state branches on the National Executive and to open up campaign committees of the union to students.
NUS is severely limited by its role as a "student parliament". In a parliament, as is widely known, elected politicians rarely carry through their platforms, and there is little or no chance of accountability. This is similar to the elections of NUS, where everybody has a vote, but groups like Unity (Labor right) and even the Liberals can falsely present themselves as leading campaigners against education cuts and get elected on this basis.
The role of NUS delegate is to attend one national and state conference. These consist of an outgoing officials' report and executive elections. The make-up of these bodies is decided on a factional basis, creating institutionalised factionalism in the union.
Individual delegates play no part in deciding the direction of the union in an ongoing way. No individual delegate (if not backed by a faction) has the power to implement policies they are elected on.
Parliaments by nature are talk shops; they discuss and decide policy, but do not implement it. This has also been the history of NUS, which, while having volumes of progressive policies, has not implemented them. This is not possible while it is seen as a representative body, because successful campaigns require the active involvement of the majority of students.
Currently NUS represents only a minority of politicised students (the 6-10% who vote in student elections). Unfortunately, as shown by the domination of NUS nationally by Labor students and by the growing number of Liberal delegates, the majority of politicised students are under the influence of conservative student leaders. If all students voted, the right-wing domination of the union would be greater, because of the even lower political consciousness. Therefore, the central role of the left must be to seek to change this consciousness and politicise students through campaigns.
Resistance believes that this includes fighting to change NUS into a participatory union run and controlled by student activists, one campaigns in the interests of all students. The best way to do this is by placing more power, and financial emphasis, in the state branches and committees of NUS, because this level is more accessible to students. More regular state conferences and open campaign committees, controlled by the students who participate, are a way of instituting this democracy.
Instituting the factional balance in NUS in all committees would paralyse implementation of union policies. Labor and Liberal students have shown themselves not to be interested in campaigning and building the student movement, by their obvious absence from the campaign against the Liberals' cuts to education.
Left Alliance protests, "There is no way to 'legislate' a left union". This is true. But changing NUS into a campaigning union will increase the possibility of the left winning influence. If we instead fight for left control exclusively by aiming to"increase delegates", it will not help to change the fundamental balance of forces in the union.