The Union: is the party over?
For decades the Oxford Union has been the most productive breeding ground for the Tory party. It has been said by some that the entire existence of the modern day Conservatives is reliant on the Union. Its alumni are littered with the toff cliques that have gone on to become the leading players in the dominant political party of the twentieth century. But is the era of traditionalist elitism about to come to an abrupt end? It would seem that this is the case.
The recent vandalism that followed a debate organised by the Union's Debates Selection Committee was witnessed by Lord Douglas Hurd during his visit to the Society. So a couple of seats were broken and a few elected officials had to unblock a toilet - welcome back to reality. If this was the worst behaviour Lord Hurd has ever witnessed he wasn't paying much attention to the governments that he was a part of. The Union has increasingly become a habitat for well-spoken backstabbing and haughty arrogance, where tweed jackets are cool and port is the drug of choice - how does this represent the student body?
Madeleine Albright's controversial visit earlier this term was a clear example of the Union's separation from the student body. When Madeleine Albright, former secretary of state for the United States, entered Border's bookshop prior to her speech at the Union she was well aware of the protests that were swarming around every orifice of the building. There was valid reason for the protest - people from all generations and backgrounds were determined that such a controversial figure should hear their opposition to what she represents. Madeleine Albright is the definition of the ineffectual state of the Democratic Party in America - the Republican policies of Clinton's Democrats would have made JFK turn in his grave. When questioned at the Union as to why she saw the death of half a million Iraqi children as a "price worth paying" she merely discarded the comment as a slip of the tongue, a "dumb mistake". It seems daunting that the former Secretary of State for the most powerful country in the world can be let off the hook on the basis of absentmindedness, especially as Iraq has been the most volatile political issue of the tail end of the past century. There was no mistaking the fact that despite the sycophantic applause of the conceited front bench Union gang there was an undercurrent of discontent in every corner of the Union chamber. Her anti-French jokes only entertained the most backslapping pretenders within the hall. Albright played into their hands. But it was a shoddy disguise for the real meaning of her comments on the relevance and significance of the UN Security Council: "Europe should not try and balance America with a common foreign policy because it cannot balance America" - a scary reminder of the menacing nature of the current US political mentality.
Perhaps even more worrying however, was the disregard with which the Union President, Marcus Walker, labelled the evocative protesters outside the building as "people who have nothing better to do on a Tuesday night". Believe it or not, there is life after Oxford and in the 'real world' this kind of attitude would fall on its face.
The times for toff clique circles to sit in the atmospheric environment of the Union building feeling smug about their supposed superiority is over. The world in the twenty-first century is very different from the world that the Oxford Union is still lingering in. There is no doubt that controversial speakers such as Madeleine Albright are a great attribute to the importance of the Union, but this does not mean they have to be praised with false flattery on their arrival - let her speak and let us decide whether she deserves it. The blinkered misdirection of the leading elements of the Union is running on a parallel course with the growing insignificance of the Conservative Party. The only solution is for the Union to break its links with its long-passed and out-dated tradition and replace itself at the forefront of modern international debate. As a member I find the 'hack culture' of student politics an exciting and pivotal part of the Union's attraction, and when I talk of moving on I'm not referring to this central element of the spirit of the Union. The point is that the Society should elevate itself to the level of the modern world and be proud to encompass the full range of views and leanings that are part of it. The party needn't be over. Take a stand, make a move. Let's keep the Union strong, but not be afraid to lose the draining elements that are grinding it into the ground.
The arguments that the Union is elitist, outmoded and outdated are nearly as old as the building itself. Given the antiquarian nature of the architecture, that means that it ought to be about time that people stopped devoting the majority of their energies into whining about what the Union allegedly isn't, and started concentrating on what it really is. For the sake of argument, we'll pretend that it hasn't been one of the world's most influential and prestigious debating chambers over the course of the last hundred years or so, and we won't look at the record number of famous speakers who have come to Oxford, as, in all honesty, these are matters that have concerned our parents' or grandparents' generation rather than ours. The Union's past may be of interest to archivists and historians, but, in the 21st century, it seems right to look at what it has to offer the modern Oxford student.
The usual argument trotted out about the Union is that it is nothing more than a right-wing, white, male public school enclave, a kind of home from home for the dispossessed fascist, for whom it represents an opportunity to sound off about matters in an environment where their bigoted and politically incorrect views would be approved and tolerated. Frankly, anyone who seriously believes this doesn't deserve to be at Oxford. A brief glance at the make-up of the Union's standing committee and higher echelons, to say nothing of general members, reveals that there are remarkably few of the 'white, male, public school elite'; instead, men and women are represented equally, as are many types of ethnic background on all levels, giving the lie to the cliché that the Union's views lie somewhere in the Victorian era, where a woman's place was in the home rather than in the debating chamber or in the corridors of power.
However, merely proving the point that the Union is inclusive in terms of the people who run it is not enough to convince people to join in. After all, one may argue, it's all very well to have one group of reasonable, tolerant people in charge for a term, but it'll all change after another term. Whether this is true or not is entirely down to the membership, who of course get to vote in the officers for the next term. Granted, not all your first choices might be elected, but that is a part of the democratic voting system, rather than any kind of vote-rigging by the aforementioned dispossessed fascists. Ultimately, the Union is as transparent and straightforward an organisation as any other, with the opportunity of getting involved on any level open to anyone.
The speakers will obviously be a major part of the Union forever, and their consistently high quality is hardly open to debate (sic); however, perhaps the truest argument that many critics have made against the Union is that £140 or so is an excessive amount for poorer students to pay to join an organisation with, inevitably, no guarantee of what will be received for the money. However, under Marcus Walker's presidency this term, the Union has pioneered an access scheme giving a £50 discount to those who have fees remission, which means that it becomes a far more affordable alternative, and represents unparalleled value for money, whether at full or reduced price.
I could go on to mention the excellent, Pre-Raphaelite illustrated library, the Purple Turtle's free admission, the cheapest bar in central Oxford, the opportunity to meet far more people than you'd ever meet in Oxford otherwise...but it hardly seems necessary. The Oxford Union is, in the words of 1066 And All That, unequivocally A Good Thing, and long may it continue to inspire healthy debate, both outside and inside its walls.
13th Nov 2003