January 18, 2004

Many interesting ideas about blogs and their role in the political process are coming from University of Waterloo bloggers, which is not surprising considering that UW’s blogging network is significantly stronger and more active than Laurier’s.

At the beginning of December, Jesse Helmer listed 10 ways in which the Feds could improve communication both with the students they are representing and with the UW administration. He suggested, among other things, that executives should maintain a personal blog, since this is an inexpensive way of building accountability and transparency into the political system. Last year I build my campaign around the idea that the transparency provided by blogs is necessary for proper political representation, and I’m glad that other people are recognizing this potential.

Matt Goyer, another UW blogger, argues that blogging is the best mechanism to combat student apathy since it allows the elected officials to demonstrate how hard they are working on behalf of students.

Because blogs and other online forms of communication are an excellent way to reach out to people and to shred secrecy, it would be nice to see them play a more important role as a communication tool in student politics. Yet so far, Laurier’s student government has done extremely little to develop innovative ways of communicating with students. Nobody within WLUSU has a blog, and the Union, paranoid about its public image, scorns the idea of online forums.

Unlike the Feds, whose goal is to “promote and maintain responsible student government,” WLUSU prefers to focus on “students’ needs” and the “spirit of fun” (according to the Union’s mission and values statements). Communication and student representation tend to place rather low on the Union’s list of priorities.

There seems to be little political will to implement a good communication strategy. And that is why I doubt that the Laurier community will eagerly embrace the progressive ideas that other universities are actively exploring. It looks like we need a goddamn revolution around her to change anything.