UvA board may not implement referendum outcome
Geert ten Dam, President of the board of Directors, would not say whether she will implement the outcome of the referendum on democratic reforms later this month. ‘Democracy is not a goal in itself,’ she said in an interview with Folia. ‘It is a means to improve education, research and innovation’.
The president of the Board of Directors together with rector magnificus Karen Maex sat down with the editors of Folia to discuss the referendum the university will hold later this month. Holding a referendum was one of the recommendations presented by the committee of democratisation and decentralisation in their report earlier this month.
The committee was appointed by the Board of Directors shortly after the student protests that enveloped the university one and a half years ago. The protests led to the six week occupation of the Maagdenhuis with protestors calling for the democratisation of university governance. The committee concluded that drastic measures must be taken in order to improve the legitimacy and effectiveness of governance at the UvA. The exact scope of the measures were to be decided through a referendum.
Green
From November 23 to December 11, students and employees can vote for their preferred model of governance. The referendum will be a ‘consulting’ referendum Ten Dam emphasised to Folia, meaning that the Board of Directors is not obliged to follow its outcome. ‘We can only implement changes together with the deans of the faculties,’ she said. ‘And the deans need to co-operate with their directors and deputies.’
Besides this practical constraint, Ten Dam and Maex are thought to be reluctant to implement all changes because the outcome of the referendum is expected to demand too radical a level of democratisation. Activist groups that were involved in the occupation of the Maagdenhuis and student union ASVA are campaigning for the so-called ‘green model’. According to this, students and employees will be able to decide on all rules and policy via elected managers and directors.
Ten Dam believes that the main goal of the referendum is to enable students and employees to be involved in the decision making process and that this will have already been achieved by the referendum taking place, regardless of whether the board accepts the outcome or not.
