An Insight into University Politics by Yuna Luisetto Vanbergen

A Shaking Democracy and Lack of Coherent Vision

I joined the student council in April 2025 and have since had many difficult discussions and made many decisions, but the first time I felt the pressure and difficulty of representation was when we discussed budget cuts. Discussing budget cuts is always met with a certain feeling of frustration, both at the situation and the process. We broke up into smaller discussion groups with representatives from teachers, support staff, management, students, and the different offices, trying to figure out where savings could be made without hurting anyone too much. The meetings were long, everyone wanted to make sure what they hold dear was protected, and the conversation went nowhere. The outcomes were taken into a room by our management team where they were formatted, summarised, and organised. The plans were then slightly modified and approved by the council because of the lack of time to discuss anything further. In the end, many were frustrated.

I will try not to bore you by explaining the way governance functions at the UU, but I still want to outline two problems of democratic governance. First, in theory, most decisions made by the universities' management boards (Management Team for us, CvB for the whole university) need to be checked by a council (the UCU Council). The councils, made up of democratically elected members, have different rights over different types of discussion: rights of consent, advice, or information. In practice, however, it can become complex to understand what rights are applicable to what decision. Often by misunderstanding, and sometimes by intentional misguidance, a decision can skip the council approval. When the issue is discovered, the decision made "illegally" is often not relevant anymore. On top of this, searching for legal advice is difficult and time-costly, which means that councils rarely go through official routes when their powers are ignored. Second, democratic systems at the university are slow (as they are in most places). Making decisions with groups of disagreeing people with differing interests takes time. When faced with dramatic and fast-changing issues such as budget cuts, those laborious discussions must be shortened. While all of the above rarely happen at UCU and are more common at the university level, the democratic process is still sometimes undermined by a need for efficiency, which does not benefit everyone equally.

Beyond the general problems encountered by all democratic systems, we are also experiencing a situation of high scarcity, especially at UCU, where the budget cuts have been very damaging. In the face of these cuts, our ideas and priorities are stripped bare, and values that used to coexist comfortably now must compete. The university keeps pushing their goals of community, open science, and accessibility to education, while at the same time cutting on communal spaces, collaborating with the military, and raising application fees. Universities are becoming more expensive and thus more elitist; English programmes are being cut; we are trading financial security for decreased diversity. Although some (including management) do want to prioritise lowering work pressure and improving wellbeing, this cannot happen without more income, compromising education quality, or reducing the number of tasks and objectives the university strives to achieve. At its core, the university is focused on saving its foundations while maintaining education standards, at the cost of some of its values. The councils usually strongly disagree with such decisions and oppose them loudly. This leads to even more tensions and less discussion; in the end, no one is happy. I fear we lack a unifying vision inside this university, and it is starting to seriously hinder our ability to discuss.

As student representatives, it is especially hard to mobilise given our yearly term. Every year, the new council must be retrained, which often means no one is ever expert enough, experienced enough, or politically embedded enough to push back effectively against a management structure. This asymmetry often means that, lacking the right tools, student representatives are less capable of pushing for their interests and values.

This is not to say that democratic processes in universities were always better before, or that management is an evil force that refuses to listen. The way our education is shaped has always been a constant struggle between different interest groups. While some of the decisions from the CvB seem counterintuitive to us students (hum hum, dining hall, hum hum), their role is also to safeguard the quality of our education.

This is, of course, purely based on my own very brief experience with university politics, but in the midst of budget cuts and sweeping changes around the world, I am worried we lack a coherent vision of what we want our education to look like, both the institution itself and in the type of governance that creates it. I am also worried about the weakening impact of the democratic processes which have so far allowed conversations between students and staff and enabled new visions. Without these processes, students can not easily be included in decision making or the creation of a vision for the future of our university. Budget cuts have made more apparent the flaws in our current system, and processes of democratic participation must adapt and learn to be faster and more efficient. I fear that, too stuck in their old ways and structures, the council's roles and agency might keep getting bypassed.

I do not, however, want this article to just be a pessimistic rant. If there is one thing I have learned from being part of this and fighting for what I believe in, it is that there are ways to do things differently and to get involved. UCU also seems to function much better than other faculties; our opinions are usually heard, management does not ignore the council, and people feel a communal effort to improve and safeguard our college. Working in the student council has also taught me that, even though we are first-year student representatives, it is only by considering everyone that we can reach a vision that will benefit us all. If the student delegation only focused on some small objective concerning students, we would forget to investigate staff work pressure, which has worsened over the years and is slowly eating away at the quality of our classes. Collaboration is difficult and slow, and communication is frustrating, but if this article is anything, it is a call for you to get at least a little involved in university politics: vote, run, promote participation. The Netherlands offers you the opportunity of choosing the people who will shape your education, so don't let that choice and its impact slip away from you.