August 2009

MOVING FORWARD WITH THE CFS

and maybe, reuniting the Canadian student movement

INTRODUCTION

0.1. Why write this?

This is an anonymous and collective contribution to the ongoing reflection taking place
within the Canadian Federation of Students (CFS). In fact, it is little more than a honest
attempt to put in writing various ideas, generated both within and outside the CFS, to
prevent these ideas from vanishing due to the rapid turnover in student associations, which
has forced so many to ''reinvent the wheel''.

One central premiss of this essay is that there is a need for national and provincial
organizations representing students in a democratic manner. There are already national
organizations
1 that represent university professors (Canadian Association of University
Teachers2 ) and university administrators (Association of Universities and Colleges of
Canada ), as well as similar provincial associations. Students are equally important
stakeholders in matters of Canadian post-secondary education, and they need their own
vehicle to make policy recommendations to both levels of government.

0.2. National representation of Canadian students

This document is written for readers who are already somewhat familiar with the CFS, which
is composed of the Canadian Federation of Students, the Canadian Federation of Students –
Services (CFS-S), and provincial components (e.g. CFS-BC, CFS-Ontario). Founded in 1981
from the merger of several national and provincial organizations, its membership currently
adds up3 to over half a million students from 86 member student associations (''member
locals''). CFS member locals span all provinces, with the majority in Ontario (38) and
British Columbia (18). They include students from colleges and universities (graduate and
undergraduate), as well as francophone, anglophone and bilingual institutions.

Founded in 1995, the Canadian Alliance of Student Associations

4 (CASA) is formed of 23
member associations totalling over 300,000 students. They are spread in eight Canadian
provinces (all except Saskatchewan, Newfounland and Labrador), with the majority in the
Atlantic provinces (9), southwestern Ontario (5) and Alberta (5). They include college and
undergraduate student associations, but only a single graduate student association (at U. of
Waterloo) and a single francophone institution (U. de Moncton). They do not formally have
provincial branches, although some provincial student organizations (such as the Alliance of
Nova Scotia Student Associations and the Ontario Undergraduate Student Alliance) share
many members with CASA.

Francophone students in Québec are not affiliated with either national student association,
but are organized in their own provincial institutions, such as the Fédération étudiante
universitaire du Québec (17 member associations, 145,000 members), the Fédération
étudiante collégiale du Québec (21 member associations, 40,000 members), and the
Association pour une solidarité syndicale étudiante (17 member associations, 37,000
members).
0.3. Why the CFS?

There are several reasons why this document focuses solely on the CFS. It is the
organization with which the authors were the most familiar. More importantly, it is the
largest and and arguably the most influent of all student organizations at the federal level,
as well as in many provinces.

Any organization of this side carries a certain inertia, and maybe for that reason, many
member locals whose executives have been critical of the CFS have preferred defederation
over attempting to reform the organization. Some cited ''reform attempts'' include general
motions brought at CFS meetings by associations which were already in the process of
defederating (such as the Kwantlen Student Association in 2007). Compared to the
mobilization efforts around defederation referenda, there has been no significant grassroots
efforts towards reform in recent years.

It has yet to be proven that the defederation of any number of member locals can lead to
change within the CFS. In the mid-1990s, CASA was founded by student associations that
were dissatisfied with the CFS, yet it was never able to replace the CFS as Canada's main
organization representing post-secondary students. In fact the absolute membership of the
CFS has increased compared to its level before the creation of CASA.

CASA also encountered its own internal dissensions and disaffiliation movements, which
could mean that there are inherent challenges to representing hundreds of thousands of
students in such a large and diverse country. It might be a good approach to address these
challenges within the existing organizations, rather than restart the whole process with new
organizations and encounter the same challenges, a dozen years down the road.

In the end, while the CFS is not the sole organization representing students in Canada, it is
fair to assume that a majority of post-secondary students will continue to be represented by
the CFS in the near future. It is also likely that many individuals appreciate their
membership but would like to get even more from it. For all those students it is worth
proposing ideas for renewing the CFS.

0.4. This document...

... has been written carefully to avoid, whenever possible, to make assumptions about the
opinions of individual students on educational policy. It aims to discuss potential reforms
that could appeal to students across the political spectrum.

This remainder of this document is split into three parts. One deals with structural change –
focusing on CFS policies and bylaws. Another deals with cultural change – elements which
shape the organization without being formally written down. The last part explores concrete
strategies to bring these changes.

PART 1: STRUCTURE OF THE CFS

5
1.1. Individual members and voting members (Bylaw 1, Section 3)

Representatives of the CFS often stress the idea that it is a federation of individual students.
The primary function of this discourse, it seems to us, is to differentiate the CFS from the
Canadian Alliance of Student Associations. CASA's lobbying doesn't focus on mass
mobilization of individuals students (through petitions, protests and the like) as much as the
CFS. Furthermore, CASA allows local student associations to join or leave the organization
without a referendum of their members.

If individual members of the CFS have the sole power, per Section 3 of Bylaw 1, to initiate a
referendum to federate or defederate (more on referendum bylaws later), this constitutes
their only formal authority within the bylaws. All other rights and responsabilities are
conferred to the local student associations (aptly named ''voting members''), that is, to the
executives and/or board of directors of these local associations. Notably, only voting
members, not individual members, are ''entitled to have access to all information and
official documents concerning the operations and activities of the Federation'' (Bylaw 1,
Section 3b.v).

Unless we can implement a direct democracy at the national scale – which is very unlikely,
as even local student associations are essentially representative democracies – individual
students on each campus will continue to be represented by their local association's
delegates. We therefore encourage students to ensure that the nomination of these
delegates at the local level is as transparent and democratic as possible. At the same time,
a number of reforms at the CFS level could improve the participation of individual members.
Giving them the right to access information on the CFS (see point above) is an obvious
start, but we can also think of new mechanisms for individual members to present motions
at general meetings, though petitions for exemple. In some cases, it might be easier for
individuals to use democratic structures on their own campuses, such as general meetings
or council meetings of their local association, to mandate their local executive to bring
certain motions to the CFS.

1.2. One local, one vote

Still on the topic of membership, the principle of ''one local association, one vote'' is central
to the CFS. All member student associations receive one vote at general meeting plenaries
of the Federation, regardless of the number of individual students they represent. Critics of
the CFS have suggested this system is unfair, since all individual students contribute the
same levy, therefore larger associations contribute more to the organization and should
have a bigger say.

Let's briefly consider the alternatives to ''one local, one vote''. First, the ''one student, one
vote'' principle appears to us as highly unpractical in this context: just imagine being a
delegate from a community college with a few hundred members, attending a meeting
where the U of Toronto representative has one hundred times your voting power. A possible
compromise would be to establish a threshold system, where associations of less than 1000
members receive one vote, those between 1000 and 10,000 receive two, etc. It would even
be possible, within this system, to limit the numbers of delegates each association can send
to be equal to their number of votes, so that all delegates are ''equal'' on the plenary floor.
The weakness of this proposal is that thresholds will always be arbitrary, which in itself can
be the source of considerable debate and contestation.

While we do not want to understate the importance of discussing such a fundamental

question, we must keep in mind that ''one local, one vote'' is a core principle of CFS and as
such, considerable inertia would have to be overcome to change it in any way. Would the
effects of such a change be worth the effort?

Consider that any move away from ''one local, one vote'' would increase the weight of
Ontario student associations, which currently account for less than 50% of the locals but
more than 50% of the individual members, at 6 a time where many students in other
provinces consider the CFS to be Ontario-centric.

Universities and colleges in four cities alone (Toronto, Montreal, Ottawa and Winnipeg)
account for at least 300,000 individual members of the CFS, and six out of the nine full-time
7
national executive officers of the CFS since 2005-2006 came from these institutions. It
appears to us that large associations already have considerable influence within the CFS,
and we don't expect the CFS policies and culture to change if these associations were given
more votes. At the same time, there are legitimate concerns that concentrating the votes
within a few large urban institutions would undermine the capacity of the Federation to
represent the diversity of colleges and universities across the country.

1.3. Membership referenda (Bylaw 1, Sections 4 and 6)

It is perhaps ironic that in almost every CFS referendum, one of the main reasons students
vote against membership has to do with the referendum procedure itself! Of all arguments
brought forward to defend the current system, two stand out:
8
• ''Referendum in, referendum out'' (RIRO): A referendum of the local association's
membership is required both to initiate and to terminate CFS membership.

• Referendum oversight committee (ROC): Since membership constitutes a contract

between the local association and the CFS, all referenda are overseen by a ROC
composed of two members from each of these two parties.

The first principle (RIRO) was part of the original CFS bylaws and has never been seriously
contested within the Federation. Full membership comes with a per student levy and most,
if not all, local student associations are required to run a referendum to collect this levy
from their members. Therefore, ''referendum in'' is a necessity and ''referendum out''
follows from the principle that the same process occurs at both ends.

In fact, since we reiterate this principle so often, intellectual honesty demands that we
ensure that both procedures – to join and to leave the Federation – are indeed the same. As
in any question of procedure, the devil is in the details, and here are a few places where the
details differ:

• Petition requirement: The bylaws appear to be in contradiction over this one. On the
one hand, Section 3 stipulates that the individual members of a local association 9
have the ''sole authority to initiate'' a referendum to federate or to defederate ,
through a petition signed by 10% of these members. On the other hand,
prospective membership in the CFS (Section 2b), which can be initiated by the
executive or council of the local association, mandates the association to conduct a
referendum to federate in the following year. To our knowledge, the CFS currently
doesn't require petitions for prospective members to run a referendum on full
membership.

• Scheduling: The referendum to federate is scheduled by the local association in

consultation with the Federation, while the referendum to defederate is scheduled
by the CFS National Executive in consultation with the local association. The term
''consultation'' is vague, but the language suggests that the National Executive is
making the final decision in the latter case (defederation). As an additional and
minor point, the restrictions on the time and duration of the campaign and voting
periods are more specific in Section 6 (defederation) than Section 4 (federation).
 • Quorum: The quorum for defederation is 5% or the local association's 10 quorum,
whichever is higher. There is no quorum specified to join the Federation.

• Time between referenda: A referendum to defederate might not be held in the two
years following another referendum (to federate or defederate). There is no parallel
restriction in the case of a referendum to federate.

These few points support the case made by some critics that the procedural barriers to
defederation are (at least marginally) higher. A good argument could be made, however,
that the very idea of ''same process'' in and out of the CFS would be impossible to enforce.
Supposing that a local association conducts a full membership referendum without taking
prospective membership beforehand, it would not have any contractual obligations to the
CFS and could run the referendum by its local bylaws. In the case of a positive outcome, it
is clear the CFS would accept to take in the new member (and associated income) in the
Federation.

One possible conclusion of this line of thought is that the defederation referendum should
also be conduced according to the
11 local association's bylaws. Interestingly, this is what the
CFS bylaws initially prescribed until the creation of the ROC process, which we now
discuss.

The powers and responsibilities of the Referendum Oversight Committee (ROC), composed
of two representatives from the CFS and two from the local association, are very similar to
those of a Chief Returning Officer (CRO): drafting and enforcing electoral regulations,
approving campaign materials, overseeing polling stations and the counting of ballots, etc.
The referendum results and any ROC decisions can be appealed: in this case, the Appeal
Committee is composed of one representative of the CFS and one of the local association,
neither of which are members of the ROC.

In most student elections, neutrality of the election staff – starting with the CRO – is seen
as essential to the integrity of the process. This idea is absent from the definition of the
ROC, which is guided not by neutrality towards the outcome, but rather by the equality of
two parties in a contract: the CFS and the local association. Representatives of the former
will of course always be pro-CFS, and have even campaigned for the pro-CFS side in
previous referenda. Curiously, no part of the bylaws prohibits ROC members from
participating in the same campaign they are overseeing. Representatives of the local
association will vary in their biases, but we can safely assume that associations seeking to
federate will have largely pro-CFS executives, while associations seeking to defederate will
have largely anti-CFS executives.

The range of ROC outcomes will therefore vary from a completely pro-CFS committee on
one end and a evenly divided committee on the other. The latter case can be the source of
stalemates that delay or even prevent any referendum from being held, which means that
the side of the statu quo has an effective veto on all decisions relative to referendum
regulations. Specifically, in the case of a referendum to defederate where stalemates are
more likely to occur, the CFS representatives hold this veto power.

Even in the cases where the referendum rules are accepted by both sides, a biased ROC
would still have considerable arbitrary power in determining violations of the rules and
sanctions for these violations. According to CFS bylaws, ''Campaign materials shall not be
misleading, defamatory or false'', and this judgement is left to the ROC. Even in the case of
a ''stalemate'' ROC, where each side could potentially use its effective veto to censor the
other side's materials, the pro-CFS side would come out with an advantage: the same CFS
bylaws stipulate that generic CFS promotion materials, that were not made for this specific
referendum, do not count as campaign materials and thus cannot be censored by the ROC.

It is not our intention to debate at length on how much the CFS has been taking advantage
of all the loopholes mentioned here. The bottom line is that if we are committed to a fair
process, we should act to close such looopholes as they are identified. Considering that
''stalemates'' of the ROC have already caused two court cases involving the CFS (one before
the Kwantlen referendum, which the CFS won, and one after the Simon Fraser, which the
CFS lost) and considering the monetary and public relations costs of going to court, putting
procedures in place to break those stalemates seems to be a priority.

We are conscious that changing this part of the bylaws is one of the toughest reforms to
sell, partly because the arguments are primarily questions of principle, while increasing and
retaining membership by any means necessary appears to be in the short-term political
interest of the organization. The emphasis should be put on ''short-term'': it is very likely
that artificially increasing support through biased referenda procedures could make the
organization less responsive to the evolution of its membership and weaken it on the long
term.

As one example of this effect, consider the rule that allows representatives of the CFS and
its member associations to participate in the referendum campaign of another local
association. It effectively removes the need to build a strong volunteer base on campus by
relying on an external campaign team, often composed of full-time student association
executives. Here you don't even have to wait for the CFS bylaws to change in order to act..
You can personally refuse to campaign on another campus and explain your reasons for this
decision. Even better yet, if there is support for it, you can get your local student
association to pass a bylaw amendment which prohibits its elected 12 officers from
campaigning in the elections and referenda of other local associations.

1.4. National Executive (Bylaw 5)

The National Executive of the CFS is composed of eighteen members: three at-large
members (full-time positions elected by the whole membership), ten provincial
representatives, two caucuses representatives (graduate and aboriginal) and three
constituency representatives (francophone, students of colour, and women).

Many students have questioned the fact that other constituency groups that were later
added to the CFS (e.g. queer students, students with disabilities) are not represented on
the National Executive. The cause of this discrepancy is probably just historical, and if
students from one of these constituency groups were to bring forward the necessary
amendments to create a new position, we believe it is very likely to pass; it would be
difficult to argue that some constituency groups are above others.

The National Executive's role is mainly one of implementation of the general meeting
decisions and day-to-day management of the Federation. Sitting on the National Executive
does not necessarily give one more power over the political direction of Federation – major
political decisions are made at general meetings – but it certainly provides a useful insider's
perspective to the organization. As such, we see only benefits in allowing a couple more
students to get into these roles, as long as the size of the committee remains reasonable.

1.5. General meeting standing committees (Standing Resolution 1)

Before any motion is voted on at the closing plenary of a CFS general meeting, it is studied
by one of four standing committees, which recommends either the adoption of the motion
as is, the adoption of an amended version, or the rejection of the motion. In the campaigns
forum, every member local association has one vote, but this is not the case for the three
other committees (budget, policy, and organisational and services development or OSD).
For those committees, each of the 10 provincial components, each of the 5 caucuses, and
each of the 8 constituency groups of the CFS receives a single vote. These 23 groups vary
greatly in size: the PEI and New Brunswick components might have three delegates or less
at the meeting, while the women's constituency group accounts for one half or more of the
delegates. Larger groups can assign many individuals to a single committee, who still have
to share a unique vote.

In this context, suppose one local association sends two or more delegates to a general
meeting. One of them will usually sit on the campaigns forum where they are guaranteed a
seat, while the other(s) will have two or three attempts (depending if they fit into a
constituency group or not) to get elected to different committees. Through either voluntary
exclusion or simple bad luck, a few delegates will be unable to get into any committee. We
have seen such cases occur in practice, including one where the local association that
brought forward a motion was unable to sit on the committee studying it, a most indesirable
outcome.

Before we describe one alternative to the current system, a few precisions are in order.
Since the sole power of standing committees is to make recommendations to the plenary, it
is not essential for all committees to respect the ''one local, one vote'' principle: indeed,
only one of the four currently follows this principle. Also, it is important to stress the point
that each of the 23 groups (provinces, caucuses and constituencies) has some meeting time
to discuss the motions, at which point they can direct their representatives to vote in a
certain way (although there is no way to enforce this, the good faith of the representatives
is assumed). In addition to bringing the group's opinion to the committee, the
representatives provide brief updates to their group on the work and decisions taken by the
committee.

For the sake of brevity, we will only present one alternative system for committee
assignments, with the hope that despite its imperfections, it will help those unsatisfied with
the statu quo to initiate or pursue discussions on the matter. Our aim was to achieve a
compromise between representation of all provinces, caucuses and constituencies on every
committee on the one hand, and a equal opportunity for all delegates to contribute to a
committee of their choice on the other hand.

Currently, all delegates must indicate their membership in a constituency group (or in the
Aboriginal caucus) on their registration form. Membership in a provincial component and
other caucuses is automatic, based on the local association sending the delegate. All that
would be required in the proposed system would be an indication of committee preference
on the same registration forms. Once the registration information is entered on a computer
(which is probably already the case), a assignment program could be run to give most
delegates their first choices, or at least their second choice, with the restriction that each
province, caucus or constituency must be represented (provided a sufficient number of
delegates) in every committee. Who gets their first choice or not would be based on the luck
of the draw (or a first-come, first-serve basis, although we have reservations with this
option). There could even be an option to manually assign some delegates before the
automatic assignment, to ensure that locals 13 who bring forward a motion to a committee
have at least one voice on this committee. All committees would operate on a ''one
delegate, one vote'' basis.
We can already foresee a few objections to this system, or any move away from the statu
quo:

• Committees will be too large: It would be possible to set a different maximum size
for each committee (as it currently done, since the campaigns forum is much larger
than the other three). However, the sum of all committee numbers has to be equal
to the number of delegates, unless we want to deprive some delegates of the
opportunity to sit on a committee.

• Minority groups will have less weight on committee decisions: Of course, this is part
of the compromise. Let us note however that if a single group (for example,
international students) is opposed to a motion, it doesn't matter that much whether
they have one vote out of 23 or one out of 50. In both cases, they must convince
one half of the delegates outside their group that their objection is valid.

• The current system allows groups to select their best representatives: Assuming
that all delegates in a group know each other sufficiently to make a decision. In the
realistic case where half of the delegates are new, judgements on individuals are
likely to be shallow. We prefer to trust that all delegates can acquire (and should
acquire) a necessary level of competence to function in their committees, knowing
that each committee will always be a mix of old and new delegates.

PART 2: CULTURE OF THE CFS

In the previous section, we highlighted what appeared to us as contentious points within the
formal structure of the CFS, as specified by its bylaws. With the possible exception of CFS
referendum14rules, which might require amendments depending of the outcome of recent
court cases , it appears to us that structural issues are not the main challenges facing the
CFS today. Even if improvements are possible, the benefits have to be weighted against the
cost of rallying the high level of support required to amend the bylaws. Furthermore, since
bylaws reflect the culture of the organization at the time they were adopted, their
modification should logically follow, rather than initiate, substantial changes in that culture.
Once we realize how many different courses of action are possible within the current
structure, it is difficult to argue that structural problems are holding us back. But then, what
is?

2.1. Stability without stagnation

It is important to give credit where credit is due, and recognize that many challenges now
facing the CFS originate from one of its biggest, if not its biggest success: providing some
continuity to a movement whose membership is constantly renewed. Maintaining this
continuity and institutional memory is often a struggle at the local student association level.
Anyone who has ever perused campus newspaper archives or past local association
minutes, only to find out the same debates and problems relived by several generations of
student activists, knows how disempowered it feels when one realizes how much time one
has been spending to reinvent the wheel.

We know few students who haven't been truly impressed by the first CFS general meeting
they attended. After meeting such a large number of students with similar interests from all
around the country and attending four days packed (from 8am until the late evening) with
workshops, policy discussions, guest lectures and social events, first-time delegates come
back to their campus with high hopes and motivation. They have also received an efficient
crash course on the history, the internal workings and the ongoing campaigns of the
federation.

Acting as a ''support network'' for local student associations and transmitting knowledge
from one cohort of student activists are two important functions of any large student
federation, and two areas where the CFS performs rather well. We would argue, however,
that there is more to accomplish at these general meetings. For the movement to progress
meaningfully, new ideas need to come forward at those meetings, the result of current
strategies needs to be assessed and necessary corrections must be made. This is not in
contradiction with the transmission of knowledge: we must know our history to learn from
it.

The amount of general meeting time spent on critical review of objectives and strategies of
the movement is, from our personal experience, remarkably scarce. This becomes more
obvious when one attends their second or third general meetings, where the workshops and
campaigns concerning core post-secondary education (PSE) issues are nearly unchanged.
Most of the issues brought forward by member locals fit into the broad ''motion of support''
category. Sometimes support is given to a local association facing problems on their
campus. Sometimes it is given to another ''social justice'' organization working on a non-
core issue (anti-war, anti-poverty) that is supported by CFS delegates. Support usually
comes in the form of a letter and (more rarely) a monetary donation from the CFS. Local
associations are also encouraged to raise awarness on the issue on their campus: the CFS
might even put aside resources to make materials related to the campaign, for distribution
on campus.

As we mentioned before, supporting local associations can is a valuable function of the

national federation. There are also good arguments to justify networking with, and
supporting, other social organizations (labour unions, charities, etc.) when we expect
mutual support on their part for our core campaigns. Regardless how one feels on the
pertinence of those motions, though, it should be recognized that these campaigns were not
initiated by the CFS and that the CFS contribution is often little more than symbolical. The
fact that motions require so little commitment might be a reason why so many are passed
without debate, or even without discussion, every general meeting. ''Why not support
[insert cause]? It looks nice and cannot hurt.''

At the same time, the discussion on core issues – tuition fees, public funding of PSE,
financial aid and the like – is centered on the tactical level. Panels where the more
experienced CFS activists share lobbying and mass mobilization techniques are a good
example. Despite the repetitive nature of some tactics (consider the mobilization around
days of action every two years of so), there is evidence that student activists are quick to
embrace new ways to spread their message, such as Facebook and YouTube. The emphasis
on tactical discussion conveys the assumption that the broader goals and strategies are the
right ones, so the only problem left to us is to mobilize enough students around our causes,
until governments have no choice but to abide by our demands.

There is no doubt that we need to win a critical number of people to our cause, both within
our membership and among the general voting population, to make any political gain. It is
not obvious, however, that we can achieve this simply with better placards, better slogans
or better viral marketing. Surely the substance of our message and the details of our policy
proposals also matter. An environment that is averse to constructive debate can be a
serious obstacle to any critical review, so we will address this problem in detail in the next
section.
Before we get to this point, let us first consider what a single local association can do to
shift general meeting resources towards review and improvement of our core goals and
strategies. Since the motions debated at general meetings are those submitted by the
locals, you can start by avoiding to submit ''motions of support'' for which the only
consequences would be symbolic. You can craft campaign motions on short-term and
current issues to include specific actions and specific objectives, and a process to review the
success of these objectives at the next meeting; we need to determine what success means
to us in order to assess the results of our efforts. In the ideal case, this assessment process
would be institutionalized in the organization's bylaws; however, in line with our proposition
that cultural change often precedes structural change, it makes sense to write your own
motions with these guidelines in mind.

To review long-term policies, you can move to create a taskforce that will compile recent
research, in order to help delegates propose make informed decisions and relevant updates
to the policy in future general meetings. The federation uses part of your levies to employ a
full-time researcher; take advantage of this ressource by proposing projects that reflect
priorities of your membership.

2.2. Superficial unity is no strength

We considered the possibility that shallow motions of support can distract delegates from
debating core policies and strategies. A further concern is that many of these motions are
adopted with little discussion, let alone debate. In fact, the sheer number of political
motions presented at a given meeting means that delegates cannot possibly discuss each of
them thoroughly even if they wanted to. The optimist would say that all delegates have
researched the issues and made their mind prior to the meeting (in which case, the same
result could have been reached by a quick vote over e-mail, avoiding the cost and
greenhouse gas emissions of air travel). The pessimist would say that most delegates did
not have the time, interest or motivation to perform this work (not to mention few
incentives to do so given the rushing of motions characteristic of general meetings).

The two or three panel discussions organized at each general meeting can provide
background information on the same issues that are the topic of campaign/policy motions.
Panel guests are either student activists, politicans, or members of social justice
organization, whose arguments stem from different perspectives but essentially all support
the motion delegates will later vote on. Their function thus cannot be to stimulate debate,
but rather provided pre-made arguments to justify the soon-to-come support to the
campaign or policy. Of course, delegates have the following question period to question the
assumptions that all panelists agree upon. The reaction of the ''crowd'' in this case is
interesting, including
15 angry or condescending responses by other delegates, followed by
strong applause.

Sometimes controversial motions never make it to the plenary floor. In 2007, the whole
preamble of a motion was struck from the package sent to delegates as it allegedly
contained ''false information'' (that despite the fact that there is no provision for that kind of
censorship in the CFS procedures or Robert's Rules of Order). Another motion that proposed
to elect the National Executive through a vote of the entire membership was removed from
the agenda by a 2/3 votes of the delegates, who for some reason feared to even have a
discussion on the topic. Local associations who propose motions on taboo topics, like
changing the referendum procedures, can expect calls from CFS executives or staff
encouraging them to retract their motion.
The election of delegates at National Executive positions would provide another forum for
delegates to discuss the priorities of the organization, if only those positions were
contested. (When was the last time that more than one delegate ran for chairperson or
deputy chairperson?)

If there is any rationale for this part of the CFS culture, it might be related to the belief that
the student movement is ''divided'' whenever internal debate occurs. This argument is
commonly brought forward whenever there are proposals to make the minutes of the
meetings public, or to allow the media to observe the plenary sessions: ''We don't want to
show division within the movement.'' If unity means the absence of any political
disagreement within the group, one has to wonder just how large and inclusive such a
''united movement'' can be, and whether this conception of unity is really a strength.
Getting used to a politically homogeneous environment where assumptions are not checked
can seriously impact one's ability to later make a convincing argument in the outside world.

There might also be an emotional aspect to debate aversion. Student activists circles are
often small enough that many people share close friendships. It might simply not be worth
expressing one's disagreement when one fears losing the trust of friends in that debate.
Peer pressure from fellow student activists can easily overrun the motivation to exercise due
diligence and even the interests of the broader membership (most of these students you
represent don't even know who you are, anyway).

The main challenge, therefore, is to change from a state of mind where critical review of
current positions and practices of the movement is seen as suspicious and even dangerous,
to one where it is a normal part of the work we do at general meetings. We can't expect
such a change to occur in one meeting, or even one year, but at the same time, basic
initiatives by individual delegations can go a long way. Here are some ideas to get you
started.

• Be prepared: There is a reason why delegations get the motions a few weeks ahead
of the meeting. Share the motion package with the council members or relevant
committees at your local association. On university campuses, you can easily find
student groups or professors who have a strong knowledge of any given issue,
saving you the trouble of researching it from scratch. Compile a number of outside
sources providing different perspectives on the question to be discussed and, if you
can, share the results of your 16 research with delegates from other associations
before the general meeting. Don't only pick sources you agree with: the whole
point is to get people out of their political comfort zone.

• Aim for a diverse delegation: Have some new delegates at every meeting, so that
more of your members can experience a CFS general meeting. If some dedicated
members of your local association have been critical of certain CFS initiatives,
encourage them to attend and share their views where it matters (but make sure
they know what they're getting into, in order for the experience to be constructive).
Have a debriefing session at your local association a few days after the general
meeting, allowing your delegates to voice any questions and concerns and to make
suggestions for how to organize for the next meeting.

• As we said before, the fear of losing the trust of friends and colleagues is one cause
of debate aversion. To achieve the change of culture advocated here, it is essential
to not turn political debates into personal fights. Nobody feels good after losing a
contentious vote, but feeling disrespected during the debate leading to that vote is
much worse, as most of us already experienced one day or another. People who
disagree with us are not always stupid, or naive, or misled. Especially when it comes
 down to subtle differences in priorites and strategies, it doesn't hurt to recognize
that you understand where the other view is coming from, but you don't agree on
this specific point, rather than dismiss the other's discourse entirely. A good
exercise is to always emphasize this respect in one's intervention, even if it's as
simple as starting with a ''Yes, but...'' instead of a ''No''. If you sincerely considered
why the other can honestly and thoughtfully disagree, it will show.

• ''Be the change you seek'': All the above are variations on this theme at the
individual or single delegation level, but at some point you might want to step it up.
If you don't like the regular panel/workshop format, why not organize your own?
Find a lunch break where you can gather enough people interested in a topic. Better
yet, advocate for a dedicated schedule block for such initiatives. Many people would
appreciate having more than one choice for every workshop/panel session, if only to
avoid hearing the same introductory workshops they have attended since their first
CFS meeting.

• As one of the self-programmed workshops described above, or just as a

spontaneous event, consider simulated debates on a given post-secondary
education issue. One reason why we sometime have trouble refuting arguments
against our political positions is that we construct simplified versions of them
(''straw men''). In a simulated debate, some delegates will be on the side they don't
support in reality, giving them the opportunity to find the strongest, rather than the
weakest, of their opponents' arguments.

• As a last point, if you're interested to run for an elected position, try it (you have
nothing to lose). If other people you know and considering to run, support them.
We've seen higher turnouts on our local campuses when more candidates run in the
student elections. Bring more candidates at CFS positions, and more delegations will
take the vote seriously. Some positions (notably the three full-time executives)
necessitate a considerable level of energy and time investment. However, even the
holders of the less-intensive positions (such as constituency representatives) are
acclaimed most of the time.

We believe this approach could yield results if systematically implemented by a number of

delegations within the movement. A possible objection would be that its ''moderate'' appeal
could be lost on the most dogmatic individuals, those who already made up their mind and
won't consider any other view. In the next section, we take a look at this ''crusader
mindset'' and what to do about it.

2.3. A self-defeating crusade

The most dogmatic members of any activist group will often display two seemingly
paradoxical behaviours: an excess of confidence in the righteousness and importance of
their group, along with an excessively defensive reaction towards any claim putting into
question this righteousness and importance. Said otherwise, the group is portrayed as both
invincible and under perpetual threat.

Confirming one's righteousness often involves rationalizing dissent as some personal

problem. In private discussions, the crusaders won't hesitate to sneer or mock political
opponents. In the process of attacking a person's character, some activists will directly
infringe the same anti-oppression principles that they publicly advocate: women who don't
follow the party line are assumed to be under the influence of their romantic interest, some
students of colour are qualified as ''less black''. (Of course, when such insults are directed at
people on their side, the crusaders will make sure to denounce it on every possible forum.)

If dissent is unimaginable for the overconfident, it cannot be afforded from the point of view
of the overly defensive. Crusaders are truly obsessed about controlling all the public
information regarding the association. Notably, it took two general meeting motions before
the bylaws and policies of the organization17– documents which, in principle, we should be
proud of – appeared on the CFS website? A simultaneous attempt to also publicize the
plenary minutes was defeated. The minutes themselves simply indicate which motions were
adopted and which were defeated (the debate and vote count are not published). The
refusal to post them suggests that some delegates will gladly vote to support a series of
good causes, but do not want their membership, or the general public, to find out about
these motions. We believe it is fair to question the strength of a movement whose most
zealous members do not want to be accountable for the official stances they take.

Controlling the information published about the CFS appears to be one of the main reasons
behind the current referendum rules: as we already discussed, the referendum oversight
committee mechanism provides CFS representatives with the power to veto ''No'' side
campaigns materials. The tendency of the CFS to threaten libel lawsuits against student or
even mainstream
18 media over relatively minor details, such as amalgamating CFS and CFS-
Services , constitutes another example of the same mindset.

These efforts at controlling information often proved to be futile and self-defeating: CFS
bylaws, policies and minutes are posted on third-party sites, and student newspapers have
printed copies of the letters they received from the CFS lawyers, giving more bad press to
the organization. Despite this, and possibly due to the same culture which prevents other
CFS tactics from being critically reviewed within the organization, the most zealous
''crusaders'' are virtually never questioned. Not only do their tactics hurt the movement on
the long run, they turn away many ''moderate'' student activists and can hurt the target of
their sneers at a very personal level.

As always, a vocal minority can dominate the discourse if the majority remains silent. Here
it is extremely important for concerned student activists to take a principled stance against
any type of character assassination, especially when it has sexist or racist overtones.
Politely refuse to discuss someone's character or opinions with their absence.

On the transparency question, a good place to start is on one's home campus. Make all
relevant information on the CFS easily accessible to your local members. Keep a
professional but friendly relationship with your local student media, so that you can later
have a calm discussion when conflicts arise, rather than resorting to expensive lawsuits.
Your transparency efforts should reduce these onflicts, anyway, since people who have the
official information are less likely to make mistakes or rely on hearsay.

If you maintain an approach of conciliation within your local membership, chances are that
students on your campus will spent less time fighting each other and achieve more lobbying
gains. All you need then is for some people to spread the word, and your tactics will soon be
emulated.

2.4. Closed circles

One consequence of the zealousness and defensive attitude of some CFS activists is that
many types of information and priviledge are exchanged
19 within closed circles, including only
those people who can be sufficiently trusted. Having loyal supporters from across the
country can often become a easy substitute to the creation of a strong local activist base.
This is clearly connected to the CFS referendum rules allowing representatives of other
student associations to take part in the campaign. It is also not uncommon for a former or
current student association executive to be nominated as chairperson 20 of the Board of
Directors or Chief Returning Officer for another local association. In principle, those are
non-partisan positions that enforce the meeting rules or election rules of the local
association. Asking if these persons can perform their duties neutrally, is like asking if you
could be a neutral judge at the trial of a close friend or political ally.

Just as the crusader problem, the first thing to do about this closed circle mentality is to
avoid participating in it. Everyone will inevitably find closer friends among their student
association colleagues; it doesn't have to lead to a hierarchy of priviledge and trust. Using
one's power to favour friends is a conflict of interest, pure and simple. As difficult as it is in
a university context, keeping a distinction between personal life and professional life is a
prerequisite for the job.

2.5. A word about campaigns

For the last section of this discussion of the CFS culture, we move away from internal issues
to address a common criticism of the CFS political action, more precisely, its consistent
emphasis on tution fees. The promise of reduced tuition fees is an easy way to win student
support, just as the promise of tax cuts is an easy way to win votes from middle-class
citizens. They remain empty promises, however, unless they are part of a full plan to deal
with the consequences of the cuts. The ''Reduce tuition fees'' message is ultimately
incomplete.

Of course, the campaign to freeze or reduce tuition fees (depending of the year) is not the
CFS' only one, but it often dominates CFS demonstrations and public discourse. This single
focus can give the impression that students only care about their wallet. We believe it would
be fairly simple for delegates to change this focus based on the currenct political context.
After all, the most recent national lobbying success of the CFS was the replacement of the
Canadian Millenium Scholarships Foundation with a national system of student grants.
Whether one agrees or not with this particular policy option, it was a concrete, precise and
feasible proposal. The CFS membership could also be mobilized to support specific bills on
post-secondary education. The idea of a Canadian Post-Secondary Education Act has been
part of the CFS campaigns guide for a long time, without having been the focus of any mass
mobilization effort. Such campaigns require a more elaborate message than the
straightforward call to reduce tuition fees: however, there is no good reason to
underestimate our membership's capacity to deal with complex political questions.

PART 3: STRATEGIES FOR CHANGE

At first glance, it might seem impossible for the average local association representative,
during their short mandate of one or two years, to create any significant change in a large
organization that holds very strong traditions and whose leadership has interests to keep
things as they are. This description could hold true for both the CFS and your university
administration. The good news, then, is that lobbying strategies you develop with one can
be very useful when dealing with the other.

Maybe the first and most important lesson we learned from dealing with university
administrations is that student action requires a diversity of tactics and a diversity of roles.
There are times for presenting motions, there are times for behind-the-scene negotiations
and there are time for mediatized protests. Some people are comfortable in board rooms,
others in front of a megaphone. We need all of them in our movement. This said, we look at
more specific types of strategic decisions below.

3.1. Inside and out

A common dilemma among activists is the question of affecting an organization or

government from inside (lobbying, negotiations) or outside (protests, mass media). The
insider approach works if the people you are lobbying can be convinced of the advantages of
your initiative by arguments alone. One example we raised earlier is the addition of
constituency group representatives on the CFS National Executive: such a change is likely to
pass, since by supporting the status quo one would imply that some constituency groups –
those currently represented – are worth more than other.

If the institutional leaders have every interest to maintain the status quo, but a broader
population (in this context, the general student membership) could be easily convinced of
the necessity of the change and be mobilized around it, then an outsider approach seems
more natural. Consider the case of the CFS referendum bylaws: the organization's
leadership strongly support the current rules, even if few rank and file students would not
find them biased in some way. This is a situation where you'd want to circulate petitions,
write op-eds, organize demonstrations, etc. Yet most previous attempt at reforming those
bylaws have relied on purely internal tactics. Simultaneous grassroots movements on
several campuses would constitute a serious force for change within the Federation,
especially since it uses the Federation's own motto, ''strength in numbers''.

3.2. Time to move

We have stated earlier our belief that policy amendments reflect changes that have already
taken place in the culture. Whether you support this view or whether you think that
structural change can precede cultural change, you will probably agree that bringing forward
a motion that has no chance a passing is a waste of time.

Just because motions are the only recorded part of general meetings, doesn't mean they are
the most important one. Just because you need a motion to create an official CFS campaign,
doesn't mean the actual campaign can't start before the motion. One thing we hopefully
learned from all those symbolic motions of support is that ''Be it resolved'' clauses won't
create change by themselves. Yet writing a motion is often the first thing that comes to the
mind of a student activist, including (ironically) those who criticize the ''top-down'' feel of
CFS campaigns.

Each of the eighty-something student unions within the CFS can take a stance
independently of the national association and each of the hundreds or thousands of students
can have their own opinions, independently of their local association. A student group can
organize to face a campus-specific problem well before their local association reacts with an
official endorsement, and likewise many student associations in the country can act around
the same issue before the CFS is officially involved. This is what we would expect of any
truly bottom-up organization.

Sometimes you can achieve more by informal networking at general meetings than through
the formal (committee) components of the meeting. Informal does not necessarily mean
covert: indeed, to oppose the ''closed circle'' mentality described above, attempts at reform
should be as open and overt as possible. People will also feel freer to express their opinion if
they see others doing so without fear or shame.

3.3. Avoiding burnout

As they spend many volunteer hours towards their cause, with few acknowledgements (and
maybe even some hostility), activists of all types are particularly vulnerable to burnout.
Some people might be more resilient than others, but in the end what matters is knowing
your own limits and feeling comfortable to take a break for the sake of your own mental
(not to mention physical) health.

Some tips previously mentioned can be, from our experience, useful to prevent burnout:
sharing with others the work and the emotional burden of going against the current;
addressing political disagreements in a way that doesn't create personal conflicts; etc.

Getting dragged into unproductive debates, whether in person or online, can easily burn a
lot of one's energy. So one needs to learn when to politely get out of a discussion leading
nowhere. There are various types of taunts and insults that can be used to provocate you,
so learn to recognize them and not fall into the trap. For activists, anger management is
nothing less than a survival skill. Only debate with the closed-minded when there's hope to
convince more moderate people who might be witness of this debate, and even in that case,
avoid getting emotionally involved in the debate.

3.4. Pay it forward

The quick turnover of student activists increases the importance of proper transition with
one's successors. If you are on the executive of a local student association, you should want
be to leave the association in a better shape than it was when you got in, and you should
want its future leaders to use your experience to help them in their own projects for the
association.

This is the main reason this guide was written in the first place. It is admittedly basic and
incomplete, but we hope that its contents will spark some much needed discussion and
provide a base for future additions and improvements by future generations of student
activists.

FOOTNOTES

1 http://www.caut.ca

2 http://www.aucc.ca

3 http://www.cfs-fcee.ca/html/english/about/member_locals.php (numbers in this section

were valid on November 2008)

4 http://www.casa.ca/index.php/member-associations.html

5 A current version of the CFS Bylaws can be found at http://www.cfs-fcee.ca/html/english/

research/constating_documents.php .
6 This was apparent in the recent wave of defederation referenda in BC. See for example
http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/98-1/issue7/cfs.html.

7 Based on approximate enrollment numbers available online for York University, University
of Toronto, Ryerson University, George Brown College, Concordia University, McGill
University (graduate students only), Dawson College, University of Ottawa, Carleton
University, La Cité Collégiale, University of Manitoba, University of Winnipeg. Of the national
full-time executives since 2005, two came from Ryerson, two from Concordia, one from
Carleton and one from Manitoba. The other three came from Saskatchewan, Memorial
University (Newfoundland) and King's College (NS).

8 According to the Definitions section of CFS bylaws, ''referendum'' includes a vote at the
general meeting of a local association. To our knowledge, no recent vote to federate or
defederate from the CFS was held at a general meeting. Nevertheless, this extended
definition of a referendum might cause some loopholes in the current bylaws.

9 In the 2008 amendments to this Bylaw, ''referendum to defederate'' was changed to

''referendum on continued membership'', but we will use former term in this document to
avoid unnecessary euphemisms.

10 Oddly, Section 2b.x refers to a referendum to federate ''missing quorum''. We must

assume that this refers to the local association's quorum. We also note that the local
association is required to organize another referendum within six months in this eventuality,
while missing quorum on a referendum to defederate would likely prohibit any other
referendum in the next two years.

11 The original 1981 bylaws and many other historical CFS documents were posted on this
site: http://www.studentunion.ca/historical/index.html which was recently taken down. The
ROC was created around 1995.

12 Student associations strongly oppose outside interference in their own democratic

processes (see for example http://oncampus.macleans.ca/education/2009/07/06/
conservatives-accused-of-meddling-in-york-u-election/), which suggests that such a rule
would not be hard to justify.

13 The feasibility of a proper computer program to carry that task is not an issue. It is in
fact a very simple problem, compared to other very common tasks – say, creating the class
schedule for a whole university campus.

14 The validity of the Simon Fraser Student Society referendum, which was run outside of
the Referendum Oversight Committee framework, is still on trial at the time of writing this
report. The CFS however lost a major legal battle recently, when a University of
Saskatchewan student successfully contested a 2005 referendum to join the Federation:
http://www.themanitoban.com/2006-2007/0314/120.A.banner.darkly.php .

15 It is interesting to note that during plenaries, the assembly chair asks delegates to
respect different views by not applauding after a contentious vote. This doesn't prevent
delegates from breaking this directive whenever the minority is small enough to get away
with it.

16 Usually, at least one member of your local association should have access to some CFS
e-mail listserv. If not, use your own e-mail or Facebook contacts.
17 The second vote actually defeated a motion to put a link from the main website to these
documents, since they were effectively inaccessible. Thankfully, the website designers
eventually put the link anyway.

18 The two organizations share the same officers, the same by-laws and the same general
meetings. If using the name CFS to refer both to CFS and CFS-Services is a mistake, it is
committed at least as often by CFS supporters.

19 The idea that there might even be a hierarchy among CFS supporters was suggested
when referendum plans in BC were leaked in 2008 (http://www.cfstruth.ca/
2008_02_04_ksa_media_release.html). In these plans, potential CFS volunteers were given
a letter grade form A+ to C. The exact significance of this rating system remains a mystery.

20 These nominations have sometimes been covered by student media,

e.g. http://www.peak.sfu.ca/the-peak/2003-1/issue5/ne-sfss2.html and
http://www.themanitoban.com/2006-2007/0221/104.Cro.connected.to.UMSU.Execs.php.