The occupational failure, where to now for USI

by grown up. Fri Aug 20, 2004 17:05

the student movement now looks weak in the eyes of the government.
oh yes. Where are all the strong students gone eh?
you effete & utterly useless selfish little monsters. The only thing you ever protest about is either condoms or fees. Maybe you haven't realised but we have too many graduates. Possibly you're parents raised you with late 1970 notions of social upward mobility? Why do you think you merit a university education?

by Fergal Fri Aug 20, 2004 17:21

All colleges have very short collective memories, due to the transient nature of being a student. This might explain why year in, year out the USI make yet another pointless protest, oblivious to the fact that the government will never take them seriously. And why should they I mean, what're you gonna deo, go on strike? I was on a de facto strike for the whole time I spent in college, and no-one even noticed.

If you're lucky enough to be in college, you'll get very little sympathy whn you start complaining.
The USI would be best advised to concentrate on areas where they can do some good, e.g. Welfare activities, helping individual students, rather than wasting time and money on grandstanding protests like this one.

When I was a student, most people I knew regarded their own SU with contempt, and the USI with utter indifference. They were seen as (and for that matter, were) training grounds for show-offs with political aspirations. It doesn't look like much has changed.

by Groundhog Fri Aug 20, 2004 20:53

"When I was a student, most people I knew regarded their own SU with contempt, and the USI with utter indifference. They were seen as (and for that matter, were) training grounds for show-offs with political aspirations. It doesn't look like much has changed"

When i was a sabbatical officer I regarded people like you with contempt, so don't feel too aggrieved. I never did - after all, moany assholes like you weren't going to vote anyhow so I could insult you all I wanted!

by Sat Aug 21, 2004 13:53

"When i was a sabbatical officer I regarded people like you with contempt, so don't feel too aggrieved. I never did - after all, moany assholes like you weren't going to vote anyhow so I could insult you all I wanted!"

Well in most colleges that would put him in about 80% of the student body. The sheer irrelevancy of SU politics or even the SU for that matter can be seen in the level of apathy displayed by students, at least in the major dublin universities that I am aware of. I think fergals last paragraph rings quite true, as does your attitude, to how most students feel. What happened to the calls for student self governance that are supposed to be the hallmarks of student politics since '68 and the university occupations that accompanied that period?

by Conor - SAucd Sat Aug 21, 2004 15:19

“We might very well say, and no one would disagree with us, that the student is the most universally despised creature in France, apart from the priest and the policeman. Naturally he is usually attacked from the wrong point of view, with specious reasons derived from the ruling ideology. He may be worth the contempt of a true revolutionary, yet a revolutionary critique of the student situation is currently taboo on the official Left.” - Internationale Situationnist, University of Strasbourg 1966.

Ciaran was correct in asserting that the move to occupy a government building was a step in the right direction for USI. As dinosaur in student terms (2001-date) I would also question that organisation, and its composite Student Union’s motive for doing so. USI officers have been apparently “radical” before – occupying buildings – chaining themselves to gates – polluting the Liffey with an appropriate number of rubber ducks, but the USI has never been actually radical, that is “favouring, or tending to produce extreme changes in fundamental political, economic, or social conditions / institutions, etc”.

When USI takes action, it is to attract media attention and/or justify its own existence to its membership. Unfortunately a USI officer’s definition of “Direct Action” differs significantly from Ciarans.

I loose Ciaran when he says “It is only through action which directly attacks the state and brings those in power down from the pedestals they have placed themselves upon that we as a collective unit can hope for victory”. Short of bringing down the state, or radically overhauling it – and all it represents, I cannot see this form of action being any more effective than the postcards ‘n interviews tactics being used by the USI at the moment. Posturing by a few, or even a few hundred students – occupying buildings and the like - will not bring about any significant change in government policy or social reality.

A major question at this point is “what do we mean by education?”. Education is “the act or process of acquiring knowledge”. In reality, Education is not for sale, because it can not be traded. Training institutions are for sale, and everyone apart from the far left understand this.

The issue of Education itself will never be discussed whilst we argue with the government over how much it costs. Education costs nothing. While the library&bookshop is open, your friends have books, and HyperText exists, it is up to yourself to look after your education. Not the State, Not an Institution, Not a lecturer. My FORMAL education ended the day I learnt to read and write. My formal training began the day after. I am always struck by how the most educated people I meet have never had a formal education. You can’t make people interested – or interesting, you can just facilitate them. As it stands, my university (UCD) has facilitated my education to a certain extent (stocking a library, funding societies&sports clubs), and has fully ensured my training in my chosen field of technical expertise. Access to an educational milieu, and educational facilities does not EXPLICITLY mean access to universities.

Anyone who thinks a slip of paper with MENG or PHDphil written on it constitutes a point in a process of education is fooling himself or herself. Anyone who thinks that learning how to balance some ballast or write an essay on critical analysis is an act in education is a fool.

The USI officer board are wholly unrepresentative of the Students of Ireland, their collective objectives, concerns and principals. So are Conservative youth, So too is Ciaran Wiefer. So am I. If any seriously radical movement involving Students emerges in Ireland, it will not be through the ranks of USI, Student Unions, or elected Student Officials. Any movement of the sort Ciaran moots above must come from the grassroots, and stem from a genuine disenchantment with capitalism. Since a vast majority of students are from middle class to ruling class backrounds, we can safely assume that students will not lead this movement. The access to education issue will not be seriously dealt with by Students, because it is Statistically and Economically not in their interest. That is not to say that students cannot take part in a wider progressive movement.

Student radicalism as it stands will always be limited to the campus and will always take the form of staged, isolated events - Optimistic by nature and defined by failure.

The issues surrounding fees and access to education are reformist, not revolutionary. The attempt by certain students and student leaders to present in the semiotics of radicalism are dishonest, and 95% of students realise this. The real issues that USI should be battling with revolutionary zest are cultural - the rise in the number of ITs, the decline of the public library system, and for the right of all to internet access, the decline and fall of intellectual space, the defining of culture and identity by economics and governments rather than individuals and individuals .

For the overwhelming majority, a college education in a contemporary university is a stepping-stone to a better job, better pay packet, better house, and better car. Ideally, as a social gain, these options should be open to all classes. In return for that paycheck and associated rewards, the future student must repay their capitalist masters in some form, and “Education” doesn’t pay. Training does. "students" are not being educated. This issue should be the most important to students - not the cost or value of their skills.

Universities are intellectual battlegrounds, and provide the Ideal space for revolutionary Ideas to be peddled, distorted and discussed. Students will never show the “unflinching belief in their tactics” that Ciaran suggests, because students are already subservient to capitalism, and the power structure of the day. He is quite right to suggest “the prospect of reaching third level education is a non reality for many” I think he must accept that while this is a reality, student radicalism will always descend into that which was once lived, a parody, a front, and a photo opportunity.

by grown up Sat Aug 21, 2004 18:23

please dont try and compare yourselves to the students of 1966 or 1968 or at any stage before you were conceived. For many important reasons-
You are not the children a generation who were at war. Your mammies and daddies did not have to make decision whilst you were being conceived and bottle fed on whether or not to support Vichy, or which resistance faction were the right ones.
And you were not born into a Europe which needed qualified technicians and professionals to launch the "post war recovery".
Rather you were born into a Europe where there are now too many graduates competing for very few positions in _managerial_ roles which increasingly are better educuated within the corporations' own educational programs.

by Starstruck - UCD Left/DGN Sat Aug 21, 2004 18:32

Occupation isnt spelt with the word mediation in it.Especially when the mediation involved is done by someone whos vested interests may jeopardise the goal of the action and the overall cause.
Good action,poor result due to lack of drive and commitment.
Its like a fellow activist said afterwards while we were having a cigarette,you can fail your exams one year with 5 per cent but the next year even if you leap up to 35 per cent you've still failed.
Lets hope USI make that extra leap the next time and pass with 45.
Critcal Mass this Friday 6pm Garden of Rememberance,USI banner more than welcome!!!!!
Lots of students cycle.....

by Conor - SAucd Sat Aug 21, 2004 20:23

If you have something constructive to say, then say it. If you want to do an analysis of my generation wrapped up in pejoratives, then start a new thread. I cant take what you are saying seriously.

Starstruck: although Im not into scorecarding the student movement (cause I dance to disco and don’t like rock), I figure that if you fail for 2 consecutive years you get booted out of college.

by g.u. Sat Aug 21, 2004 22:38

can you morally and ethically justify the amount of public money spent on third level education?
can you really so blytherly and ignorantly (all-be-it) at such a young and impressionable age, without any real life experience worth talking about, so un-self critically defend a system that serves to prop the globalised capitalist economy by providing key corporations with cheaply trained employees and consigning the majority of other graduates to a life of poorly adjusted precarious worker?

I REPEAT-
why do you think you merit a university education.

by g.up Sat Aug 21, 2004 22:47

What dear boy makes you think you deserve to sit in my classroom?
& then what exactly is it that merits your particular little lobby's occupation of a government office?
& What makes you sure the education you seek can be imparted in a university and what in goodness name makes you think the poor lost generation that attempt to teach you are qualified in any other sense than being neutered idiologically and having "served the time" - just like you dear boy.

Some fifty years ago money or social class alone guaranteed a place in university.
Your senior professors' teachers would not have passed the state examinations you have. Education is in a mess dear boy, but the answers really aren't going to come from "your generation".

So stick your fucking USI as far as it will go up your young and probably completely unstretched by mortgage, death, real life, marriage, divorce and kids ARSE.

the only comfort is - "we fail people like you".

by Starstruck - UCD Left Sun Aug 22, 2004 13:34

You can fail two years in a row (same year) and cintinue in with a little verbal persuasion...
Some1 i no is doin 3rd arts for the 4th time this year!

by Ex USI member Mon Aug 23, 2004 13:03

If SU's want to make a real impact on the government they would link up with workers in struggle such as CIE, Aer Lingus and Aer Rianta workers as well as campaigns such as the anti bin tax campaign. The government couldn't care less if a few SU officers chain themselves to something or even if 10,000 students march on Leinster House. They do sit up and take notice if there is a generalised movement against the movement that involves organised workers.

by Ray Mon Aug 23, 2004 13:24

How do you reckon the SUs should link up with workers in struggle? March out to Dublin Airport? Occupy the Dublin Bus offices?
Why not call for a General Strike Now! while you're at it?

by bonzo Mon Aug 23, 2004 14:47

First I'd prefer to stick to the discussion on the merits of the protest. A constuctive discussion on where it went wrong and why people view it as a failure.

But people on this thread try to insult students just because they are young and inexperienced and also insult students unions and call them irrelevent etc.....

First age has nothing to do with experience (some kids i work with aged 8 to 12 have experienced more in their lives and are more mature than alot of so called grown ups). The facts are that these kids are held back in our education system because of their socio economic back ground.

Second alot of students (15%) are mature students including students who took part in that occupation.

Third I believe that money spent on educating people is well spent. Why should 3rd level education be a preserve of the rich. That same argument about free education being a waste of money for the middle class was used when free 2nd level ed was being introduced.

4th Su's do lots of good work for individual students with their welfare programs and they do more constructive work on equal access to education ( UCDs access week for example).

5th I believe that education at all levels in this country needs improvement, free eduaction at all levels needs to preserved and introduced where not all ready present. The goal should be that all citizens get the same opportuinities in life no matter what their personal circumstances. This is worth fighting for and easily justified.

by R. Isible Mon Aug 23, 2004 20:36

You wrote: "The real issues that USI should be battling with revolutionary zest are cultural - the rise in the number of ITs"

And I don't know what an "IT" is. Not trying to score any points, just want to know.

by hari Mon Aug 23, 2004 21:07

Could you please explain how anybody can make a link between a discussion on student unions occupation of Dept of Education offices and Household Waste Collection Charges? I know that recently "anti bin tax" campaigners and "anti-war" campaigners have shared platforms. Why? While I may very well support both causes, there is no connection between the two. Linking separate campaigns like this serves no purpose but to alienate people and discredit one or both causes.

by Conor - SAucd Mon Aug 23, 2004 21:13

Instead of investing money in Universities, the government has decided to concentrate education spending on “Institutes of Technology” or ITs. Although many University courses are essentially the same as IT courses – only directly to a higher standard (Engineering / Law / Science / Business), ITs tend more toward the skilful and technical rather than the educational and intellectual.

IT courses also tend to be more flagrantly tailored to suit industrial demands in their vicinity. Extra curricular activities are not as well facilitated in ITs, society and sports funding is lower, and students must sign in for each lecture. Not exactly a “well rounded” education – for want of a better term. Universities are not much different these days – just a little better at facilitating the individual in their broader education.

by R. Isible Mon Aug 23, 2004 23:43

Interestingly enough Kevin St. DIT produces science graduates (course title is "Applied Science" or somesuch) who then go down to Trinity College, pay them around 1000 quid and are given a degree from Trinity.

Apparently their educational levels are high enough to meet Trinity's standards. Also the really elite institutes in France developed out of what were the equivalent of the ITs. (Know you're not making that point, just musing).

by Conor - SAucd Tue Aug 24, 2004 01:02

I have no doubt that standards of TRAINING are as high in certain ITs as in Universities, However it is unfortunate that students in ITs don’t have EDUCATIONAL facilities provided, that they have to sign into lectures, etc.

My point is that USI should also campaign for the transformation of ITs into universities (in more than just name) that would not just offer degree courses, but diploma etc standard levels in training – whilst treating their students like adults, and maintaining sporting, societal, and other “educational” facilities to a higher standard.

There are 2 principal reasons why governments don’t want to do this:

1) Cost.
2) Possible gain in the cultural awareness and social conscience of the Individual. As a school leaver, one is accustomed to the drudge of the leaving cert, keeping hours that industry likes (up at 9, home at 4, homework…). Every technical and scientific graduate lost to another less industrious profession is a monetary loss to the state.

by paulc Tue Aug 24, 2004 01:37

same goes for cdvec then ?

although... don't want to veer to far away from the practical

by ex USI member Tue Aug 24, 2004 14:34

There is quite a clear link between the anti bin tax campaign, the fight against college fees and struggles against all other cuts. They all are products of cutbacks being implemented by the government. If these campaigns do not unite, 1 - Students can and willl be just ignored and 2 - it allows the government play each movement off each other, for example the government could say 'we can't afford to pay increased social welfare because the students want grants'.

By uniting and targetting the government, who are the real enemy, I can't see how this weakens the students camapaign against cutbacks and fees.

by Ray Tue Aug 24, 2004 14:38

Its all very well to talk about how bin taxes, Aer Rianta privatisation, and student fees are all products of government cutbacks. But what exactly are you proposing should be done to link the struggles against them? Motions at student conferences? Letters of support? A joint march of students, Aer Rianta workers, and householders against the bin tax? A general strike?
What EXACTLY do you think the student unions should be doing?

by Groundhog Tue Aug 24, 2004 21:10

"I think fergals last paragraph rings quite true, as does your attitude, to how most students feel."

Why should I care about how you or most students feel? It's not like you did anything then, and it's not like you're going to do anything now.

Fair play to those who got involved - at least they got off their arses and did something.

by ex USI member Wed Aug 25, 2004 05:00

I really can't see why you are getting caught up in the nitty gritty of my suggestion. the point I am making is that if students are to be successful in overturning government cuts in education they willl NEED to link up in a common struggle with workers (both inside and outside the education sector).

This can take many forms. For example; first off, motions could be passed expressing solidarity with workers in CIÉ, Aer Rianta, Anti Bin Tax campaign etc which call for a common struggle against the government. This is of course not enough, the SU's should link up with these workers and communities and organise effective joint actions such as visiting picket lines and participating in demonstrations. This was done, to my knowledge to a limited extent in UCD with the anti bin tax campaign in South Dublin last year. Such would give huge confidence to these workers and will show to the government that students will not be an easy push over as they are with these joke occupations and photo opp demos.

by Ray Wed Aug 25, 2004 11:02

"I really can't see why you are getting caught up in the nitty gritty of my suggestion. "

Because its easy to chant slogans and mouth platitudes, and harder to put forward concrete, workable suggestions.

"For example; first off, motions could be passed expressing solidarity with workers in CIÉ, Aer Rianta, Anti Bin Tax campaign etc which call for a common struggle against the government."

Back when I was a USI member, motions like this would be described by the right-wing as 'gay Nicaraguan whale' motions. And you know what? They had a point. You can pass a motion in support of anything you like in an SU or USI council, but that isn't going to make a blind bit of difference to the students you are supposed to be representing, the people you are supposed to be supporting with your motion, or any of the governments, anywhere, that you are criticising. *

(Okay, that's a slight exagerration. It can be useful from an informational point of view, letting people on the council know about some issue you think is important)

"This is of course not enough, the SU's should link up with these workers and communities and organise effective joint actions such as visiting picket lines and participating in demonstrations."

Are you expecting thousands of students to come out on these demonstrations? Or just the SU officers? Because I can tell you which option has a possibility of coming true.

"This was done, to my knowledge to a limited extent in UCD with the anti bin tax campaign in South Dublin last year. Such would give huge confidence to these workers"

Hmm, I must have missed that. Did the workers in South Dublin storm the Dail last year after being addressed by a couple of UCD students? Maybe I was on holiday.

"and will show to the government that students will not be an easy push over as they are with these joke occupations and photo opp demos."

I've got news for you, 'ex USI member'. In all but a very few situations, students _are_ an easy push over. They don't get involved in political activity until a couple of months after they start college, then they stop for Christmas holidays, then you have about a month or two of demonstrations before the exams start getting too close for comfort.

Outside of a general upheaval (eg France 1968), the only sustained campaign students will run is a campaign based in the colleges. Overcrowding, fees, lack of facilities - these are all issues that students can and will work on for more than a couple of weeks.

I'm not attacking students in this, by the way. The same is true of everyone, pretty much. You can organise a strong campaign in a workplace around something like wages or working conditions**. You can even, if you're lucky, campaign about something that affects people far away, if there's a link to your workplace (the apartheid campaign in Dunnes, for example). But if you stand up in your canteen today 'ex USI member' and shout "Down tools lads, lets go march in support of the UCD students"... well, don't bother making too many placards in advance, is all I'm saying.

People don't go marching in support of stuff at the drop of a hat (okay, students might, but only twice a year). They want to know, quite reasonably, what they're getting out of it. And they know that the government isn't going to fall because 200 students turn up on a bin tax demo.

You're trying to wish a revolutionary situation into existence. You seem to think that because, in a period of massive struggle you will get cross-pickets and joint demonstrations, that you can create a period of massive struggle by criticising student unions for not organising these joint demonstrations. But this is not just about a 'crisis of leadership'. This is not 'Field of Dreams'. You can call for these things, but the students and workers aren't going to come.


* The Coke campaign is a good example of how you can work on issues in support of people on another continent, while remaining relevant. Instead of just saying "This union is appalled by etc, etc, and condemns it in the strongest possible terms" it said "This is a bad situation, and we can have a direct effect on it by doing something right here on campus"

** the fact that, in many workplaces people expect to be around for decades, not a couple of years, is also important.

by Dan - UCDSU Thu Aug 26, 2004 17:12

If you expect us to conjure up a mass movement of students and workers overnight, don't hold your breath. The first step along the road towards this notional goal, is to make people aware of the connections between the different issues. Even if we can't stage joint actions, we can at least understand that we face the same enemy and promote each other's causes as much as possible. This is in itself a victory, because the government is determined to play a game of divide and rule, playing one social group off another and evading the blame itself.

Let's say a student rep is being interviewed. The reporter asks them: "How can you justify free fees, when hospitals are being closed?" It makes a big difference if they declare their support for people fighting health cutbacks, rather than saying "that's nothing to do with me, I only care about MY issues." The whole spin the government has put on any third-level cutback is that students are privileged, so the money should go to someone more worthwhile. This is totally undercut if students DON'T behave like selfish gits who care about nobody but themselves (as some people in the "movement", with whom I have argued more than once, would like to be the case). Equally, it's important that other groups fighting cutbacks see students as allies, not enemies. I for one am delighted that Dublin bus workers can see that USI support their campaign against privatisation; I'd be surprised if they weren't glad to receive some support, given the overwhelming hostility of the media.

Once we have got a consensus around this, then we can move onto considering what kind of practical support we can give to people. I don't have any magic formula for this, but I'n quite sure that opportunities will arise. UCDSU was able to support one of our students who was jailed in connection with the bin tax protests last year. You mentioned the Coke boycott, another excellent example. After all, it was much LESS likely that Irish students would be able to help Colombian bottling workers, given the enormous geographic and cultural difference, yet we did.

You should know better than to quote approvingly that sad conservative line about "gay Nicaraguan whales". What bothers people like that is not that solidarity gestures are ineffectual; on the contrary, it worries them that such gestures might be effective. I believe that snide little phrase was first coined around the time when the international student movement had made a very significant contribution to the defeat of apartheid. Today's crop of Toryboys were enraged by the Coke campaign, because they knew it was more than an empty gesture - it might actually have an effect.

BTW, since "grown up" demonstrated his/her own gross immaturity by throwing childish insults, I can't resist the temptation to point out that he/she is a bitter, decrepit old twat who should leave the discussion to grown ups

by Ray Thu Aug 26, 2004 18:10

A couple of quick points first

"Let's say a student rep is being interviewed. ...It makes a big difference if they declare their support for people fighting health cutbacks, rather than saying "that's nothing to do with me, I only care about MY issues."

When was the last time a SU or USI rep said that in an interview? Straw men are easy to argue against... And seriously, who does it make a big difference _to_?

"I for one am delighted that Dublin bus workers can see that USI support their campaign against privatisation; I'd be surprised if they weren't glad to receive some support, given the overwhelming hostility of the media."

Quick experiment (the readers can try this at home too)
1. Get on a bus
2. Ask the driver how he feels about USI's stance on Dublin Bus privatisation
I'll give you 10 to 1 that he says "What's USI?", followed shortly by "What's their stance on privatisation?"*


The problem I was trying to point out is that 'lending student support' and 'linking areas of struggle' too often boils down to 'passing a motion in SU council, that nobody else will ever hear about' and 'congratulating yourself later in the bar about how radical you are'. (and I'm sure I wasn't immune to this either, back when I was a student)

The fact is that nurses, bus drivers, binmen, and other workers are not waiting with bated breath for the results of USI congress. They don't know and they don't really care what motions are passed in UCD SU, because they know that 'motions of support' are not going to make any difference to their lives.

That's not to say that students couldn't make a difference. For example, there are tens of thousands of students in Dublin, many of whom take the bus in and out of college each day. If all of those students said that they would refuse to use privatised services, that would be a real gesture of support, particularly if they demonstrated their seriousness by, for example, boycotting Dublin Bus for a week.

Thing is, I know, you know, Dublin Bus workers know, and the Department of Transport knows that there isn't going to be a boycott.** There's not going to be any action taken by the students unions in support of the bus workers. So the motions passed in support of them might as well be in support of gay nicaraguan whales.

The Coke campaign worked because it wasn't just motions, it had a set of practical, realisable goals, that would have an actual effect. Abortion was such a long-running struggle in the colleges partly because it had a direct effect on something in the colleges - the student handbooks and counselling services. The trouble with 'linking up' with the campaign against the bin tax, for example, is that there weren't any such in-college linkages, it was just a paper trail.

The right-wing will continue to condemn campaigns as irrelevant to students, and the kind of pointless posturing that demonstrates how far removed council members are from the real concerns of the student body. The way to counter this is not by shouting about how right-wing they are (they already know), but by showing how these campaigns _are_ relevant to students. Not by reciting slogans about the solidarity of the oppressed, but by showing how students can put that solidarity into practice. And that means coming up with real, concrete, practical ideas, rather than calling for 'a generalised movement against the government that involves organised workers', as if calling for it would somehow make it appear.


*Yeah, once you explain it all to him he might be happier. But he'll be just as happy if you tell him that you support the Dublin Bus workers yourself, and don't mention USI at all.

** I'd be delighted for you to prove me wrong on this

by Ray Thu Aug 26, 2004 18:13

"Today's crop of Toryboys "

I thought you were posting from UCD. Do the Conservative and Unionist party have a branch there?

by Conor - SAucd Thu Aug 26, 2004 23:55

The toryboys in UCD are posting on this forum RAY.

by Ray Fri Aug 27, 2004 11:38

Or is it the current right-wing in UCD? Are they not members of the KBC?