Elections for each major, college, and university occur every year, starting from October if early, and last until November or even December. Details of the procedures for elections differ for every major, college, or university, but the overall picture is the same for all elections at KU. As many may already know, elections determining the yearly Korea University Student Association (KUSA) president are planned and organized by the Central Election Management Commission. Therefore, members of this commission know about the election procedures in great detail, while most ordinary students do not.

 

Plans for the elections can be set by first gathering a Central Election Management Commission. Each year the Central Management Committee of KUSA has the responsibility to gather and announce the members of the Central Election Management Commission 10 days before the last day of candidate registration. During this process, the KUSA presidents, student association of every college, and KU Club Association are each obliged to send at least one of its members as a member of the Central Election Management Commission. This commission has the duty to plan and organize the election process so that it is maintained democratically.

 

Those wishing to become a candidate must gather a campaign team with a team leader and have it approved by the Central Election Management Commission. Then the candidates must receive recommendations from at least 600 KU students, fill out a candidate registration form, send a photograph to use for campaign posters, prepare a file with the candidate's main election pledges and the name of their campaign team, and submit many more documents that are required by the Central Election Management Commission.The student regulations, including all of this information, are provided by the KUSA.

 

The Election Management Commission and campaign team leaders gather together to decide on the specific rules to elections that are not already written in the Election Regulations. These specified rules are mostly promises between different campaign teams under the arbitration of the Election Management Commission to guarantee the fairness of the election. One rule that many students do not know concerns corrective orders, cautions, and warnings. Two corrective orders regarding the same problem is equivalent to one caution, and two cautions are the same as one warning. If a candidate receives three warnings, the whole campaign team would be disqualified.

 

Also, the candidate recommendation and registration period must be within three days, the electioneering period must be within nine days, and the voting period must be within three days. Saturdays and Sundays are not included when counting the number of days. While many details are usually determined by the Election Management Commission, this is considered as part of the overall plan, and thus is decided by the Central Management Committee of KUSA. The Election Management Commission receives the power and rights to organize and run the KUSA for sections directly related to KUSA presidential elections. Therefore, all students must realize that it has a lot of power in determining what the next year's student society might look like.

 

There are specific clauses and regulations about the elections that ordinary students, who are the voters, need to know. In addition, there are sections within the Election Regulations that have not been revised for many years, making them outdated to the extent that they impede fair elections. For example, according to Election Regulations, candidates are not allowed to electioneer using certain means of media before the electioneering starts, in order to keep the November 2015 election procedure as fair as possible. However, this bylaw does not include electioneering via social media, which is one of the most influential way in today's world to earn people's support.

 

Changes to the Election Regulations are mostly proposed by the Student Autonomy Special Committee (SASC). Ko Jun Woo ('14, Sociology), the president of SASC states, "The basic change to election bylaws is to amend clauses that allow the Central Election Management Commission to find minor faults of campaign teams and to adjudicate cautions or warnings. These regulations were created to prevent too much money from being spent for elections and organize them in a more fair way, but they are clearly being misused nowadays, which is why they need to change." Ko emphasized that the amendments will still encompass the original premise that elections must not be under the control of resources of any kind.

 

Problems exist not only in the regulations for candidates' electioneering. Usually, the year's president of KUSA is elected as chairman of the Central Election Management Commission. The reason is that usually nobody else is enthusiastic or interested enough to organize the largest election of KU, since the leading position of this commission is often considered a troublesome task involving issues that can be and usually are very sensitive. Also, since the associations are obliged to send members to participate as the Central Election Management Commission, including the KUSA presidents, most people from other groups are not willing to, or think they are not capable enough to be the leader of the commission.

 

However, Ko and SASC strongly believe that the current president of KUSA becomes a direct stakeholder during elections, because he or she still has the power of politics within the university student society. Having power over elections by being the president of the Election Management Commission can tempt one to help the candidate that one sides with. Therefore, the president's private preference towards a certain campaign team and candidate can be dangerous. The problem of this bylaw was seen through the issue regarding Godaegonggamdae. Thus, SASC proposed

to change Election Regulations to forbid the current president of KU from becoming the leader of the Election Management Commission. 

 

These issues have arisen every year, but it is difficult to make changes, big or small, because a great majority of the student body is unaware of the specifics of the Election Regulations. Most students of KU do not know what the problems are unless they have been part of an executive branch of any group directly related to a student association. It may be the responsibility of the annual KUSA executive branch to make students familiar with the general Election Regulations at KU. Simply making election pledges aimed for the betterment of student welfare may not be the final answer to bring overall attention and participation.