The Condorcet Method was founded by mathematician, philosopher, and political scientist, Marquis de Condorcet in 1785. His method determines the winner of an election by a comparison of voter’s preferences in a multiparty election. This means rather than a one choice vote, voters rank candidates based on their preferences. This method is based on the premise that voter’s preferences of the majority share an intransitive relationship. Intransitive simply means that if a certain percent of voters prefers party A over party B, and another percent favors party B over party C, the percent that prefers party C over A can not be calculated because it will be a completely unrelated number.

With a mandate to “provide advisory, legal, and financial assistance to fund, initiate and continue advocacy, lobbying and litigation to improve education and access to education at UBC and such other matters of law, which set broad precedent and concern UBC students,” you’d think that the Student Legal Fund Society would be a hub of activity. After all, with costs of education continuously increasing, the BC government profiting off of student loan interest rates, and UBC international students paying the highest tuition fees in Canada, there’s no shortage of ‘access’ issues to be dealt with.

Average cost of tuition for students who study in Sweden, Finland, Cuba: 0
Average cost of tuition for domestic UBC student: $4,612.14
Average cost of tuition for international UBC student: $18,448.56
UBC President Stephen J. Toope’s annual salary: $578,936.79
Number of domestic UBC students it takes to pay for President Toope’s annual salary: 125
Estimated cost of student tuition after Blake Fredrick’s 1st term as President: 0
Minimum number of baboons forced to smoke crack in a 1989 study testing the efficacy of cigarettes as a drug delivery device: 3

In this year’s election, of the 21 candidates running for the AMS Executive and Board of Governors, only three candidates are women (representing 14% of all candidates).    There are more joke candidates than there are female candidates in this election (and no, they aren’t the same, you sexist pig).  In the previous AMS election, VP External Stefanie Ratjen was the only woman elected to the 2008/09 AMS Executive.  Despite its claim as a democratic and representative organization, clearly the AMS fails to ensure equality of opportunity and does not reflect the UBC student body.  The absence of female candidates within AMS elections – let alone female representation within the AMS Executive and Council – indicates systemic barriers that have yet to be addressed by the AMS itself.