As this year’s PPE Society leadership elections are fastly approaching, we cannot stress the importance of informed voting enough. With the debate just around the corner, understanding the intentions and aims of the candidates – our fellow students – is crucial. This report explores the preferences and opinions of the students prior to the debate, aiming to provide a snapshot of the current preferential alignment.

A survey was conducted to gather insights from the students of the PPE program, focusing specifically on the awareness of the candidate programs and promotional videos, their intended voting choice and reasons for potentially abstaining from the upcoming vote. 

The participation level in this pre-debate survey was only about 43 out of an approximate 240 students total – which would put the percentage at around 17.5%. Although this represents a wide spectrum of the program’s demographics and their preferences, it raises the question of whether the final election will be able to reach the minimum necessary participation in order to be considered valid – which is 25% of the total student body.

The survey was conducted via Google Forms from the 20th to the 24th of March and was primarily distributed via the official PPE Society announcement channel with additional distribution via class and private group chats. With this being the reality, we do have to acknowledge the potential of incomplete accuracy and reiterate that this report serves as an exploration of potential preferences and is by no means predicts a definite result for the election.

As the first question, the students were asked to specify their year of study. The results show us that the highest participation came from the students in their first year, totaling 22 out of 43 respondents (51.2%), followed by the students from the second year with 14 out of 43 (32.6%) and lastly the third year students with 7 out of 43 (16.3%). This kind of result might beg the question of whether students get progressively less active within the student activities or if this is just the nature of these selected classes and we won’t see a similar degradation happening in the future. 

The students were also asked if they had looked over the candidate information, particularly their campaign video and proposed program, located on the PPE wiki notion website. Out of the total 43 responses, 19 (44.2%) have stated that they have seen and read both the proposed programs and campaign videos. 4 out of 43 (9.3%) have only read the proposed programs. 9 out of 43 (20.9%) have only seen the campaign videos. 5 out of 43 (11.6%) have only seen some of the videos or read only some of the programs and 6 out of 43 (14%) have not engaged with any. The year of studies did not seem to correlate with the engagement with either programs or videos of the candidates. 

Moving onto voting preferences. The largest portion of students voted for the ‘Undecided’ option, totalling 13 out of 43 (30.2%). This was followed by the candidate team of Nia and Iris with 12 out of 43 (27.9%), Sophie and Liz with 10 out of 43 (23.3%), and a tie between the options of the candidate team of Maksym and Taishi and the ‘I don’t plan on voting’ option, each with 4 out of 43 (9.3%). This puts the leading team in this pre-debate survey (Nia and Iris) in a close competition with the follow-up team (Sophie and Liz) and we shall see how this evolves following the debate. 

Additionally, students who decided to abstain from voting were asked to briefly express their reasons. This left us with multiple different concerns expressed by these students, namely, having a hard time choosing the right candidate, expressing dissatisfaction with the lack of diversity among the candidates and criticism put forward about the PPE Society as an institution. 

One particular answer delved deeper into the concerns regarding this year’s election, stating the process to be very fast paced, pointing out the fact that the changes to the voting system (who can run, the PPE Society constitution) and the announcement of candidates and their campaigns have all been condensed into a 3 week period, which leaves no room to get to know the candidates and make a proper decision when it comes to voting. The student points to a lack of any actual campaigns happening within this short time frame. They also bring in the question of the current state of the PPE Society and its president, and question the need for the newly created PPE Society Constitution. 

This answer, perhaps along with the low participation in both this survey and the general election, shows us an existing dissatisfaction with the current system within the PPE program. This raises the question, can this be solved by simply electing new leadership or is this a more deep-rooted issue? 

This pre-debate survey has provided valuable insights into the sentiments and preferences of the student body of the PPE program nearing the PPE Society election period. Engagement with the candidate campaigns appears to be varied. The candidate preference and voting intention shows a competitive landscape, which might lead to a dynamic debate in a few days time. 

The reasons provided by students who are choosing not to vote highlight areas of potential improvement for the PPE Society. Addressing these concerns could help increase the voter turnout in the upcoming election and promote a more engaging nature for this program. 

As we near the debate, it will now be crucial for the candidates to address the concerns highlighted by their fellow students and engage with the student body more directly. This report sets the stage for a follow-up analysis of the post-debate shift in preferences and the ability of the candidates to sway the large number of undecided voters toward their side.