Misleading

Sir,—I hope that you will excuse this intrusion by a student at another University in another country, but I feel compelled to comment upon the article "Foreign Student News Usually Confuses" which appeared on page 7 of your issue of March 25th. Specifically, I am rather disturbed by the quite misleading character of the section on the I.S.C.

My reason for saying this is, briefly, that the writer of the article appears to be totally unaware of the tremendous change which has occurred in the I.S.C. during the last three years. This change has resulted from the historic decision of the 9th I.S.C., held at Klosters in 1960, to drop altogether the "students-as-students" Clause which had been so great a source of contention right from the days of I.S.C. genesis in Stockholm in 1950.

As a result of this decision we find amongst the Resolutions of the 10th I.S.C., held in Quebec in June of last year, a total of thirty-five "Statements on Colonialism, Totalitarianism, Imperialism, Racialism . . ." etc.

Most of these statements are about specific areas and problems and are quite irrelevant to "students-as-students"—e.g. condemnation in very strong terms of the South African Government's racial policy; of "Imperialist Aggression in Cuba": and of the conditions prevailing in the since-dismembered Federation of Rhodesia and Nyasaland.

Since 1960 the new I.S.C. attitude has gained more and more support, and is now accepted by nearly all participating National Unions. It was adopted by the National Union of Australian University Students over a year ago and since then has been approved by every one of the twelve constituent Universities—the most conservative of all at last capitulating in January of this year.

Thus, the article was obviously misleading internationally—but I have a strong suspicion that it was also misleading nationally. By this I mean that I am fairly certain that New Zealand also accepted the new outlook at the 10th I.S.C. ('Acceptance'. I think, can only be determined by participation in or abstention from the discussion and voting on those Motions clearly lying outside the 'Students-as-students' boundary-line). I would hasten to add, however, that I may be wrong on this point—as I say, it is a "strong suspicion," not by any means a complete certainty.

In any case this does not affect the main point which I have sought to make in this letter.

I should like again to apologise for this interference and, should you decide to make any amendment to the article in question, to thank you, in advance, for doing so, Yours etc.,

Robert Mcdonald,

Assistant International Officer, Students Rep. Council, University of Sydney.