Dear colleagues,

  A blog "between apu & me" entitled "My Absentee Ballot" (13 July
  2006, at http://www.beautiful-people.org/betweenAPUnMe/?p=58) lists
  an Absentee Ballot submitted to the APU Alumni
  Association. According to the ballot:

    A：　Selection of New Executives

    Disagree

    B：　Activities, Financial and Audit Report for FY 2005

    Disagree

    C：　Proposed Activities and Budget for FY 2006

    Disagree

    D：　Changes in Regulations for the APU Student & Alumni Association

    Disagree

  Moreover, concrete reasons for each option are given, which serve to
  underline the high quality of foreign students at APU. For instance,
  the decision to oppose the selection of new executives (question A)
  is articulated as follows. The selection does not meet the two basic
  principles of free elections - freedom of active participation and
  freedom of passive participation. The blog continues:

     "Freedom of active participation refers to the idea
     that all citizens (in this case alumni) can put
     themselves forward to be candidates. In the case of the
     APU Alumni Association, the nomination of the
     excecutives is done in secret and nobody knows why the
     people who are on the list are on the list.  Freedom of
     passive participation refers to the fact that all
     alumni can ELECT the executives. In this case, there is
     nothing to elect. There is a ready-made committee and
     you can only agree or disagree".

  In the system designed to elect the next President of Ritsumeikan,
  the freedom of active participation does not exist. Moreover, since
  the system is based on an indirect election in which members of a
  selection committee are elected without having to clarify who they
  will vote for, it cannot be said that the freedom of passive
  participation exists either. This is perhaps only natural, since the
  system to elect the President was designed out of a fear of the
  inability to control or predict the results of a "free" election.

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Editor: Toru Tsujishita 
( College of Science and Engineering, Professor )

Japanese version sent to 3887 faculty members and staffs, 
archived in http://ac-net.org/rtm/No/90,  　
this partial translation sent to 406 faculty members, 
archived in http://ac-net.org/rtm/No/92.