Interview with OPEC Head Chair Haiyi
By Jaden, Press Editor
Haiyi is a rare person. In a committee of Model UN delegates and chairs—ACJC debaters and polsci undergrads—the incoming PPE student has probably thought the most about the issues at hand. Though it might very well be the case, she doesn’t assume she’s the smartest in the room. Open to experience, she listens to the takes of every delegate, as she forms her own opinions, never kowtowing to any bloc or ideology.
As a MUN delegate and the current head chair of OPEC, Haiyi subscribes to a purer form of diplomacy than most delegates do. The ideal MUN delegate cannot be more removed from the ideal UN diplomat. Hyper-aggressive and uncompromising, the typical best delegate would find it hard to even be an intern at the MFA. Among all the skills that one gains at a MUN conference, diplomacy is not one.
Humble and mild-mannered, it’s hard to believe that Haiyi has attended almost a dozen MUN conferences. Wherever she learned diplomacy, it certainly wasn’t here. A true diplomat, the she doesn’t proselytise her politics, even outside of committee. When she isn’t sure of something, she’ll tell you only as much.
Unlike polsci students desperately trying to prove their intellectual heavy weight, she’s perfectly comfortable with saying, “I haven’t thought about it.” Rather than give half-baked on-the-spot analyses, she treasures deep and careful thought—thought that is nuanced, unemotional, and principled.
Her way of political thought is best described in terms often attributed to Singaporean ministers—pragmatic, sensible, and executive. Most MUN-goers subscribe to a single political system, proudly calling themselves democratic-socialists, neo-Marxists, intersectional feminists, and—very rarely but always annoyingly—nationalists. Haiyi doesn’t identify with any of these. But it would be a mistake to think of her as apolitical; to know deeply, yet refuse a label is as political an action—if not far more so—than choosing to identify with any political group.
For the average individual, politics is about more than just policy. It’s about social belongingness. In the same way that an individual turns towards their confidantes for emotional support, the vulnerable mind is quick to detect and attach itself to ideology when it appears in a normal person.
All ideologies are able to attribute human suffering to political reasons. Without critical thought, a susceptible youth is convinced that it is capitalism, patriarchy, welfare, collectivism, or the “post-modern neo-marxists” that are to blame for the many societal and psychological problems that they encounter.
Youths, especially politically-aware youths that attend MUNs, are susceptible for many reasons. While the stereotype of the university socialist has existed since socialism itself, a new form of political propagation far more effective than any other social or communication system exists within the pockets of every student.
Modern social media algorithms are able to pick up on exactly the kinds of vulnerabilities that drive people towards ideologies by analysing by clicks, likes, and the time spent viewing each post. A form of propaganda driven only by consumption, these algorithms are indiscriminate in how the politics they serve.
They are positive feedback loops, latching on to a single vulnerability and forever rubbing it raw, constantly stoking outrage at what is and what ought to be. And if a person discovers they like Contrapoints more than Jordan Peterson, the algorithm adjusts only to keep the person consuming.
Somehow, Haiyi remains pure amidst all of this. Not pure like a flower that withers and wanes with the climate—pure like a diamond, forever crystalline and clear-minded, never scratched or sullied or dulled. Her political maturity is neither condescending nor impulsive, not the elder decrying the activist nor the activist decrying the system.
She doesn’t believe in theory but in practice, in enacting principled solutions that lead to beneficial outcomes rather than in social martyrdom. Her down-to-earth political thought comes as a refreshing reminder of the frightening abstractions of political propaganda, as a reminder that politics is ultimately about doing good.