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Queen’s Model United Nations (QMUN) is taking on today’s global issues as it marks its 30th year.

The student-organized event, being held at the John Deutsch University Centre from Thursday to Sunday, has 155 delegates this year, all from Queen’s University. However, it’s not simply a venue for politics students. Delegates this year hail from a wide array of faculties, including engineering, life science and commerce.

The strength of QMUN in comparison to other similar programs, according to co-chairs Brandon Jamieson (Artsci’15) and Prabhjot Sidhu (ConEd’15), is that there is a wide range of topics.

“Our topics are very broad, very diverse, and because of that I think everyone can relate to one issue or another,” says Mr. Jamieson. “We are talking about obesity and inequalities to militarizing outer space, to resource depletion in East Africa. It covers everything. People enjoy the sharing of ideas, the debate.”

Add to that the fact that delegates are not required to have any experience in the field and QMUN draws students who might not otherwise attend a model UN event.

Delegates represent various countries on various committees such as the Arab League, the Security Council and the World Health Organization. At the committees real-world issues are debated and the delegates must represent their country’s interests, even if they do not agree with them on a personal level.

“This opens them to different viewpoints, viewpoints that they would necessarily consider,” says Ms. Sidhu. “They represent a country and it’s not necessarily their country so they have to take on those views. A lot of the time they may be representing a country they don’t agree with at all and so to take that perspective is a huge learning experience.”

One of the end goals of the event is for delegates to gain some insight into how difficult multinational forums such as the UN can be. Problem-solving skills and understanding are required.

“It’s very easy to be critical and approach it from a critical lens but I think that people overlook the struggles,” says Mr. Jamieson. “The United Nations is meant to be an open forum and when you have 198 opposing views in one room, trying to find a solution that pleases 50 per cent plus one of them is very hard to do.”

QMUN also offers a number of guest speakers, who also represent a wide range of views and backgrounds, such as Israel’s Ambassador to Canada Rafael Barak who took part in Thursday evening’s opening ceremony. Others taking part include former Speaker of the House Peter Milliken, US Consul General Jim Dickmeyer, China’s Ambassador to Canada Luo Zhaohui and  Margaret Biggs, former president of the Canadian International Development Agency (CIDA).

“We’re just trying to give our delegates the most well-rounded experience possible and allow them to get the best understanding of international politics and global issues,” says Ms. Sidhu.

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