World Universities Debating Championship

Not to be confused with World Schools Debating Championships.

World Universities Debating Championship

Established	1980
Region	International
Format	British Parliamentary Style
Number of Teams	~250-400
Record participation	~400 teams (2012), Possibly 440 teams in the Thailand WUDC 2020
Current champions	University of Oxford
Most championships	University of Sydney (8)
Website	worlddebating.org

The World Universities Debating Championship (WUDC) is the world's largest debating tournament, and one of the largest annual international student events in the world. WUDC is parliamentary debating tournament held in British Parliamentary Debate format (involving four teams of two people in each debate). Historically, the format of WUDC was determined by the host country which allowed for the American Parliamentary Debate format (two teams of two people). Each year, the event is hosted by a university selected by the World Universities Debating Council. The tournament is colloquially referred to as "Worlds" and the winners of the open competition acknowledged as the "world champions". The current world champions, Jason Xiao and his partner Lee Chin Wee, are from the University of Oxford. The university with the most world championships is the University of Sydney with 8 victories. The 2020 edition which was the 40th edition was hosted in Assumption University.

History

Predecessor Tournaments

The Trans-Atlantic University Speech Association held tournaments in London (1976 and 1978) and at McGill University, Montreal, in 1977. Chicago was to hold a tournament in 1979 but this was postponed and then abandoned. A "World Debating Festival", sponsored by Honeywell was held in Sydney in 1978. The TAUSA event attracted mostly Northern Hemisphere tournaments, the Honeywell was largely Southern Hemisphere.

Format

The championship is usually held in the days following the 25th of December, since many of the institutions attending from the Northern Hemisphere where the championship originated take vacations at this time. Although many countries that do not celebrate Christmas have become participants at the competition, the timing has remained the same. In most recent years, the nine preliminary rounds of the tournament have been held over three days from 29–31 December, with the elimination rounds being held on 2 January and the Grand Final on 3 January.

In recent years, the championship has varied from about 150 to 400 teams, depending on the capacity of the host institution. With judges and organisers, this involves 500 to 1,000 participants in all.

The competition involves nine preliminary rounds, which become "power-paired" as the tournament progresses, matching the strongest-performing teams against each other. Two teams form the "government" ("proposition" in the UK and North America) and two the "opposition" in each debate room. The process of scoring and pairing these teams is known as "tabbing". The scoring of teams is done by judges, most of whom are students or former students from the competing institutions, who return "ballots" with their scores to the adjudication team, led by a Chief Adjudicator who is assisted by one or more deputies. The deputies are not members of the host institution.

The nine preliminary rounds are followed by a "break" at which the teams proceeding to elimination rounds are announced. This is traditionally done on New Year's Eve, although this is subject to the timing of the tournament. In the current tournament format, the top 16 teams from the preliminary rounds proceed to the octofinal round. The teams ranked 17-48 also break into a partial double octofinal round, and the winning teams from this round join the teams ranked 1-16 in the octo-finals. While preliminary rounds are usually judged by three to five judges, the break rounds are judged by panels of five, semifinal judged by panels of seven and the finals by panels of nine.

Separate breaks are announced for the English-as-a-second language (ESL) and English-as-a-foreign language (EFL) team competitions, for the individual public speaking competition, and the "World Masters" tournament which is participated in by judges (most of whom are no longer students) representing the countries where they studied or of which they are citizens. In addition, a comedy competition is also open to all participants in Worlds.

Governance

The World Universities Debating Council consists of representatives of every country that competes at the World Universities Debating Championship. Each country selects one council delegate (the national debating association president, or selected from the participants at Worlds). The Council is responsible for setting the rules and awarding the right to host the championships.

A Worlds Committee is elected to discuss issues during the year as Council only meets at the championships itself. This Committee consists of a mix of elected officers and regional representatives from Africa, the Americas, Australia and New Zealand, Continental Europe and the Middle East, and the British Isles (referred to in debating as Islands of the North Atlantic thought more politically acceptable than British Isles).

The Council formerly operated not unlike the United Nations Security Council, with seven nations holding "charter member status" – the United States, Canada, England, Scotland, Ireland, Australia and New Zealand. A two-thirds majority of these countries was required for changes to the championship's constitution, irrespective of how the general vote was tallied. However, as the number of non-charter nations attending grew, many fielding far more teams than some of the upper tier, and the championship began being hosted outside the Charter nations, pressure grew for the distinction to be eliminated.

The modern championship grants voting strength of between one and four votes per country, based on numbers of institutions attending recent championships. To allow for fluctuations in participation due to the financial difference in attending championships nearer or further in succeeding years, nations lose or gain their voting strength gradually.

List of Tournaments

Year	Host City	Hosting Institution	Winning Institution	Best Speaker	Topic of Open Grand Final
2021	Goyang, South Korea	Debate Korea	TBD	TBD	TBD
2020	Bangkok, Thailand	Assumption University	University of Oxford	Lee Chin Wee, University of Oxford	This House, as China, would grant universal suffrage to Hong Kong.
2019	Cape Town, South Africa	University of Cape Town	University of Sydney	James Stratton, University of Sydney	This House believes that the present condition of humanity is preferable to its condition in 100 years time.
2018	Mexico City, México	Asociación Mexicana de Debate	Harvard University	Dan Lahav, Tel Aviv University	This House would rather save the life of a single child, over extending the life of 5 adults by 10 years.
2017	The Hague, Netherlands	Debating Societies of the Netherlands	University of Sydney	Raffy Marshall, University of Oxford	This House would apply universal jurisdiction to crimes against the environment.
2016	Thessaloniki, Greece	Debating Society of Greece	Harvard University	Michael Dunn Goekjian, Faculty of Business Economics and Entrepreneurship, Belgrade	This House believes that the world's poor would be justified in pursuing complete Marxist revolution.
2015	Shah Alam, Malaysia	Universiti Teknologi MARA	University of Sydney	Ashish Kumar, University of Cambridge	This House believes that humanitarian organisations should, and should be allowed to, give funding, resources or services to illegal armed groups when this is made a condition for access to vulnerable civilians.
2014	Chennai Worlds 2014, Chennai, India	Rajalakshmi Engineering College	Harvard University	Eleanor Jones, University of Sydney	This House believe that India should pursue aggressive economic policies.
2013	Berlin, Germany	Berlin Debating Union	Monash University	Chris Bissett, Monash University	This House would not allow religious communities to expel members on the basis of views or actions that contradict doctrinal teachings.
2012	Manila, Philippines	De La Salle	Monash University	Ben Woolgar, University of Oxford	This House supports nationalism.
2011	Gaborone, Botswana	University of Botswana	Monash University	Victor Finkel, Monash University	This House would invade Zimbabwe.
2010	Istanbul, Turkey	Koç University	University of Sydney	Shengwu Li, University of Oxford	This House believes that the media should show the full horror of war.
2009	Cork, Ireland	University College Cork	University of Oxford	Naomi Oreb, University of Sydney	This House would ban abortion.
2008	Bangkok, Thailand	Assumption University	University of Oxford	Sam Block, University of Cambridge	THB that people who give HIV to others must pay drug support.
2007	Vancouver, Canada	University of British Columbia	University of Sydney	Jess Prince, University of Oxford	This House believes that economic growth is the solution to climate change.
2006	Dublin, Ireland	University College Dublin	Hart House	Rory Gillis & Beth O'Connor, Yale University	This House would abolish all laws prohibiting cruelty to animals.
2005	Cyberjaya, Malaysia	Multimedia University	University of Ottawa	Kylie Lane, Monash University	This House supports corporal punishment in schools.
2004	Singapore	Nanyang Technological University	Middle Temple	Alex Croft, University of Sydney	This House would ban the abortion of fetuses on the grounds of their permanent disability.
2003	South Africa	Stellenbosch University	University of Cambridge	Wu Meng Tan, University of Cambridge	This House believes that the world has learned nothing from 9/11.
2002	Toronto, Canada	Hart House	New York University School of Law	Ewan Smith, University of Oxford	This House would bail out failing industries.
2001	Scotland	Glasgow University Union	University of Sydney	Paul Hunyor, University of Sydney	This House would elect its judges.
2000	Sydney, Australia	University of Sydney	Monash University	Andy Kidd, University of Oxford	This House believes Marx would have approved of the internet.
1999	Manila, Philippines	Ateneo de Manila University	Monash University	Andy Kidd, University of Oxford	This House believes Netanyahu is the biggest obstacle to peace in Israel.
1998	Athens, Greece	Deree College	Gray's Inn	Neil Sheldon, Gray's Inn	This House believes that humanitarianism is a first world affectation.
1997	Stellenbosch, South Africa	Stellenbosch University	Glasgow University Union	Andy George, Gray's Inn	This House would legalize all drugs.
1996	Cork, Ireland	University College Cork	Macquarie University	Adam Spencer, University of Sydney	This House believes that strong dictatorship is better than weak democracy.
1995	Princeton, United States of America	Princeton University	University of New South Wales	Chitra Jenardhanan, Nanyang Technological University
1994	Melbourne, Australia	Melbourne	Glasgow University Union	Ben Richards, Monash University	This House believes that Machiavelli is the way to go.
1993	Oxford, England	Oxford Union Society	Harvard University	Daniel Mulino, Australian National University
1992	Dublin, Ireland	Trinity College Dublin	Glasgow University Union	James Hooke, University of New South Wales & Richard Douglas, Australian National University	Nationalism is a hangover from history.
1991	Toronto, Canada	Hart House, University of Toronto	McGill University	Steve Bibas, University of Oxford
1990	Glasgow, Scotland	Glasgow University Union	Yale University
1989	Princeton, United States of America	Princeton University	University of Sydney	John Gastil, Swarthmore College
1988	Sydney, Australia	University of Sydney	University of Oxford	Francis Greenslade University of Adelaide
1987	Dublin, Ireland	University College Dublin	Glasgow University Union	Michael Hall, University of Oxford
1986	New York City, United States of America	Fordham University	University College Cork	Bruce Meagher, University of Sydney
1985	Montreal, Canada	McGill University	The Honorable Society of King's Inns	Ashley Black, University of Sydney
1984	Edinburgh, Scotland	University of Edinburgh	University of Sydney	David Celermajer, University of Sydney
1983	Princeton, United States of America	Princeton University	Glasgow University Union	John Geisnell
1982	Toronto, Canada	Hart House, University of Toronto	University of Auckland	Stuart Bugg, University of Auckland
1981	Glasgow, Scotland	Glasgow University Union	Hart House	Andrew Taylor, Hart House	This House regrets living in the nuclear age.

See also

• Australasian Intervarsity Debating Championships
• European Universities Debating Championship
• North American Debating Championship
• United Asian Debating Championships
• World Universities Debating Championship in Spanish

External links

• Assumption Worlds 2008 website
• Cork Worlds website
• Koc University Worlds website
• De La Salle Worlds website
• Berlin Worlds 2013 website
• Chennai Worlds Website
• Malaysia Worlds 2015
• Thessaloniki Worlds 2016 website
• Korea Worlds 2021 website