The Juridical Commission (JC) will have a new Commissioner after being elected at Spring Agora 2020, which this year will take place fully online, because of the coronavirus crisis. One of the candidates for that position is Heiko Kirchner, member of AEGEE-Köln since 2018 and Sub-commissioner of the JC since the run-up to Agora Salerno. We interviewed him about his programme and objectives for this year.
Hello, Heiko and thank you for your time to be interviewed. To start off, could you tell us a bit about yourself and your career in AEGEE?
Hi! I am Heiko, twenty-two years old and a student of French and German law. I joined AEGEE in Köln about two and a half years ago. I was AEGEE-Köln’s President for one year and during that term we organised the Strategic Planning Meeting 2019. After I moved to France last year, I joined the Juridical Commission, first as a Subcommissioner and then as an interim member. Besides, I look a bit like this year’s Eurovision contestant from Iceland, Daði Freyr.
In the two years you have been an AEGEE member you have had a hectic AEGEEan life, playing many different roles. What are the main lessons you learnt of all those experiences and in which sense have they helped you with where you are now?
When I started getting involved in AEGEE-Köln, I was very much clueless concerning most aspects of volunteering in an organisation like AEGEE. I think I learned two main lessons:
First, it does not make sense to do everything on your own. This might seem obvious, but when I started out on the local board, I had trouble with delegating tasks. However, after some time I experienced that often other members just did not know what there was to do, and were glad to be able to contribute. At European level this is just as true – active AEGEEans want to learn, help and work as a team in some capacity. Without this realisation I would not have had the motivation to take the step to the European level.
Second, knowledge transfer is very important. After my reasonably long and active time in AEGEE, I have amassed considerable experience with different aspects of this organisation. And even though there is still so much to learn, there are tons of things that I can do and answer without thinking – it would have been an insurmountable obstacle for me two years ago. And although I have not given as many good KTs (Knowledge Transfers) as I have received, I am aware of the need, at least. And I think it helps to connect with other AEGEEans and outsiders to be aware of the information gaps concerning AEGEE knowledge, but also all other information.
We have noticed you initially wanted to fill this position until July, but eventually you have gone for the whole term. What caused you to change your mind?
It was basically just hesitation to make such a commitment. Even though I like working in the JC and have been planning for a while to apply for this full term, it is a very big responsibility. That is why I pondered this decision longer than when I applied for the rest of this term, a term of office that is shorter and with a team I already know very well.
In your programme you speak of completing the tasks given to the JC by the Statutes and other legal documents of AEGEE. How are you going to carry it out if you are elected?
I stressed this because more than many other bodies of AEGEE-Europe, the Juridical Commission has mostly procedural tasks: it is supposed to ensure a smooth-running organisation from a legal standpoint. If elected for both terms of office, that would mean efficiently integrating the changes that will be decided at this Agora, and then preparing for the next one and ensuring that the candidature and proposal procedures for the Autumn Agora go down according to the rules set out. And at the same time I would, of course, work on JC’s other tasks, such as collecting locals’ statutes and providing consultancy. That might not sound very extraordinary, but for the JC, I believe, doing the usual tasks well comes before a greater vision (i.e. it should be more important than having a vision and working on it as a Juridical Commissioner).
How do you plan to increase the JC and the CIA’s visibility inside AEGEE if you are elected?
The current team has gained quite a lot of experience with social media during this term, especially on Instagram. I would use this experience to expand on the strategy of providing interested AEGEEans with bite-sized JC information. Both JC and CIA are very visible during the Agora, but beyond it, it is a good idea to remind past and future delegates about their existence. Depending on the size, motivation and availability of the next JC, I would also consider holding workshops at European events.
Could you explain more deeply what you mean about cooperation with the DPC as the second main actor of the OI?
Starting this summer, the new Focus areas and their Working Groups from the Strategic Plan which was drafted in Köln and voted in Salerno on will become active. But the Strategic Plan has a second set of objectives: the OIs, acronym for Organisational Improvements. They were chosen to move AEGEE as an organisation in a positive direction, and are not taken care of by Working Groups, but by `main actors´, mostly European bodies that have something to do with the topic of the OIs.
Concretely, JC and DPC are main actors of the OI “Legal documents review”, which is basically about increasing the coherence and accessibility of AEGEE’s web of legal documents. I hope that this cooperation on the OI will benefit both bodies and the Network as a whole.
This question could be a bit hard to answer: how would you engage potential Subcommissioners and assistants’ interest to be part of the Commission?
I think this is a communication issue. The challenges and possibilities of working in the JC are unique and I think a lot of law-affiliated and law-interested AEGEEans would very much enjoy it and be motivated by it. As part of the general visibility initiative, I would also communicate the way to become one of us and why it is a great idea.
To conclude, what are your next objectives in case you are not elected as Commissioner?
I think I would still offer my services to the next team as a Subcommie or assistant. Other than that, I would try to go to the next Agora as a delegate again.