Based in London, The New College of the Humanities Essay Competition is a writing competition for Grade 11 students from anywhere in the world. Their selection of essay titles engages across a broad range of humanities and social sciences topics.

The essay I wrote for the New College of Humanities Competition encircles the topic of politics and international relations. The prompt that I wrote about was, “Is democracy facing a setback worldwide?”. I researched the validity behind the intensifying doubts of the future of democracy worldwide. Debating whether or not democracy is losing their moral objective of liberty, that democracy is no longer representing the people. Therefore researching and finally summing up that 2020 has proven that it is truism that democracy is indeed facing a historic crisis.

Writing the NCH essay enlarged my perspective regarding the world of politics as I began to realize that the dimensions of political conflict that I once knew have changed. The enormity of the different political concepts that I haven’t yet learned, such as the contentious rise of populism posed a great challenge for me whilst writing this essay.  Not to mention the countless, complex articles and resources that I had to decipher to make the essay as credible and persuasive as I wanted it to be. 

Nevertheless, considering the difficulties and stress that I faced whilst writing this essay, I am extremely gratified knowing that my essay was highly commended despite competing with 6,000 people. I am also immensely grateful for the teachers who helped me and Josephine as I couldn’t have gotten this far without them!

Erin Natasha Tobing – Grade 12 Humanities

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