United Asian Debating Championships

The United Asian Debating Championship (UADC) is an annual debating tournament for teams from universities in Asia. It is the largest inter-varsity Parliamentary Debate tournament in Asia, with over 600 participants. The UADC holds debates in the Asian 3-on-3 format Parliamentary Debating. The 1st UADC was hosted by Assumption University, Bangkok in 2010.

The UADC was created after a decision to merge the two separate championships that were held after the Asian Debating community split in 2005 - the Asian Universities Debating Championship (AUDC) and the All-Asian Intervarsity Debating Championships (AIDC or "All-Asians"). The decision to unite the two competing tournaments, and thus, create a single debate championship for Asia was taken at the last Asian Universities Debating Championships in 2009.

Origin

Arising out of a unification of the Asian Universities Debating Championship as well as the All-Asian Intervarsity Debating Championships, UADC represents the results of efforts to bridge the schism that emerged in Asian debating.

Institutions who were unhappy about aspects of the organisation of the All-Asian Intervarsity Debating Championships established the Asian Universities Debating Championship in 2005 as an alternative to the All-Asians Championship. Since then, many universities in Asia with strong debating traditions – most notably universities from the Philippines and Singapore, including all except one of the institutions who won the All-Asian championships up to 2004 – had chosen not to participate in the All-Asian Intervarsity Championships and have instead entered teams in the Asian Universities Debating Championship.

While not necessarily intended to be a rival tournament, the last three AUDCs coincided with the schedule of the All-Asian Championship, which made it impractical for teams to attend both tournaments.