I have a hard time understanding why it WOULDNâT work elsewhere, tbh. Have not read about convincing reasons or perspectives as to why the model wouldnât function well across the world. Have you?
As soon as you start charging a fee to be a member, people will become suspicious that youâre trying to sign them up because you want their cash, rather than being purely dedicated to charity. Itâll also cost you members because theyâll have the choice to either spend the money or not feel fully part of the community. This effect will be worse in some countries than others.
If you donât get enough members signing up, then the organisation becomes vulnerable to capture by someone who signs up a bunch of straw members who never show up to meetings except to vote once. You can reduce this by adding rules around attendance at meetings, but then this makes it more formal and may cost you more members, especially if people are used to groups being much more casual.
Counterpoint: This seems to work all right for university clubs.
My understanding is that these general assemblies work by people literally coming to the same room to vote (even during covid). Willingness to spend a day on this is part of how you screen for whoâs invested. In a country the size of the US, the time and money costs of travel to any one location would be much greater.
I imagine youâd organise it the same way youâd organise any other national democratic organisation in the USâthrough representative structures, regional chapters, online participation options, and other standard approaches that democratic organisations use to manage scale and geography.
I asked Claude for examples:
The American Medical Association has around 270,000 members across all states and manages democratic governance through state medical societies that send delegates to their annual House of Delegates meeting, plus online voting for leadership positions. Professional engineering societies like IEEE operate similarly with over 400,000 members globallyâthey use regional sections, online balloting for board elections, and hybrid conferences. Even academic organisations like the American Psychological Association coordinate democratic decision-making across their 120,000+ members through divisional representation and electronic voting systems.
I assume each of the AMA, APA, and IEEE have substantial barriers to entry (e.g., professional education and/âor licensing) that serve the screening-for-investment function Julia describes.
I also would not assume these organizations do a good job at representing their populationsâe.g., about 75 percent of US physicians arenât members of the AMA, which isnât a big vote of confidence.
I think youâre right about the limitations of these examples, but this feels like weâre getting lost in the weeds. The original point was about travel costs making democratic decision-making processes suboptimal in large countries. These examples show thatâs not trueâorganisations routinely manage democratic processes across large geographies.
EA Norway has shifted from in-person to digital general assemblies since COVID. This change has sparked some ongoing debate.
Benefits of in-person assemblies:
More informal networking and conversation
Better discussion environment
More enjoyable experience (digital meeting fatigue is real)
Previously combined with weekend conferences featuring talks and group discussions
Benefits of digital assemblies:
Easier attendance
Especially for members with families
Especially for people not living in Oslo, the capitol
Lower costs (minor)
Lower bar of entry for new members
EA Norway now also maintains an annual in-person gathering, essentially a mini-EAGx for Norway, were we plan to increasingly focus on organizational strategic planning to better capture some of the benefits of an in-person assembly.
I doubt âEA USAâ would be the most practical expansion of this model. The prototype is a country of about 5.5MM people, about the size of New Mexico (although the bulk of the population is more concentrated than that might imply). The organization has a few hundred members and a budget in the low/âmid six-figures. My hunch is that EA Norwayâs membership and program size may be fairly close to ideal for this model.
Rather, I think the more viable expansion in larger countries would be subnational (e.g., EA Mid-Atlantic would have ~ an OOM larger population in range, with NYC and DC being within a few hours of Philly). Even that might be too big.
Youâd have to tweak the model for more geographically diffuse areas, possibly with some sort of federalism /â representative governance (e.g., EA Flyover States?) Having local units elect delegates is common (e.g., for associations of congregationist churches).
I think I donât understand what the purpose of a regional US EA electoral group would be. We had a slack channel for east coast organizers, but there wasnât much to coordinate about.
I have a hard time understanding why it WOULDNâT work elsewhere, tbh. Have not read about convincing reasons or perspectives as to why the model wouldnât function well across the world. Have you?
As soon as you start charging a fee to be a member, people will become suspicious that youâre trying to sign them up because you want their cash, rather than being purely dedicated to charity. Itâll also cost you members because theyâll have the choice to either spend the money or not feel fully part of the community. This effect will be worse in some countries than others.
If you donât get enough members signing up, then the organisation becomes vulnerable to capture by someone who signs up a bunch of straw members who never show up to meetings except to vote once. You can reduce this by adding rules around attendance at meetings, but then this makes it more formal and may cost you more members, especially if people are used to groups being much more casual.
Counterpoint: This seems to work all right for university clubs.
My understanding is that these general assemblies work by people literally coming to the same room to vote (even during covid). Willingness to spend a day on this is part of how you screen for whoâs invested. In a country the size of the US, the time and money costs of travel to any one location would be much greater.
I imagine youâd organise it the same way youâd organise any other national democratic organisation in the USâthrough representative structures, regional chapters, online participation options, and other standard approaches that democratic organisations use to manage scale and geography.
I asked Claude for examples:
I assume each of the AMA, APA, and IEEE have substantial barriers to entry (e.g., professional education and/âor licensing) that serve the screening-for-investment function Julia describes.
I also would not assume these organizations do a good job at representing their populationsâe.g., about 75 percent of US physicians arenât members of the AMA, which isnât a big vote of confidence.
I think youâre right about the limitations of these examples, but this feels like weâre getting lost in the weeds. The original point was about travel costs making democratic decision-making processes suboptimal in large countries. These examples show thatâs not trueâorganisations routinely manage democratic processes across large geographies.
EA Norway has shifted from in-person to digital general assemblies since COVID. This change has sparked some ongoing debate.
Benefits of in-person assemblies:
More informal networking and conversation
Better discussion environment
More enjoyable experience (digital meeting fatigue is real)
Previously combined with weekend conferences featuring talks and group discussions
Benefits of digital assemblies:
Easier attendance
Especially for members with families
Especially for people not living in Oslo, the capitol
Lower costs (minor)
Lower bar of entry for new members
EA Norway now also maintains an annual in-person gathering, essentially a mini-EAGx for Norway, were we plan to increasingly focus on organizational strategic planning to better capture some of the benefits of an in-person assembly.
I doubt âEA USAâ would be the most practical expansion of this model. The prototype is a country of about 5.5MM people, about the size of New Mexico (although the bulk of the population is more concentrated than that might imply). The organization has a few hundred members and a budget in the low/âmid six-figures. My hunch is that EA Norwayâs membership and program size may be fairly close to ideal for this model.
Rather, I think the more viable expansion in larger countries would be subnational (e.g., EA Mid-Atlantic would have ~ an OOM larger population in range, with NYC and DC being within a few hours of Philly). Even that might be too big.
Youâd have to tweak the model for more geographically diffuse areas, possibly with some sort of federalism /â representative governance (e.g., EA Flyover States?) Having local units elect delegates is common (e.g., for associations of congregationist churches).
I think I donât understand what the purpose of a regional US EA electoral group would be. We had a slack channel for east coast organizers, but there wasnât much to coordinate about.