As soon as you start charging a fee to be a member, people will become suspicious that you’re trying to sign them up because you want their cash, rather than being purely dedicated to charity. It’ll also cost you members because they’ll 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 don’t 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.
As soon as you start charging a fee to be a member, people will become suspicious that you’re trying to sign them up because you want their cash, rather than being purely dedicated to charity. It’ll also cost you members because they’ll 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 don’t 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.