Leverage Research organized the first EA Summit in 2013 and the second EA Summit in 2014. The EA Summits were the first effective altruism conferences of any kind.
Leverage Research also helped to organize the first EA Global conferences, which began in 2015 and continue to this day.
In 2016, a major EA program, the Pareto Fellowship, was run largely by Leverage Research. There is some evidence the Pareto Fellowship was run in a cult-like fashion.
Leverage Research eventually gained full control of the Centre for Effective Altruism in 2018 when one of its members, Larissa Hesketh-Rowe, became the CEO.
The purpose of the deep-dive post would be for people in EA to understand the truth about what happened. And to learn whatever lessons they think they should learn from that.
These are the questions I would recommend asking and attempting to answer in the deep-dive post:
Is Leverage Research a cult?
Did it take over the Centre for Effective Altruism?
Did it organize the EA Summits and the Pareto Fellowship? Did it play an important role in organizing the first EA Globals?
If so, how could the EA movement, particularly the core international leadership, let this happen?
If so, what might be the broader ramifications of this for the EA movement?
What (if anything) is there to learn from this?
I donât know what the chances would be of actually getting funded, but someone who wanted to spend a lot of time investigating this topic could apply for a $1,000+ grant from the EA Infrastructure Fund.
Iâm not sure if Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy) would even consider funding something so small and so specific to EA community self-reflection, but you can look at the relevant info here.
âDid it take over the Centre for Effective Altruism?â
This seems false? (Depending on how you meant the framing.) My (unprofessional) read of the situation is that something closer to the inverse is true.
(Redacted a few comments because I work at CEA and this could be taken as more authoritative/âofficial than it was meant to be. The info in those comments I already knew before I joined CEA.)
(Please correct me if Iâm wrong here, thatâs just my impression from talking to people. And Iâve talked to both Leverage and non-Leverage early EAs about this.)
The post itself seems like a good idea to me. I think most of the info is public (lots of threads on Twitter) and not hard to find.
(Edit: It also doesnât seem true that âLeverageâ was organising EAGs & CEA so much as individual people who were into EA/âCEA (like Kerry & Larissa) at some point started also being into Leverage. But epistemic status a bit unclear. Just my impression.)
Did Leverage Research take over the Centre for Effective Altruism permanently? Is it still in control to this day? No, of course not. No oneâs claiming that.
Did Leverage Research take over the Centre for Effective Altruism for some amount of time? Thatâs how Oliver Habryka, who I believe worked at the CEA at some point during the 2010s, characterizes it:
I will again remind people that Leverage at some point had approximately succeeded at a corporate takeover of CEA, placing both the CEO and their second-in-command in the organization. They really were not very peripheral to EA, they were just covert about it.
If, as I understand, the Leverage Research people left the CEA sometime around 2019, that doesnât mean they werenât at some point in control of the organization. For instance, Larissa Hesketh-Rowe stopped being CEO, but that doesnât mean she was never CEO in the first place. If someone loses or gives up a position of power, that doesnât mean they never had it.
It would be great to get a fuller and more detailed picture on what happened. Thanks for pointing out that a lot of public info is on Twitter. Someone could probably write a pretty deep post only using public info. (Going above and beyond would be talking to sources and getting new info, but that probably isnât necessary to write a great deep dive post.)
Yeah, probably just slightly disagree with the word âtakeoverâ in Oliverâs comment to some extent, but that seems like a reasonable linguistic disagreement. (If itâs not taken over for a significant amount of time, because then the other people kicked you out, it wasnât much of a takeover. Maybe Oliver and me would arrive at âlong/âmid-term-unsuccessful-takeoverâ as the concept weâd both agree on. Also acknowledging that I wasnât there at the time, and he was.)
Doesnât change the fundamental point that it seems important to have some transparent documentation on this. Seems good.
Suggestion: Leverage Research deep dive
Someone (other than me) should write a deep-dive post about the cult Leverage Research and its infiltration of effective altruism.
The story, in brief:
Leverage Research is a cult.
Leverage Research organized the first EA Summit in 2013 and the second EA Summit in 2014. The EA Summits were the first effective altruism conferences of any kind.
Leverage Research also helped to organize the first EA Global conferences, which began in 2015 and continue to this day.
In 2016, a major EA program, the Pareto Fellowship, was run largely by Leverage Research. There is some evidence the Pareto Fellowship was run in a cult-like fashion.
Leverage Research eventually gained full control of the Centre for Effective Altruism in 2018 when one of its members, Larissa Hesketh-Rowe, became the CEO.
The purpose of the deep-dive post would be for people in EA to understand the truth about what happened. And to learn whatever lessons they think they should learn from that.
These are the questions I would recommend asking and attempting to answer in the deep-dive post:
Is Leverage Research a cult?
Did it take over the Centre for Effective Altruism?
Did it organize the EA Summits and the Pareto Fellowship? Did it play an important role in organizing the first EA Globals?
If so, how could the EA movement, particularly the core international leadership, let this happen?
If so, what might be the broader ramifications of this for the EA movement?
What (if anything) is there to learn from this?
I donât know what the chances would be of actually getting funded, but someone who wanted to spend a lot of time investigating this topic could apply for a $1,000+ grant from the EA Infrastructure Fund.
Iâm not sure if Coefficient Giving (formerly Open Philanthropy) would even consider funding something so small and so specific to EA community self-reflection, but you can look at the relevant info here.
I think itâs worth noting that Larissa and Kerry have denied being involved with Leverage until after they departed CEA.
There is a thread here where Kerry (now deleted) makes claims on his side of this story.
âDid it take over the Centre for Effective Altruism?â
This seems false? (Depending on how you meant the framing.) My (unprofessional) read of the situation is that something closer to the inverse is true.
(Redacted a few comments because I work at CEA and this could be taken as more authoritative/âofficial than it was meant to be. The info in those comments I already knew before I joined CEA.)
(Please correct me if Iâm wrong here, thatâs just my impression from talking to people. And Iâve talked to both Leverage and non-Leverage early EAs about this.)
The post itself seems like a good idea to me. I think most of the info is public (lots of threads on Twitter) and not hard to find.
(Edit: It also doesnât seem true that âLeverageâ was organising EAGs & CEA so much as individual people who were into EA/âCEA (like Kerry & Larissa) at some point started also being into Leverage. But epistemic status a bit unclear. Just my impression.)
Did Leverage Research take over the Centre for Effective Altruism permanently? Is it still in control to this day? No, of course not. No oneâs claiming that.
Did Leverage Research take over the Centre for Effective Altruism for some amount of time? Thatâs how Oliver Habryka, who I believe worked at the CEA at some point during the 2010s, characterizes it:
If, as I understand, the Leverage Research people left the CEA sometime around 2019, that doesnât mean they werenât at some point in control of the organization. For instance, Larissa Hesketh-Rowe stopped being CEO, but that doesnât mean she was never CEO in the first place. If someone loses or gives up a position of power, that doesnât mean they never had it.
It would be great to get a fuller and more detailed picture on what happened. Thanks for pointing out that a lot of public info is on Twitter. Someone could probably write a pretty deep post only using public info. (Going above and beyond would be talking to sources and getting new info, but that probably isnât necessary to write a great deep dive post.)
Yeah, probably just slightly disagree with the word âtakeoverâ in Oliverâs comment to some extent, but that seems like a reasonable linguistic disagreement. (If itâs not taken over for a significant amount of time, because then the other people kicked you out, it wasnât much of a takeover. Maybe Oliver and me would arrive at âlong/âmid-term-unsuccessful-takeoverâ as the concept weâd both agree on. Also acknowledging that I wasnât there at the time, and he was.)
Doesnât change the fundamental point that it seems important to have some transparent documentation on this. Seems good.
Calling it a âyear-long takeoverâ would resolve the ambiguity.
The GWWC weekends away in Wales were effectively the first EA conferences and they preceded EAG.