Summary: Professional organisations are more transparent, with clearer boundaries, norms, and responsibilities compared with ‘communities’. I’m not saying ‘we should erect barriers’ or ‘we should stop being inclusive’ but the ‘community’ model is riskier when scandals hit.
Caveats
Weakly held hair-brained idea that I want challenged by people smarter than me. While I’m chair of EA Australia, this idea doesn’t represent the board.
What is a community?
A community is a social unit (a group of living things) with a shared socially significant characteristic, such as place, set of norms, culture, religion, values, customs, or identity. Wikipedia
Some problems with communities are the lack of clear membership of the social unit. It’s also unclear who is speaking for the community. As written by Dustin Moskovitz:
When a group has a shared sense of identity, the people within it are still not all one thing, a homogenous group with one big set of shared beliefs — and yet they often are perceived that way. Necessarily, the way that you engage in characterizing a group is by giving it broad, sweeping attributes that describe how the people in the group are similar, or distinctive relative to the broader world. As an individual within a group trying to understand yourself, however, this gets flipped, and you can more easily see how you differ. Any one of those sweeping attributes do apply to some of the group, and it’s hard to identify with the group when you clearly don’t identify with many of the individuals, in particular the ones with the strongest beliefs. I often observe that the people with the most fringe opinions inside a group paradoxically get the most visibility outside the group, precisely because they are saying something unfamiliar and controversial.
It also creates reservations among the community’s biggest funders:
I expect to spend some time thinking about how we should relate to the effective altruism (EA) community. While we are the largest funder of organizations in that space, many of our programs have little or no connection to EA. I’d like to see if there are ways for us to continue to capture the huge upside some of our EA funding has enabled while having a little more independence from a community and brand that we can’t — and don’t want to — control. Alexander Berger, Open Philanthropy CEO
What is a professional association?
Professional associations are organisations of people from the same industry. They help educate members, maintain high standards and ensure ethical behaviour within an industry. ACCC
A professional association is also known as a ‘professional body’ and is a group that represents the interests of a particular industry. As umbrella organisations, they can assist individuals and organisational members through learning, networking, quality control and research. Most professions will have a professional association or body and many of these associations will have a student membership option where you can gain industry insights and contacts.Adelaide University
These sound pretty close to what we’re trying to do, as a global community.
What I’m not saying
I’m not saying we should erect high financial or administrative boundaries to joining the community. For example, students could join for free or for $20. Those funds would obviously go into building the professional association and doing things professional associations do (e.g., advocating for the principles, marketing the principles, growing the association, educating members, facilitating networking)
I’m not saying we should remove people from the professional association on a whim. I won’t weigh in on the Nonlinear controversy. Regardless of what side people are on, most can agree the process was controversial. I don’t imagine either side is happy with how it played out. Professional organisations almost always have their own version of the community health team. These would conduct investigations and decide the appropriate course of action.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t have organisations processing donations in each country. I am staying it might be clearer for people who just want to donate where their money goes. I have had at least one donor ask this week about whether his donations to global health go toward community activities (they don’t. Still, he seemed concerned). Separating ‘charity’ from ‘professional association’ makes each user journey clearer. Want to donate, go to the charity (e.g., GWWC). Want to work on this stuff, go to the professional association (e.g., 80k). Fellowships might still feed into each. Presentations about EA might still feed into each, but it’d be obvious who should go where.
What bullets we might need to bite
We’re unlikely to get tax deductible charity status in many jurisdictions (at least in Australia). Instead we’d get professional association status. ‘Dues’ and ‘training’ could still be educational expenses, so at least in Australia, likely tax deductible. Still, we might end up with fewer people ‘in the community’ than ‘in the professional association’ if working professionals are expected to pay for the difference between expenses and grants (e.g., the CBG might foot chunks of the bill, but if expenses are higher, members might be expected to pay dues)
Many professional associations are governed by member voting rather than the board making the selection via committee. For example, from the other EA
The Board is made up of six directors from Engineers Australia’s membership who are elected by Engineers Australia’s National Congress. A further two directors can be appointed directly by the board and do not need to be engineers. Any member of Engineers Australia who has the required skills can nominate to be considered for the Board.
This might be controversial. Many community members might like it because it creates more accountability for the board. In contrast, it might create painful politics within EA ranks. Major funders might expect seats on the board. Membership voting also isn’t mandatory. The Australian Medical Association selects their board by committee, not membership voting (as far as I can tell).
Reversal test
Imagine we were a series of professional associations (the world’s various medical associations). Members were paying dues at whatever level covered expenses. Some countries had two associations, which was fine. They competed. Students still attended conferences, many on scholarships or reduced fees. We ran events as a professional association, people tax deduced their educational expenses. SBF did something obviously stupid and the relevant professional association did their own investigation (because it’s obvious who’s responsible for it) and they rescinded his membership alongside a public admonishment.
In this world, do we switch back to an unstructured ‘community’ (social unit) with no clear membership? I imagine so if there’s no product-market fit: people who receive benefits from the professional association are be unwilling to spend enough on it for it to be commercial viable, or funders don’t agree with the model on philosophical grounds. Both of these might be true. I just haven’t seen anyone play with the idea.
Case study: Psychologists
In Australia, there are at least 3 professional organisations for the profession (AAPi, APS [at least 40% of all psychs in this one], ACPA). Maybe the fact there’s three reveals how dysfunctional they are. Being transparent, I stopped my engagement—didn’t get enough return on investment. Still, they do all the things we’d expect community builders to do: networking events, professional advocacy, marketing the profession, conference. When a psychologist does or says something stupid that contradicts the code of conduct, usually the APS will confirm ‘stupid things’ veracity, then rescind membership, and issue a position statement. This might have more sway than statements from individual community members, community ‘leaders’, or CEA. Not everyone will agree with the statement, but it might have more authority.
With these associations, it’s clear what the quid-pro-quo is. You get these things for your dues (and the grants). Maybe you don’t get enough, but it’s less ambiguous than the ‘community’ or if you imagined ‘strong minds’ also educated/represented /advocated for psychologists (how at least one donor sees us). Googling mental health community gets you either a professional association or community mental health services (public health or charities).
“where many people think that EA is highly centralised, whereas really it’s in-between. We get the downsides of appearing (to some) like one entity without the benefits of tight coordination” Will MacAskill
Cost 5-20,000 USD in time set up a new ‘professional association’ or to pivot from a ‘we give money to the poor charity’ or ‘community’ to a professional association (60% confidence)
For someone naive to EA (e.g., university freshmen), advertising as a professional association instead of community will reduce the phyg perception from 10-30% to 1-3% (70%)
The number of views on mass media articles using the world ‘phyg’ would go down from 200,000 views per year to 150,000 (60%)
Faster and more direct feedback between the members and the professional association will lead to:
5% higher satisfaction rate in events (60%)
At least 1% of donors using the donations processors (e.g., GWWC) would pay dues >$50 USD (60%)
This would increase ‘professional organisation’ revenue in the top 10 EA countries by enough to pay for a CEO (least 0.5 FTE; 70%)
Conference attendance would remain flat (80%)
The time between ‘norm violation’ and ‘investigation releases results’ would reduce from >6 months to <6 months due to clearer role clarity (75%)
[Question] Should EA ‘communities’ be ‘professional associations’?
Summary: Professional organisations are more transparent, with clearer boundaries, norms, and responsibilities compared with ‘communities’. I’m not saying ‘we should erect barriers’ or ‘we should stop being inclusive’ but the ‘community’ model is riskier when scandals hit.
Caveats
Weakly held hair-brained idea that I want challenged by people smarter than me. While I’m chair of EA Australia, this idea doesn’t represent the board.
What is a community?
Some problems with communities are the lack of clear membership of the social unit. It’s also unclear who is speaking for the community. As written by Dustin Moskovitz:
It also creates reservations among the community’s biggest funders:
What is a professional association?
These sound pretty close to what we’re trying to do, as a global community.
What I’m not saying
I’m not saying we should erect high financial or administrative boundaries to joining the community. For example, students could join for free or for $20. Those funds would obviously go into building the professional association and doing things professional associations do (e.g., advocating for the principles, marketing the principles, growing the association, educating members, facilitating networking)
I’m not saying we should remove people from the professional association on a whim. I won’t weigh in on the Nonlinear controversy. Regardless of what side people are on, most can agree the process was controversial. I don’t imagine either side is happy with how it played out. Professional organisations almost always have their own version of the community health team. These would conduct investigations and decide the appropriate course of action.
I’m not saying we shouldn’t have organisations processing donations in each country. I am staying it might be clearer for people who just want to donate where their money goes. I have had at least one donor ask this week about whether his donations to global health go toward community activities (they don’t. Still, he seemed concerned). Separating ‘charity’ from ‘professional association’ makes each user journey clearer. Want to donate, go to the charity (e.g., GWWC). Want to work on this stuff, go to the professional association (e.g., 80k). Fellowships might still feed into each. Presentations about EA might still feed into each, but it’d be obvious who should go where.
What bullets we might need to bite
We’re unlikely to get tax deductible charity status in many jurisdictions (at least in Australia). Instead we’d get professional association status. ‘Dues’ and ‘training’ could still be educational expenses, so at least in Australia, likely tax deductible. Still, we might end up with fewer people ‘in the community’ than ‘in the professional association’ if working professionals are expected to pay for the difference between expenses and grants (e.g., the CBG might foot chunks of the bill, but if expenses are higher, members might be expected to pay dues)
Many professional associations are governed by member voting rather than the board making the selection via committee. For example, from the other EA
This might be controversial. Many community members might like it because it creates more accountability for the board. In contrast, it might create painful politics within EA ranks. Major funders might expect seats on the board. Membership voting also isn’t mandatory. The Australian Medical Association selects their board by committee, not membership voting (as far as I can tell).
Reversal test
Imagine we were a series of professional associations (the world’s various medical associations). Members were paying dues at whatever level covered expenses. Some countries had two associations, which was fine. They competed. Students still attended conferences, many on scholarships or reduced fees. We ran events as a professional association, people tax deduced their educational expenses. SBF did something obviously stupid and the relevant professional association did their own investigation (because it’s obvious who’s responsible for it) and they rescinded his membership alongside a public admonishment.
In this world, do we switch back to an unstructured ‘community’ (social unit) with no clear membership? I imagine so if there’s no product-market fit: people who receive benefits from the professional association are be unwilling to spend enough on it for it to be commercial viable, or funders don’t agree with the model on philosophical grounds. Both of these might be true. I just haven’t seen anyone play with the idea.
Case study: Psychologists
In Australia, there are at least 3 professional organisations for the profession (AAPi, APS [at least 40% of all psychs in this one], ACPA). Maybe the fact there’s three reveals how dysfunctional they are. Being transparent, I stopped my engagement—didn’t get enough return on investment. Still, they do all the things we’d expect community builders to do: networking events, professional advocacy, marketing the profession, conference. When a psychologist does or says something stupid that contradicts the code of conduct, usually the APS will confirm ‘stupid things’ veracity, then rescind membership, and issue a position statement. This might have more sway than statements from individual community members, community ‘leaders’, or CEA. Not everyone will agree with the statement, but it might have more authority.
With these associations, it’s clear what the quid-pro-quo is. You get these things for your dues (and the grants). Maybe you don’t get enough, but it’s less ambiguous than the ‘community’ or if you imagined ‘strong minds’ also educated/represented /advocated for psychologists (how at least one donor sees us). Googling mental health community gets you either a professional association or community mental health services (public health or charities).
What do you think?
Why should we stay as a ‘community’ with links to charities rather than being a ‘professional association’, one ‘that aims to find the best ways to help others, and put them into practice.’ Is this a dumb model or does it help us avoid the worst of both worlds:
My hypotheses are that using professional organisations to increase centralisation would:
Cost 5-20,000 USD in time set up a new ‘professional association’ or to pivot from a ‘we give money to the poor charity’ or ‘community’ to a professional association (60% confidence)
For someone naive to EA (e.g., university freshmen), advertising as a professional association instead of community will reduce the phyg perception from 10-30% to 1-3% (70%)
The number of views on mass media articles using the world ‘phyg’ would go down from 200,000 views per year to 150,000 (60%)
Faster and more direct feedback between the members and the professional association will lead to:
5% higher satisfaction rate in events (60%)
At least 1% of donors using the donations processors (e.g., GWWC) would pay dues >$50 USD (60%)
This would increase ‘professional organisation’ revenue in the top 10 EA countries by enough to pay for a CEO (least 0.5 FTE; 70%)
Conference attendance would remain flat (80%)
The time between ‘norm violation’ and ‘investigation releases results’ would reduce from >6 months to <6 months due to clearer role clarity (75%)
These are weakly held, so please change my mind.
Appendix
Photo by Cytonn Photography on Unsplash