Thanks for sharing your story. I personally found it really inspiring.
Regarding “Gatekeeping by a Small, Elite Group”:
It is sadly my impression that CEA does see itself as a small, elite group and that this is intentional. See this comment from Max Dalton, the executive director:
Implicitly, you’re suggesting that the appropriate place for discussion of CEA’s governance is in public. In contrast, I think CEA’s board holds that responsibility. Overall, I think that discussion is going to be more productive with a few highly-skilled and high-context individuals rather than a broad discussion. While I agree that getting broad community input into our work is important, I also think that it’s critical that we are held accountable for doing impactful work, which will not always be the same as what pleases community members.
The aim is obviously to prioritise impact over “the community”. Which might be fine theoretically—but it is implied that the small, elite group can judge impact better than the community, which I find troubling.
But I think one part of the solution is for EAs to stop regarding CEA as the representatives of the movement, as they clearly aren’t trying to be. This means rejection by them is just that—rejection by one specific organisation. Of course I’m overly simplifying, because the influential orgs in EA, and the ones that control fuding, are all highly centralised and the people are friends with each other. But the more EAs try to make it decentralised, or to create more democratic or representative institutions, the better these things may become.
I think it’s hard to maintain that you’re not trying to represent the movement if you call your event “Effective Altruism Global” and own/run effectivealtruism.com
I’m busy with EAG prep, so I can’t respond properly right now, but I wanted to note that I think the comment thread above (Guy’s original comment + Joshua’s) doesn’t quite capture how I’m thinking about CEA’s relationship to the community or to representativeness, though I can see why you’re taking these things from what I wrote.
The quote above is about who should decide how CEA is governed (note—it’s not even about who should govern CEA, it’s about who should decide the right governance structure). I still think that the board is best placed to do this, and it is their legal prerogative. I think that they should probably decide that there is more community governance/a slightly broader set of perspectives on CEA’s governance (but I also think that the perspective of the current board is very helpful, and I don’t think I would change it massively, and I’d regret losing the input of everyone on the current board).
Conor draws out of this the implication that a small elite group can judge impact better than the community. I agree with some versions of this and not others.
I don’t think that CEA staff have all of the answers here. We frequently ask other community members for their advice and input on many questions here.
I do think that there are some community members (at CEA, but also at other organizations) whose judgement I trust significantly more than the average forum user on questions about assessing our impact. This is usually at least in part because they have thought seriously about such questions for a long while. They’re not infallible.
I am coming around to the view that we should now be investing more in evaluations, including sharing more publicly. I don’t think that was the right call for the last ~2 years, but I think we might be at a stage where we should focus on it more. I expect that if we share more public evaluations, the community will share useful perspectives.
We are really keen to hear feedback from the community about our programs, and feed that into our understanding. E.g. we do surveys at the end of each EAG, review all of the answers, and have that directly feed into our plans for subsequent events.
Then we move onto (paraphrasing very slightly) “CEA clearly aren’t trying to be representative of the movement”. I think that “representative” could mean lots of things here, and again I agree with some versions but not others:
It could be something like “CEA is not doing EAG admissions so as to be a representative cross section of everyone in the movement”. If you take this interpretation, there’s then a question of who is “in the movement”.
If you take a broad view—e.g. everyone who’s heard of EA or who has identified with it on some level—I think it’s true that we’re not trying to be representative in this way.
If you take a more narrow view—e.g. people who have thought really carefully about EA ideas and are taking significant action on that basis—I think that we end up being reasonably representative (and are in part aiming to be representative (alongside goals like admitting people who would benefit from the event, and thinking about who will contribute to the event)).
Another thing that this often refers to is cause area representativeness. For EAG content and admissions, and EA.org content, and all other CEA programs, I do want us to accurately represent what the EA community is. I hope to share more on what this means to us soon. (I think there’s a lot to be unpacked about what exactly it means to accurately represent EA.)
Probably some other interpretations that I’m missing.
I do think that it’s a good attitude to view being rejected from EAG as “rejection by one specific organisation”, or maybe even as “one organisation saying that they don’t think you’re a good fit for this event right now” (when we might still think you’re a good fit for EAGx or whatever, or might be a good fit later).
Hi,
I upvoted because I appreciate that you took the time to give a detailed answer.
I’m going to reply more thoroughly, but for now I’ll highlight this:
Then we move onto (paraphrasing very slightly) “CEA clearly aren’t trying to be representative of the movement”. I think that “representative” could mean lots of things here, and again I agree with some versions but not others:
By this I’m referring to the decision-makers in CEA being representative of the community. Not participants of EA events.
I still don’t know how exactly you choose participants, and I think the problem there is not necessarily the way you choose, but the fact that nobody seems to know what it is. But this is way less important to me than the general decision-making and transparency in CEA.
Thanks, and to clarify, by decision-makers, do you mean mostly the board or mostly staff? And do you want them to be representative on particular dimensions? Or maybe chosen by a representative process like elections? I expect that we disagree on what the right structure is, but still interested to understand your view.
EAG conference activity has grown dramatically, with EAGs now going over 1,500 people, and more EAG and EAGx conferences. Expenses and staff have all increased to support many more attendees.
The very CEA people who are responding here (and actively recruiting more people to get more/larger conferences), presided over this growth in conferences.
I can imagine that the increased size of EAGs faced some opposition. It’s plausible to me that the CEA people here, actively fought for the larger sizes (and increased management/risk).
In at least a few views, this seems opposite to “eliteness” and seems important to notice/mention.
I think the emotional cost of rejection is real and important. I think the post is about feeling like a member of a community, as opposed to acceptance at EAG itself.
It seems the OP didn’t want to go to EAGx conferences. This wasn’t mentioned in her OP.
Presumably, one reason the OP didn’t want to go to EAGx, was that they view these events as diluted, or not having the same value as an EAG[1].
But that view seems contrary to wanting to expand from “elite”, highly filtered EAGs. Instead, their choices suggests the issue is a personal one about fairness/meeting the bar for EAG.
The grandparent comment opens a thread criticizing eliteness or filtered EAG/CEA events. But that doesn’t seem to be consistent with the above.
BTW, I think views where EAGx are “lesser” are disappointing, because in some ways, EAGx conferences have greater opportunities for counterfactuals (there are more liminal or nascent EAs).
She responded to this concern here. She has been to an EAGx before and was and is open to going to others
When she talked to Amy (which is probably where you are getting the info and drawing conclusion from), it was not because she viewed them as lesser but because she had a scheduling conflict since she was a speaker at the AVA Summit.
Quick point of clarification: on the call, I recall Constance saying that her heart was set on EAG and that she was not interested in EAGx. Perhaps there was a miscommunication or I misunderstood, but that is the information I was working with throughout communications.
Reading the comment you link to, it doesn’t indicate having been to an EAGx before [edit: maybe a virtual event was indicated], but does indicate openness to going to others.
You are right she doesn’t mention it in the comment. But in the OP she mentioned she went to EAGx Virtual. See the “Rejoining the EA Community (Fall 2021)” section.
To be clear, I’m grateful for much of the work done by CEA and I’ve really enjoyed the conferences I’ve been to.
I guess here what I mean by “elitist” diverges from what Constance meant. Because indeed you’re getting more participants and there’s strong pushback against that. On the other hand, decision-makers are still the same small group.
Thanks for sharing your story. I personally found it really inspiring.
Regarding “Gatekeeping by a Small, Elite Group”:
It is sadly my impression that CEA does see itself as a small, elite group and that this is intentional. See this comment from Max Dalton, the executive director:
The aim is obviously to prioritise impact over “the community”. Which might be fine theoretically—but it is implied that the small, elite group can judge impact better than the community, which I find troubling.
But I think one part of the solution is for EAs to stop regarding CEA as the representatives of the movement, as they clearly aren’t trying to be. This means rejection by them is just that—rejection by one specific organisation. Of course I’m overly simplifying, because the influential orgs in EA, and the ones that control fuding, are all highly centralised and the people are friends with each other. But the more EAs try to make it decentralised, or to create more democratic or representative institutions, the better these things may become.
I think it’s hard to maintain that you’re not trying to represent the movement if you call your event “Effective Altruism Global” and own/run effectivealtruism.com
Good point.
I’m busy with EAG prep, so I can’t respond properly right now, but I wanted to note that I think the comment thread above (Guy’s original comment + Joshua’s) doesn’t quite capture how I’m thinking about CEA’s relationship to the community or to representativeness, though I can see why you’re taking these things from what I wrote.
Coming back to pay off this IOU.
Some points:
The quote above is about who should decide how CEA is governed (note—it’s not even about who should govern CEA, it’s about who should decide the right governance structure). I still think that the board is best placed to do this, and it is their legal prerogative. I think that they should probably decide that there is more community governance/a slightly broader set of perspectives on CEA’s governance (but I also think that the perspective of the current board is very helpful, and I don’t think I would change it massively, and I’d regret losing the input of everyone on the current board).
Conor draws out of this the implication that a small elite group can judge impact better than the community. I agree with some versions of this and not others.
I don’t think that CEA staff have all of the answers here. We frequently ask other community members for their advice and input on many questions here.
I do think that there are some community members (at CEA, but also at other organizations) whose judgement I trust significantly more than the average forum user on questions about assessing our impact. This is usually at least in part because they have thought seriously about such questions for a long while. They’re not infallible.
I am coming around to the view that we should now be investing more in evaluations, including sharing more publicly. I don’t think that was the right call for the last ~2 years, but I think we might be at a stage where we should focus on it more. I expect that if we share more public evaluations, the community will share useful perspectives.
We are really keen to hear feedback from the community about our programs, and feed that into our understanding. E.g. we do surveys at the end of each EAG, review all of the answers, and have that directly feed into our plans for subsequent events.
Then we move onto (paraphrasing very slightly) “CEA clearly aren’t trying to be representative of the movement”. I think that “representative” could mean lots of things here, and again I agree with some versions but not others:
It could be something like “CEA is not doing EAG admissions so as to be a representative cross section of everyone in the movement”. If you take this interpretation, there’s then a question of who is “in the movement”.
If you take a broad view—e.g. everyone who’s heard of EA or who has identified with it on some level—I think it’s true that we’re not trying to be representative in this way.
If you take a more narrow view—e.g. people who have thought really carefully about EA ideas and are taking significant action on that basis—I think that we end up being reasonably representative (and are in part aiming to be representative (alongside goals like admitting people who would benefit from the event, and thinking about who will contribute to the event)).
Another thing that this often refers to is cause area representativeness. For EAG content and admissions, and EA.org content, and all other CEA programs, I do want us to accurately represent what the EA community is. I hope to share more on what this means to us soon. (I think there’s a lot to be unpacked about what exactly it means to accurately represent EA.)
Probably some other interpretations that I’m missing.
I do think that it’s a good attitude to view being rejected from EAG as “rejection by one specific organisation”, or maybe even as “one organisation saying that they don’t think you’re a good fit for this event right now” (when we might still think you’re a good fit for EAGx or whatever, or might be a good fit later).
Hi, I upvoted because I appreciate that you took the time to give a detailed answer. I’m going to reply more thoroughly, but for now I’ll highlight this:
By this I’m referring to the decision-makers in CEA being representative of the community. Not participants of EA events.
I still don’t know how exactly you choose participants, and I think the problem there is not necessarily the way you choose, but the fact that nobody seems to know what it is. But this is way less important to me than the general decision-making and transparency in CEA.
Thanks, and to clarify, by decision-makers, do you mean mostly the board or mostly staff? And do you want them to be representative on particular dimensions? Or maybe chosen by a representative process like elections? I expect that we disagree on what the right structure is, but still interested to understand your view.
Thanks for saying this!
I’ll be happy to hear what you think when you have the time.
EAG conference activity has grown dramatically, with EAGs now going over 1,500 people, and more EAG and EAGx conferences. Expenses and staff have all increased to support many more attendees.
The very CEA people who are responding here (and actively recruiting more people to get more/larger conferences), presided over this growth in conferences.
I can imagine that the increased size of EAGs faced some opposition. It’s plausible to me that the CEA people here, actively fought for the larger sizes (and increased management/risk).
In at least a few views, this seems opposite to “eliteness” and seems important to notice/mention.
I think the emotional cost of rejection is real and important. I think the post is about feeling like a member of a community, as opposed to acceptance at EAG itself.
It seems the OP didn’t want to go to EAGx conferences. This wasn’t mentioned in her OP.
Presumably, one reason the OP didn’t want to go to EAGx, was that they view these events as diluted, or not having the same value as an EAG[1].
But that view seems contrary to wanting to expand from “elite”, highly filtered EAGs. Instead, their choices suggests the issue is a personal one about fairness/meeting the bar for EAG.
The grandparent comment opens a thread criticizing eliteness or filtered EAG/CEA events. But that doesn’t seem to be consistent with the above.
BTW, I think views where EAGx are “lesser” are disappointing, because in some ways, EAGx conferences have greater opportunities for counterfactuals (there are more liminal or nascent EAs).
She responded to this concern here. She has been to an EAGx before and was and is open to going to others
When she talked to Amy (which is probably where you are getting the info and drawing conclusion from), it was not because she viewed them as lesser but because she had a scheduling conflict since she was a speaker at the AVA Summit.
Yes, Amy’s comment is where I got my information/conclusion from.
Yes, you are right, the OP has commented to say she is open to EAGx, and based on this, my comment above about not liking EAGx does not apply.
Quick point of clarification: on the call, I recall Constance saying that her heart was set on EAG and that she was not interested in EAGx. Perhaps there was a miscommunication or I misunderstood, but that is the information I was working with throughout communications.
Reading the comment you link to, it doesn’t indicate having been to an EAGx before [edit: maybe a virtual event was indicated], but does indicate openness to going to others.
Amy gave her impression on the point here.
You are right she doesn’t mention it in the comment. But in the OP she mentioned she went to EAGx Virtual. See the “Rejoining the EA Community (Fall 2021)” section.
To be clear, I’m grateful for much of the work done by CEA and I’ve really enjoyed the conferences I’ve been to.
I guess here what I mean by “elitist” diverges from what Constance meant. Because indeed you’re getting more participants and there’s strong pushback against that. On the other hand, decision-makers are still the same small group.