How Humanists International Makes Decisions At The Global Level - Guide to the General Assembly

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With less than a week to go before the World Humanist Congress in Ottawa, Gary McLelland and Leon Langdon step back from interviews to do something different: build an evergreen guide to how Humanists International's General Assembly actually works. The idea came from a board meeting where HI decided to use the podcast to create resources that will remain useful long after any particular news cycle. This episode is designed for delegates heading to Ottawa and for anyone joining the movement who wants to understand how a humanist voice becomes global humanist policy.

Slides for this episode are available here:
https://drive.google.com/file/d/10LEduM7jK97FkabbJduNOiyYBX3Ano2a/view?usp=sharing

In this episode we cover

• Who makes up the General Assembly
• The governance structure
• GA timelines and submission: resolutions, motions, and board nominations
• Emergency motion process
• How a resolution becomes global policy
• Safety mechanism and: quorum rules, emergency assemblies

Further reading and references

• Humanists International General Assembly: https://humanists.international/about/our-members/general-assembly/
• HI Member Organisations: https://humanists.international/about/our-members/

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This podcast is produced by Humanise Live.

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🎶Music: Horizon by Simon Folwar

Podcast transcripts are AI-generated and may contain errors or omissions. They are provided to make our content more accessible, but should not be considered a fully accurate record of the conversation.

Transcript

Welcome and episode format overview

Leon Langdon 0:05

Welcome to Freedom of Thought, a podcast by Humanist International. With me, Leon Langdon. And me, Gary McClelland. Each week we'll be discussing news, research, policy developments, and campaigns related to freedom of thought around the world. But I think as I give that info, Gary, I think there's maybe a sort of meta discussion to be had. Because this week we're not going to be talking about campaigns, news, research, or policy developments. We're going to be talking about the Humanist International General Assembly and all of that. But before that, I think it's probably good for listeners to know that this podcast is a sort of experiment for us at Humanist International, and one that we're continually playing with the format. I feel like we've sort of landed almost by accident on the sort of you and I chat for 10 minutes or so, 10 to 15, about what we've been up to, what the organization's been up to, and then we have our incredible guests on, our amazing guests. But I think, yeah, it's probably worth pausing and even just reflecting on that and how we've gotten here.

Gary McLelland 1:03

Absolutely, yeah. And I think as well, we mentioned that we had uh this board meeting in Oslo now a couple of months ago, and we had a discussion at that meeting about the structure of the podcast and uh the way forward, based as well on a lot of feedback from members. And and one of the ideas that came out of that was to use the podcast as a way of creating almost like resources on specific issues that can last longer than you know a podcast looking at a particular moment in time or a particular advocacy issue or so on. And I think that's what we're going to try and do today is to try and use this as a way of making a almost like a guide to the General Assembly, which hopefully will be useful. Hopefully it'll be interesting in the moment, but then in the years to come will also be useful as a way, for example, for new delegates coming to the General Assembly to be able to understand how it works and the functioning and how to get the most out of their membership of Humanists International.

Leon Langdon 1:59

To pick up on two things. I think it's it is really useful to have a sort of mix of content. I think, you know, think about podcasts I listen to, and although they do have a sort of standard format, it took them a long time to kind of get there, and I think we're still exploring that. And I think as you pointed out, having sort of, let's say, evergreen content, these sort of guides, is definitely useful, as well as the opportunity to talk to our members about what we're doing week to week. I know I I've had members talk to me about the podcast and about the sort of issues that I'm working on that that my team is working on because of the podcast, which I think is great. But also on this specific episode on the General Assembly, I think it's also a really good opportunity. I think I said this on the podcast before, really good opportunity for prospective members. You know, if you are a part of our member, it's really good for you to, or part of any one of our members, it's really good for you to hear how this all works. You know, if you're a humanist leader, you might already know or you might be new to it. If you're a member of a member of ours, it'll be good for you to see how this works. But also, as we saw from our listening stats at the end of last year, we had, you know, people in countries we we don't regularly interact with. And, you know, if you're there and you're you're a humanist and you're considering starting an organization, we'd obviously love to support you. Javen is incredible, our membership manager. But also, I think it's really good for you to know that that your voice would be part of a global movement and what that looks like, what the democratic nature of this organization actually means in practice. So yeah, you know, I don't often think about the General Assembly in terms of the process of it. It's just kind of something that happens. But when it comes to the policy that it makes, the resolutions, as we'll talk about, the motions, that is the thing I think about probably the most. It's what guides our advocacy work, you know, it's what the organized humanist movement, the what the voice uh of that says, but it's also what directs my work, my priorities. And, you know, when it comes to lobbying the UN or the European Union or wherever, it comes from the General Assembly. It comes from policy documents and and resolutions of the General Assembly. And I think that's really important for people to know that direct link.

Gary McLelland 4:02

Absolutely. Yeah. And you make a really good point there as well, Young, which is important to foreground in terms of you know, we're we're looking at the international level here, but each humanist organization, each member of Humanists International is a democratic organization, and that democracy will look different according to different cultures and so on. But for members of our members, i.e. individual humanists around the world, you will have an well, if you're fortunate enough to be in a country that has a national humanist organization, which I think are in 68 countries in the world do, and then you have access to that national democratic structure. And what this is, is the international structure that your national member will be sending delegates to, and so on. So that's an important sort of situation, uh I guess, or situatedness to put the the General Assembly in.

Leon Langdon 4:52

Well, Gary, you've told

🔗 Where to the view accompanying slides

Leon Langdon 4:53

me you've made some slides. Many people listen to us on Spotify or Apple Podcasts or, you know, what's the line, wherever they get their podcasts. But also we are on YouTube and we do have a visual component. And so I would encourage people for this episode in particular to join us over there if they can, or on both, you know, booster listening stats. That would be the most ideal. But um, yeah, Gary, you've got some slides if people want to watch them, pop over onto YouTube. Oh, they're very nice altogether.

Gary McLelland 5:20

Thank you. Yes, we've got some slides here. So um we will include them as a link in the show notes so that people can uh look at them afterwards if they're listening by audio. But we'll also describe them. I mean, there there's nothing particularly different on the slides than what we'll talk about. It's just a visual guide to help us as we discuss the General Assembly.

The Basics: What is the General Assembly?

Gary McLelland 5:43

So what is the General Assembly? Well, as the the bylaws of Humanists International make clear, and it's the bylaws that that govern almost all of the business of the General Assembly. The General Assembly is the sovereign body of Humanists International, so it is the authority decision-making body, the final authority of the organization. And as you can see here on the slides, there's a few questions. So who is in the General Assembly? The General Assembly is made up primarily of representatives of our members and associates around the world and the Board of Humanists International. Of course, myself and you, Leon, and the other staff attend the General Assembly, but we're not members of the General Assembly in the sense that we don't vote on decisions and so on. We're there to be accountable to the General Assembly, to take instruction from the General Assembly and support the board and the members. We have at least one General Assembly per year as required by the bylaws, but we can often have more than one if it's felt necessary to for emergencies or to make changes to the bylaws in a timely manner and so on. And the General Assembly takes place alongside the World Humanist Congress, and it can take place online or what we say is by correspondence, so it is possible for the General Assembly to make decisions using electronic communication or on online video conferences, but generally it takes place as an in-person event alongside the World Humanist Congress. And that happened during COVID, right? That's right. So in 2020 and 2021, we actually amended the bylaws so we had to have we didn't have the ability to have online General Assemblies, so we had to have a General Assembly by correspondence, i.e. by emailing everybody to get their agreement, to allow us then to have an online General Assembly. And the General Assembly is corit, i.e. it's it can make decisions and is is kind of um legally present when one third of all of the members' votes are present at that meeting. So that's the basic structure of the General Assembly. And as we move on,

Membership & Votes: Who takes part and with how many votes?

Gary McLelland 7:50

thinking then about in terms of who takes part, one of the questions is you know, votes, entitlement and so on. So on the screen now we have a chart here which sets out the voting entitlement of the various different types of members. So generally speaking, we have two types of members we have members and we have associates, and members are national or state level organizations open to all humanists in their country, run on a not-for-profit basis. Associates can be local or at least non-national members or non-national organizations, and they may be, for example, research institutes or local regional or city organizations, but not a full national member. So this this uh chart sets out that members who have paid their fees for over two years and have either 10,000 members or regular government funding are entitled to 13 votes. Other members are entitled to seven votes, other members who have not paid their fees for the last two years, so new members, for example, or members who have reactivated their membership, are entitled to one vote until they've been through the process for two years. Associates which operate nationally or in countries where we don't have a member are entitled to one vote. But associates or individual supporters in countries where we already have a member do not get a vote. And that's to try and respect the balance of votes from each individual country so that we don't have a high number of votes from one country that has a lot of associates and so on.

Leon Langdon 9:24

I think it is worth just reinforcing for those who aren't familiar, is our members and associates are organizations. They are not, like you say, individual supporters. They are, you know, have to go through a process that our membership manager runs alongside the board and for consultation with the current membership in terms of becoming a member or associate of Humanist International. And so that is, if I'm not mistaken, so that rather than people coming directly to us and trying to vote or trying to influence us, that that we encourage them to either found an organization themselves and to go through that process, or simply to join a pre-existing organization to join their national member or their local associate or whoever it might be. And again, like you said, our individual members themselves are democratic, and so you know there are mechanisms to become involved in them and then in turn to vote and to become part of Humanist International.

Gary McLelland 10:18

Absolutely. And uh, I guess two other additional things to mention in terms of the participation element of the General Assembly is that our members can send someone as a proxy. So if you are uh running a member organization and you're unable to make it to the General Assembly, you can ask someone to be your proxy, which is to instruct them to vote for you in one way or another. But individuals can only be proxies for two organizations, no more than two organizations. Um and we also have a mechanism to make sure that at the General Assembly it's the members' votes that hold the majority. So in the situation, if the situation was ever to arise that associate votes in total outweighed the number of member votes, then they would be recalculated in such a way that the member vote always has the majority.

Leon Langdon 11:10

I think the um the proxy thing is is important and interesting. Sorry, I feel like I'm playing the role of the sort of Greek chorus here commenting and asking questions as you're presenting, but nevertheless, I think the proxy thing is interesting just because we are a global organization. We have members across every continent except Antarctica, and we have you know this global representation. And and the unfortunate truth is visas can be barriers, money can be barriers to being involved, time can be a barrier to being involved, and so ensuring that even those members who who are not able to be present are able to nominate a proxy and that those their voice can still be heard, I think is really quite important. I think speaks to the the global nature of the organization of the movement more generally. Absolutely, absolutely.

Gary McLelland 11:55

And then there has been discussions over the years about whether we should have a hybrid or an online General Assembly. And generally speaking, it's been the position of the organization through consultation that it's better to have an in-person General Assembly. We we've spoken on this podcast before about the added benefits of having in-person staff meetings and planning meetings, and it's just felt that the with some of the sensitive policy motions and bylaws, amendments, and so on, it's so much more beneficial to be able to have in-person conversations about delicate issues and to be able to read the sense of the room and so on. So but that brings challenges, of course, and and and one way to navigate that is to have a proxy representation system. But yeah. So that's who can take part in the General Assembly.

Governance Structure: How the pieces fit together

Gary McLelland 12:41

Let's just have a look now about the kind of the structure of where the General Assembly sits. So on the slide here, we can see that there's a a chart which shows that Humanists International has about 120 members and associates around the world. And you can see that that is then they appoint delegates to the General Assembly, which, as we've said, is the sovereign body. Those delegates can nominate um board members for election, they can propose resolutions, policy motions, changes to the bylaws and so on. And at the General Assembly, where they meet, they can discuss, approve, reject motions, declarations, changes to the bylaws and so on, and also elect board members. And this is a very important function of the General Assembly. So one of the functions of the board obviously is to govern the organisation in between General Assemblies. So the board is made up of ten board members or trustees, consisting of the president, vice president, and treasurer. Collectively, we call these three positions the officers of the board, and then seven additional board members. So yeah, basically, in between General Assemblies, it's the job of the board to implement the General Assembly's decisions, to adopt strategy and budget, to monitor the finances, to provide a report to the General Assembly with activities and so on, and to work with myself as the chief executive and the other staff members under what's called a delegated authority schedule, which is what sets out what's the authority of the staff and what's the authority of the board and where the reporting requirements are.

Leon Langdon 14:14

I think what's clear from this, at least clear to me, as someone who has been in the organization about three years and you know has a I guess less uh less time in it than many of our members and and their representatives, is just how complex it all is. The amount of, you know, you've called this slide how the pieces fit together, the amount of moving pieces and moving parts is really quite a lot. And the fact that it functions quite well is is really quite impressive, both the General Assembly, but also, you know, the day-to-day running of the organization. And I think there is just a lot of complexity. I mean, I guess that's the reason for doing this this episode of the podcast is to unpack some of that. But it really is, I mean, the board have a big role in terms of particularly, I guess, the financial aspect really comes to mind, but the strategy, the financial stuff as well. And I think there there's just so much more to running an organization than I guess a lot of people would realise, especially at this scale.

Gary McLelland 15:06

Yeah, yeah. And it's it is complicated, and the these mechanisms are all here and that they've all evolved, I should say, as well, by input and decisions from members. I mean, the bylaws have been rewritten several times in the last 10 years since I've been here, to achieve greater transparency, accountability, democratic participation, but also obviously to be workable for a team of 10 board members and 11 staff to actually be able to manage the organization. So yeah, it is a complicated organization.

Timeline: The countdown to a General Assembly

Gary McLelland 15:38

In fact, onto the next slide now, which has a bit of a timeline, and you can see here that it's an ambitious timeline, which which we had the deadline uh only a few days ago for submission to the General Assembly. So maybe I'll just run through this this timeline quickly to give listeners a sense of of how the progress of preparing a General Assembly happens. So again, all of these deadlines are set out in the bylaws. But in front of us we can see a timeline starting at the left and then heading along to the right, which is the day of the General Assembly. So starting from the left, 120 days before the General Assembly, the board issues a formal announcement and notice of the General Assembly. Now, in practice we do this much earlier because 120 days, what's that? Four months. Um, you know, in practice we send out the notice about a year ahead and people are reminded of it. So there should be no, hopefully, should be no ambiguity about when the General Assembly is happening. But we're required to announce the General Assembly 120 days before. Then the next big deadline is 40 days before the General Assembly, and this is the main deadline. We we generally call this the General Assembly deadline. This is the deadline whereby members must submit any resolutions. So this can be, for example, and we'll talk about this in a minute. If a member wants to propose that the global humanist movement has a policy on this issue, for example, last year it was artificial intelligence, then they can put forward a motion. Ideally, they would collaborate with other members to get a sense of what the consensus is, and they would put forward a motion for the deadline, which would then be circulated to members, as well as board member nominations, so we have an application form. If anybody would like to be elected onto our board, they need to be supported by three member organizations, and then they can be a delegate for in the board elections, and also for registration for the General Assembly, and so on and so on. So it's the big deadline 40 days before. And then five days after that, the bylaws require us to circulate all of these papers, motions, a list of all the board candidates, minutes of previous General Assemblies, basically every piece of paperwork that the General Assembly would need to interrogate and review and participate in the General Assembly. Now that's a very short deadline. In between those two deadlines, in between that 40 days and 35-day deadline, the board meets to review all of the submissions, they have to check that they are valid and that the members paid its fees and so on and so forth. So it's a very, very busy time to turn around all of these emotions and so on. But then that means that 35 days before the General Assembly, the papers are sent out. And then there's another window of time from that 35 day deadline until the Friday before the General Assembly, which would usually give a maybe say 30 days, give or take depending on when the date's full. You um you have time to do two things. Members have time to do two things. One, to submit amendments to any of the resolutions or motions which are contained in the papers, or secondly, to submit an emergency motion. So if something has happened in between those two deadlines, then a member can submit an emergency resolution to comment on a issue of geopolitics or an event that's happened, so that the deadlines remain

Emergency Motions And Real Examples

Gary McLelland 19:04

somewhat flexible.

Leon Langdon 19:05

I was gonna say I think a good example of that, Gary, is when we were in Singapore two years ago, there was a resolution brought, I think the day, yes, by by that deadline on uh the Taliban had just passed the I think it's the law on the propagation of virtue and prevention of vice, which you know outlaws I I don't want to say exactly what outlaws, because I don't know the law off the top of my head, but basically impedes women's rights and and rights to freedom of expression and things like that. So as a as a response to that, um one of our members brought a brought a resolution within that within that window. So I think that's a good example of something that that emerged that is relevant given our work on Afghanistan and and the sort of theocratic nature of the regime there and you know the repression faced by humanists in in the country. So I think that's a good example of something that is urgent and timely and happened within that sort of 35-ish day window.

Gary McLelland 19:59

Absolutely. And and that's exactly why this mechanism exists, because the leaders of the global humanist community will be together to discuss issues of the day, and the board and the General Assembly wants to have the flexibility to be able to talk about an issue of concern, but obviously sometimes things happen after deadlines. But generally speaking, in the normal run of things, emotions and and resolutions should be submitted before the 40-day deadline, just because as we mentioned, there's a lot of administration and checks and things that have to happen, and that gives us sufficient time to do that. But on the Friday before the General Assembly, so the General Assembly generally on a Sunday, on the Friday before that, the board will meet to review any of these amendments or emergency resolutions, and they will check them to make sure that they are valid and can go forward. The board then at that point has a decision to make on whether to include or not include any amendments, and we'll talk about that on the next slide. But um yeah, generally the purpose of this is just to set out the kind of deadline for how members and associates can participate in the General Assembly. But we'll move on now to look at the kind of hypothetical journey of a resolution through the General Assembly.

Policy-Making: The journey of a resolution

Gary McLelland 21:07

As we mentioned before, and we've got on the screen here in front of us um a sort of five-step process which I'll describe and as before you can you can see this on YouTube or you can uh have a look at the slides below in the show notes. But the first step is that a member can submit a resolution, as we mentioned before, the for today deadline. Number two, the board sets the agenda by deciding which items that are submitted are put on the agenda for the General Assembly and which are taken off. Now, the board has this power for a few reasons. One is to make sure that the motion which is submitted, if for example it's to change the bylaws, the board has a responsibility to make sure that if that resolution was passed that the organisation could still function legally and administratively, that it wouldn't cause any problems with the functioning of the organisation. And secondly, to make sure that it doesn't affect our legal compliance, you know. There are certain actions which theoretically could be taken which would not be in keeping with our legal status as a not-for-profit. So the board does have a decision to make whether to include or not include those motions. Now, in the event that the board says or decides that we don't want to include this resolution because we think it would be legally problematic or could create other unforeseen problems, it must say that and set out its reasons for doing that in the General Assembly. And the General Assembly does have the right to overrule the board and say, no, notwithstanding your concerns, we would like to discuss this item. But the hope is that obviously the General Assembly would take on board the reasoned views of the board and weight it sufficiently. So we have that process. Number three is we have the amendment stage. So in the days leading up to the General Assembly, after the papers have been published, members can submit amendments, ask questions, discuss and so on. And the fourth step is that on the Friday before the General Assembly, any final texts or amendments which have been accepted by the Board will be circulated to the General Assembly delegates. And this is to make sure that all of the discussion and the consideration of the motions can happen before the meeting of the General Assembly, so that when we meet, and this is stage five, for the General Assembly on the Sunday, there should be opportunities for questions and clarifications, but we shouldn't be doing line-by-line amendments, i.e., we shouldn't be trying to edit the texts and punctuations of amendments from the floor of the General Assembly, that it should be a process of clarification and then voting, and motions to the General Assembly will be carried and agreed by a simple majority vote. And that can sometimes be done by a hand vote or sometimes by a secret ballot, depending on the item on the agenda.

Leon Langdon 23:48

Again, super complex. I'm always struck by the different levels, but uh it really does work like a well-oiled machine in practice, I think. Yeah, yeah.

Elections: How the GA elects the Board

Gary McLelland 23:58

So thinking on to how we elect board members, one of the most important jobs of the General Assembly. So our board, as we mentioned, is made up of nominees from all of our member organizations around the world. So on the screen in front of us here we can see just a few different points. So in order to stand for the board, the individual must be over 18 years of age, belong to the humanist movement, i.e., be nominated by three of our member organizations 40 days before the General Assembly and keeping with the general deadline. There are three types of board members. In practice, they function as equal board members, of course. Once elected to the board, you are a board member with as much influence and decision-making power as any other board member. But in order to ensure that we have a representative board, we have different types of vacancies. So we have officers, as I mentioned before, this is the president, vice president, and treasurer, and they are elected individually with their own individual mandate. Then we have what's called specific and general vacancies. So specific vacancies is a mechanism to ensure that the board has diverse voices and representatives. So the way that this works is a bit complicated. We do not have representatives on the board, that's a very clear thing to say. Every board member is there to represent purely the interests of Humanists International. But if there is an election called, and if there is no one on the board who is either 35 years of age and under, or from Africa, from Asia or from Latin America, if that happens, then a specific vacancy limited to delegates from that region or from the age of 35 years and under will be advertised and will have a short list which will be made up of delegates from that region or under that specific age. And that's simply to ensure that the board has a globally diverse set of voices and the voice of somebody who is young. So yeah, I think sometimes there can be some confusion that people think that these board elections produce a representative for Africa or Asia or Latin America. That's not how it works. It's basically just an election mechanism. So if there is an election called and we don't have a board member currently from Africa, then we have an African shortlist for that board vacancy. But once elected, they are a board member exactly the same as everyone else.

Leon Langdon 26:21

I think that's also the perspective of those representatives will obviously be informed by their experience as someone under 35, as their experience in Latin America, from Asia or Africa. But I think it's important to know that they're not there kind of lobbying for their organization, but they're, you know, even as the governance kind of as charity law sets out in the UK, they're there for the best interest of the organization, whatever, whatever that looks like. But it's so important that that perspective, that what is best for the organization, is informed by the global movement and the globally diverse nature of the movement.

Gary McLelland 26:57

Absolutely, absolutely. And I guess that the other thing to say is that the voting for board members is done using an online secret ballot. Um, it's done using first past the post. We've experimented over the years with various different types of voting systems. We use this system because it can be done secretly, it can be done using the various weightings that we have, and also anonymously. So there's an IT protocol which allows us to verify that the voting has been done according to the bylaws, but without knowing who voted in which way. That's an important point. And it's also important to say that there's always an option on every ballot to ensure that if the General Assembly does not want to appoint one of the candidates, in the case, for example, where there's one vacancy but only one candidate, we have a mechanism called reopen nominations, and that means that every candidate has been positively elected by the General Assembly. And if the General Assembly wishes to not appoint anyone and to go back out and look for a different candidate, it has that right. So every board member has been positively elected through a choice of the General Assembly. So thinking on now, just in terms of how some of the business of the General Assembly runs, so we've got a slide up here with just a few points which I'll touch

Conduct On the Day: How business gets done

Gary McLelland 28:11

on. So who gets to speak at the General Assembly? Well, generally speaking, it's delegates, which as we mentioned is representatives of our members and associates and the board of Humanists International get the right to speak, ask questions, make points at the General Assembly. The business is conducted in English as our working language. There are sometimes observers from national organisations or partners of Humanists International. They can speak, but only at the invitation of the President. Generally speaking, it's only the delegates and board members who have the right to speak. It's chaired by the president. In the president's absence, the vice president takes over. The board members of Humanists International do not have the right to vote at the General Assembly, so they would not be, for example, proxies, they would be there to represent Humanists International as a corporate body. The president, however, in the case of a tied vote, does have the right to cast a casting vote. By precedence and tradition, which is not set out in the bylaws, the president generally would vote in a way that maintains the status quo, which is in line with a lot of kind of parliamentary traditions, but that's not something which is set out in the bylaws. Generally speaking, for things that require a vote which are not particularly controversial, such as whether to approve the annual accounts and so on, votes are done with voting cards. So each delegate is giving a voting card which corresponds to the number of votes they're entitled to. And if, for example, we're approving minutes or the annual report or something like that, this is just done by a show of hands and a majority or sometimes unanimous vote. And yes, as as the uh slides make clear that a simple majority, unless the rules require anything different in the bylaws, but generally speaking, in our case, all the decisions of the General Assembly are carried by simple majority, which means 50% of the votes plus one. And on the agenda of the General Assembly every year we have the same type of things at least. So making sure that we have a quorum, reminding people of the governance rules, an annual report from the board, our audited financial statements, the appointment of our external auditor, board elections, and member resolutions and declarations.

Leon Langdon 30:18

It's a busy day. It's a busy time and it's a real it's a lot to get done in a pretty short length of time.

Gary McLelland 30:26

It is a very, very busy agenda. And I'm really hopeful that this having a bit of a conversation about this, the uh the how it works in the process and things, might actually help hopefully our members to engage with the process by perhaps demystifying some of the functions of the General Assembly.

Leon Langdon 30:43

It also just shows how bureaucratic democracy is, honestly.

Gary McLelland 30:47

Yeah, I mean that that's yeah, you're right. It's um I mean democracy can be slow at times because as you can see in here that there's a lot of built-in consultation periods and and checks and balances and things like that, so it can at times be for some frustratingly slow. But it's important, you know, because we are a global movement, um, and it's important to make sure that we have got the chance to discuss and and ventilate the different positions. I mean, one of the things I always keep in my mind is that my view is the General Assembly should be the forum for agreement, but also for reasonable disagreement, you know. So where we have diverging views on where the organization should go, where the movement should go, perhaps even on policy issues, it should be the mechanism to ventilate and to explore those reasonable disagreements? So

Safety Valves: When things can’t wait, or go wrong

Gary McLelland 31:38

thinking on uh just in terms of the kind of this slide is called safety valves, but basically the General Assembly is to govern humanists international, but if all of these procedures and deadlines and processes fail, uh what options are available to the board and the members to ensure that decisions can be made quickly? So as we mentioned before, we have an emergency resolutions process, which we've discussed before, so that's one. Secondly, we have an emergency general assembly function. So if the board decides it needs to have a General Assembly quicker than is usually planned, it can call an emergency general assembly, which it actually did do this year in 2026, in order to make some changes to the bylaws. And that can be held that can be called by the board, but it can also be called by members. So if members holding one-fifth of the General Assembly votes and from at least three different countries request the boards to hold an emergency general assembly, then it must do so. And the third mechanism is in the unlikely event that we get to a General Assembly and we don't have a quorum present because one third of the votes haven't turned up, then the President has the right to postpone that meeting and call a fresh General Assembly, which would usually be done in London, where Humanists International is based, or online, and in order to make sure that the f the necessary functions of the General Assembly can happen and can continue. So we have some safety valves built into the system.

Leon Langdon 33:06

Has that ever happened in I'm gonna say your lifetime in the organized movement?

Gary McLelland 33:11

Well, we've had we've had many emergency general assemblies in order to make changes deemed necessary by the board. Emergency is a broad word here. For example, we held one in January 2026 because we wanted to change the process for handling motions to the General Assembly to make them representative of what we've discussed here. But there's never been a situation since I've been here in the last 10 years or so that we haven't had a quorum present at the General Assembly. And it looks very likely that that won't be the case this year in October in 2026, which

Next Stop: Ottawa 2026

Gary McLelland 33:44

actually, coming to the last slide, is really just a kind of advert for at the time of recording the next General Assembly, which is planned to take place alongside the World Humanist Congress on Sunday, the 9th of August. And so as we've discussed, I really hope this is helpful for our members and associates, but also individual humanists around the world to know that this international democratic forum exists, how to get involved in it, how to get the most out of it. And yeah.

Leon Langdon 34:12

No, I think that that's really great, Gary. And I think Ottawa is, as as you pointed out, at the time recording, less than 40 days away and is really kind of creeping up on us. But also, as we sort of had that meta discussion at the start, the hope is that this will be evergreen. So if you're joining us in 2027, 2028, it'll again be alongside World Humanist Congresses in respective years and into the future, as long as this organization keeps continuing and you know, I think it returning 75 next year. So there's kind of no no designs on us wrapping up anytime soon, I don't think. I remember when I joined, it was actually right after the World Humanist Congress in Copenhagen. And I remember emailing staff at the time, and everyone was so busy, you know, as I was kind of trying to get my contract in order and all the rest, it was it was a busy time that was very clear. It was only 11 months later when we ended up in Singapore, which was you know the General Assembly there, that I really felt that I got to see the what I can only describe as the pulse of the movement, because as well as this sort of business side of things, as it were, approval of accounts, approval of motions, it's also just an incredible opportunity, at least for staff, but I think for delegates as well, to just talk, to hear what other people are going, are going through or are dealing with, to discuss potential collaborations and partnerships, you know, the European Humanist Services Network, which we've talked about before and we've had Lona on the podcast, I think is another, you know, sort of that type of cooperation can really grow out of a General Assembly or a World Humanist Congress, whatever it might be. And I would really encourage whether you are a part of a member of ours and want to come along or want to encourage your officers, your president or whoever to engage as a delegate. But also if you're just considering starting an organization or joining one, I think to know that that this democratic body exists, how it works, hopefully have a bit demystified, to know that you as an individual through these mechanisms can have an impact and have your voice put to the world, or or you know, to ensure that is represented by the global humanist movement, I think is really valuable.

Gary McLelland 36:17

Absolutely, yeah. And I look forward to seeing all of the listeners of the podcast, at least in this year, in Ottawa in just a few weeks' time.

Leon Langdon 36:25

Well, we'll have millions of listeners very soon, so they won't all fit in one room, Garrett. That's true. Well, challenges for the future that we'll look forward to navigating. Exactly.

Closing Requests From The Hosts

Leon Langdon 36:34

If you found this episode useful, please share it with others, subscribe wherever you listen to podcasts, and leave us a five-star rating and review. It makes a big difference in helping new listeners find the show.

Gary McLelland 36:45

If there's a topic you'd like us to cover or someone you'd like to suggest as a guest, you can contact us via the links in the show notes.

Leon Langdon 36:52

To find out more or join Humanist International, visit humanists.