The love for hot seats

Oh, how they love committees

Have you ever studied the constitution of an oldstyle Asian organisation?

• The constitution is like a tiger's footprint that experienced game wardens can 'read' to describe the age, weight and sex of the tiger that may be standing behind you in a safari park
• The constitution is like a blood sample. A medic can can analyse the blood and tell you a few things that your wife should not know about
• The constitution is like a wine in a bottle without a label. A trained wine merchant can taste a small amount of the product to tell you the age, source and other properties of the wine
• The constitution is not like a cover of a book. It cannot hide the story or provide an ending that you did not plan for.

Many years ago I had the joy of analysing constitutions of Asian societies, temples and cultural organisations. The aims and objectives often bore little or no relationship to the work being carried out by the people. The choice of vocabulary took you straight into the dying moments of the British Raj in India. You could feel the tensions and strife that could erupt if the clauses in the document were not followed. In other words, the constitutions were used to closely define the do's and dont's of the organisation to the extent that you felt safer by staying away.

Then there was the regular problem of understanding the positions in their committee structure. The positions were created to fill the demand for seats by aspiring leaders who could not contribute unless and until they had a title to define their role. However, the status of the aspirants outside the committee detemined the title they were awarded in the committee. So, far from having a person as an ordinary member of the committee, their position in society warranted that they should be appointed as fourth deputy assistant secretary general. It made sure that the person's mind was in perfect focus at all times and that in the event of any open-ended task required urgent action, his status as a secretary precluded him from serving as anything else.

You had to remember that the fourth assistant secretary general could be needed at any time especially if the first three assistant secretary generals had gone somewhere else. You also had to remember that the fourth assistant treasurer could not be asked to help post some urgent mailing about an event. That was the role of the public relations officer or any of his six assistants.

I think I have made my point but I forgot to tell you my title. In general the constitution also told you what the organisation was not! It told you that there was no trust amongst the members, that competition for recognition was rife, that the six treasury roles only had to account for a budget that was less than £500 per year. It was a committee structure with a lot of Chiefs and no Indians.

Jokes aside, this preoccupation with status has had an impact on social and community organisations. Leaders had been described as 'gatekeepers' who decided that there was no problem with high blood pressure in their community, their children were not malnourished or susceptible to abuse, that the women did not need help in dealing with depression. You had to be aware at all times that there was no mental illness in the Asian community. Our social and familial institutions worked so well that mental illness did not have a chance to take root.

All this evidence could not be ignored. It had the wonderful effect of ensuring that the Asian organisations ruled themselves ineligible for grant aid. I leave you to work out the rest but are you sure that you can manage that task without an official title?