Electing leaders allows the Fellowship to keep authority, while elements of the service structure can decide according to informed conscience. 

Concept 2

The leadership of SA, as represented by the General Delegate Assembly and the Board of Trustees, has become for nearly every practical purpose the active voice and the effective conscience of our whole society in its service matters. 

Even though the Fellowship has ultimate authority, it is not practical to poll the entire Fellowship on the conduct of SA’s business affairs. Therefore, the Fellowship elects leaders through their groups, intergroups, and regions to represent them in the General Delegate Assembly (GDA). On matters of policy, the GDA is the group conscience of the Fellowship. The Trustees are elected by the GDA to execute the policies determined by the GDA. In essence, the Board of Trustees (BOT) is the service board of the GDA, directly responsible to the GDA. Delegated authority allows the Fellowship to function in its daily affairs while retaining ultimate authority of the individual and collective membership.

Concept 3

To ensure effective leadership, we should endow each element of SA’s service structure, the General Delegate Assembly and the Board of Trustees and its staffs and Committees with a traditional “Right of Decision.” 

The GDA, Trustees, and Committees are generally very deliberative in their decision-making process. It is not uncommon for an important item of business to be postponed to a future meeting so that information about the impact of the decision can be gathered and considered. This allows for an informed group conscience. There have also been some issues that have been postponed so that the will of the Fellowship can be polled. However, the trusted servants have the authority to decide how specific decisions should proceed. The “instructed” Delegate who cannot act on his own conscience in a final [Assembly] vote is not a “trusted servant” at all; he is just a messenger. Without this “Right of Decision,” the business of SA would quickly grind to a halt.