Announcement from the IASPM treasurer

IASPM is organised in branches which vary in size and mode of operation. Each branch operates in line with IASPM statutes and has their own executive committee. Branches have different levels of activities including local mailing lists, conferences, journals, study days and newsletters. Larger branches tend to have more of these activities whilst smaller branches may have none.

At an international level, IASPM elects an executive committee to run the association. Internationally, IASPM counts with a mailing list, journal and a conference held every two years. When a member joins any IASPM branch they automatically join at the local and international level.

Where there is no branch, members may join IASPM directly at the international level. Currently and when possible, we strongly recommend people to join IASPM via a branch as this helps to share admin tasks amongst the executive committees across the globe.

IASPM fees are comprised of the international fee + a local fee. The international fee is implemented by the international executive committee in line with the decision made by the general meeting that takes place at the international conference. The local fee is decided by the branches individually. Local fees normally vary depending on the level of activities and organisation of each branch.

IASPM membership runs from January to December every year (debated and clarified in Liverpool 2009).

Currently, the international annual membership fees are:
– waged: US $25
– branches unwaged and student: none
– individual unwaged and student: US $10

The reason for the difference in fee for branches and individual unwaged/student was the result of a Grahamstown 2011 discussion in which it was proposed that every IASPM member should pay at least something to belong to the association. As the majority of branches have a student/unwaged fee already, increasing this would work at a disadvantage to the branches. Therefore, a decision was made to leave the branch unwaged/student international fee at nil as most student/unwaged members were paying a local fee to join IASPM. For individual members the annual fee would be USD 10 starting from the time we opened a PayPal account (opened in 2012).

The core benefits for IASPM members are:
– eligibility to attend and present at any IASPM conference (any branch + international conferences)
– eligibility to publish in the IASPM journal
– IASPM international mailing list

Running IASPM is no easy task due to the number of members v/s financial and human resources available. Everyone at the executive level of the international and local boards is a volunteer – some working in academia, some working in other jobs. In an ideal world, the IASPM dealings could be a lot more automated and smoother. However, implementing changes and improvements takes time and money which is limited. Therefore, the improvements we are working on are rather manual and are taking time to implement.

I appreciate some people have had trouble joining IASPM. I can only ask you to accept our apologies and help us by trying again. If you live in an area where there is a branch, please contact your local branch executive. Alternatively, contact us on this email to join as an individual member. If someone prefers to join IASPM at an international level due to financial difficulties, I personally think this is acceptable. However, please do join your local branch if you can afford to.