Adyar Election 2014:- Theosophical Society Membership

The Future? of the Adyar Theosophical Society

A Society

Without

Members

Dave Marsland

Is this how the Adyar Theosophical Society ruling elite see themselves?

Membership figures are not normally reported even to the paying membership and in fact are only revealed to a limited extent when there is an election. The voting figures reveal the actual numbers voting alongside those eligible to vote under the current rules which stipulate two years membership. An annual statement of membership is rare at national section level and unknown at international level. On the one hand, the leadership aren’t interested in the membership levels but on the other, they don’t want to draw attention to continuously falling membership as this may lead to calls for action and change.

As campaigning in the 2014 presidential election gets under way, candidates will be frustrated by the problems of finding eligible voters as some national sections are now virtually non-existent with defunct and dormant lodge contact details optimistically kept alive and lapsed members retained on the listings beyond their sell by date. Some sections will rush to get the subscriptions in this year with the opportunity to vote offered as an incentive and some recently lapsed members may receive begging letters outlining the “benefits” of renewing.

In his address at the 2013 Adyar Convention, the International Vice President Mr M P Singhal put the total membership for 2013 at about 25,000. The total membership for 2007 (given in the 2008 election results) was 29,014 with 20,724 eligible to vote in 2008. If Mr Singhal’s figure is reasonably accurate then this represents roughly a 14% drop over the last 6 years. An equivalent drop in the electorate will bring it down to 17.823. Total extinction of the Society may be some years away but it may be close to the point where many national sections deteriorate to a list of contact details supported by no real activity.

Mr Singhal has mentioned the problem of membership decline without announcing any initiative to tackle it, perhaps the intention is to leave this to the next international president. If the leadership hasn’t any ideas for increasing membership and ultimately saving the Adyar Theosophical Society from extinction then why not throw it open to suggestions from members. A forum could be set up along with a panel to co-ordinate ideas from all over the world with strategies from local success stories being tried in other locations. All this could be done via the internet and even members without access to the internet could participate through their lodges. However, any such forum that comes into being is unlikely to have official backing from the leadership and will probably be ignored by officials in a position to implement proposals generated by it.

Asking members for their ideas is not an option

The main problem with a membership forum is that the leadership would have to involve and listen to the views of the general membership and they would rather let the Theosophical Society become extinct than do this. For at least the last eighty years, the Theosophical Society elite have always felt the need to maintain a clear differential in status between themselves and the general membership as is indicated by the use of the word “BALLAST” to describe the membership at the 2013 Adyar Convention. The members are therefore deliberately kept out of the game and it is to be seen if there is anything in the 2014 presidential election manifestos to change this.