The Absence of a Boss Is Not a Vacancy

Here is the move that uses Tradition 9 against itself: read "ought never be organized" as a confession that A.A. is amateur and unmanaged, then offer to supply the management. Bill W. answered it before anyone made the offer (P-44, A.A.'s Legacy of Service, p. 3). A.A. has services — meeting places, offices, phones, literature, committees, trustees — and "Nor can we make A.A. more simple by abolishing such services. We would only be asking for complication and confusion." A.A. is not unstructured. It refuses one kind of structure: the kind that governs. And Bill gave the only test A.A. applies to its own machinery: "Concerning any given service, we therefore pose but one question:" — "Is this service really needed?" — and the answer carries a duty: "If it is, then maintain it we must, or fail in our mission to those who need and seek A.A." Read who that test is for. Those who need and seek A.A. — the alcoholic still out there. Not owners, not funders, not a head office. That is a question the Fellowship asks about itself, and it is not an opening for anyone else to answer on its behalf. When a programme says it will organize A.A. for its clients, the absence of a boss is not a vacancy. It is the design.