Contents

Editorial (Membership or Statistics) - By John Wan
Letters to Editor
Polio and Nash - By Harry

editorial

Membership or Statistics

For the last decade, Rotary International has been talking about Rotary having over 1 million to 1.2 million Rotarians in as many if not more countries as there were in the United Nations. Successive RI leadership have been telling district governors and clubs the importance of membership growth. The last two RI Presidents had designed incentive schemes and awards for districts that had demonstrated outstanding achievements in membership growth.

The official RI statistics show that as at 30 June 2002, we had 1,243,431 Rotarians worldwide in 31,256 clubs in 164 Rotary countries. At the last RI Convention in Barcelona, awards and praises were showered upon the district governors who had the most impressive percentage growth. This is all very good, until we heard from sources close to RI that some of these districts have since lost many members and many clubs have given up their charters after 1 July 2002. Indeed, RI has since lost over 350 members, which has prompted more than a few murmurs in the Board and suggestions that maybe the membership awards should only be given a year later in the future.

What do we have here? How does that square up with the 4-Way Test? Are we more interested in statistics and awards than our products? And what are our products?

We have often seen a drop in membership numbers on 1 July every year. Some district leaders have called such phenomenon a technical correction. Some club presidents would persuade members who were about to leave or who had left to allow their names to remain on the club roster, to make the records look nicer. Our District has been talking about having close to 2,000 members for many years, but our membership figures have never picked up since the mid-nineties; and to date we are struggling around the 1,500 line.

Now, let us look at our friends in the Lions Clubs International. They now have an estimated 1.4 million members in 44,500. And last month, in October 2002, they chartered at least 20 clubs in Shenzhen alone, each with at least 50 members, all bona fide Chinese citizens.

While it is true that we need members who can impart and interpret Rotary and that we should be more interested in our products and in taking service to the people who need ours most, it is high time we look at the fundamentals of the District with a view to devising plans that would ensure long term sustainable development.

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Letters to Editor

You are welcome to write to Club Webmaster John Wan on any topic, particularly in response to articles published in Kingspark News. We would publish all contributions as long as the authors identify themselves, the contents are not offensive or abusive, and would not offend common decency or common sense. You need not be a Rotarian to write to us and you have a choice to withhold your name in the published version. Where the contents make reference to statements or policies of individuals or organizations, we would try to obtain a response fro the latter for publication in the same issue if possible.

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Polio and Nash
By Harry

The update on the polio situation and its relatively promising history reads like a testament to a collective movement for something positive and life-changing. It leads me to an economics concept known as positive externalities. The last line of your article is particularly thought-provoking, because it sounds like a minor contribution (of an individual) can result in such potentially widespread benefit. At a small cost individually, collectively we can all benefit.

The idea of positive externalities, however, intimates that because a good is considered a public good (like a city park, military defense, etc), any small contribution would indeed go a long way. On the other hand, it can be argued that even if one were to not contribute, others would and ultimately, the outcome would still be provided. This of course is not a mindset to be encouraged for it would be no different from saying, if I do not clean up my trash outside my home, my neighbors inevitably will because of my laziness, inconsideration, and so on. In some respect, this is akin to the contribution plate being passed about during service, or any charity-like situation. The obvious benefits from such contribution are tangible, worthy and reasonable. However despite all these, we often have people holding back. Perhaps this is because the giving is not mandated, for if it were, it would lose its effectiveness and message, and be considered something more like taxes.

Another economics concept coming to mind after reading your article was the idea of a prisoner's dilemma. You may very well be familiar with this idea, but I'll skim the basics just for reference. Two people are detained by the police. The authorities separate the two culprits and individually interview them. Implicate your partner and your sentence decreases. Now, placing yourself in the position of the detained individual. If I rat on my partner, my sentence gets reduced. If I stay mum, and he happens to rat on me (because he will be presented with the same opportunity), he gets off the hook and I'm stuck with a longer sentence. In terms of self-defense, I would HAVE to rat on him. Both parties think in this manner and thus both implicate the other. The ending outcome is worse than if they had colluded beforehand, however, even then, at the moment they are interviewed, acting in their best individual interests produces a less desirable collective outcome.

I may have been convoluted in the exposition, but this is coincidentally a corollary of the Nash equilibrium. As such, acting as individuals will produce a less desirable outcome than if we were to act collectively, and that is because under the pretense others will act collectively, we can actually benefit individually. In the polio example, if we assume others will contribute, a cure will be funded without our contribution. Yet if we were to be stricken with the disease, a readily available cure (now) would exist. And as such, we have what economists call deadweight loss, and why many what seem like no-brainer issues and campaigns fall head-scratchingly short.

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