Tradition Eight

Short form:

“Eight—Alcoholics Anonymous should remain forever non-professional, but our service centres may employ special workers.”

Long form:

“8.—Alcoholics Anonymous should remain forever non-professional. We define professionalism as the occupation of counselling alcoholics for fees or hire. But we may employ alcoholics where they are going to perform those services for which we might otherwise have to engage non-alcoholics. Such special services may be well recompensed. But our usual A.A. "12 Step" work is never to be paid for.”

(our emphases)

Again a pretty straightforward bit of advice. Administrative functions have to be carried out and whereas a lot of key work can done by AA volunteers things like office management, literature distribution etc need to be conducted by full timers, and bills after all do have to be paid somehow! AA however is NOT in the business of providing employment and whereas such individuals should always be paid the full market rate for their skills this sector should be kept to an absolute minimum consistent with providing an optimum service. The key element of this tradition from our point of view however is the one we have emphasised. This statement is itself pretty unambiguous although what constitutes “12 Step” work might be debated. In the narrowest possible sense this could refer simply to those members who go out on 12 Step calls ie. to contact and possibly meet up with potential newcomers to the Fellowship. However we prefer to use it in the widest possible sense ie. any activity which involves carrying the AA message to the still suffering alcoholic. This would therefore include practically everything that takes place in AA (apart from those administrative functions mentioned above). So for example it would seem to us that the practice of charging entrance fees to so-called “workshops” (or any similar activity) is entirely contrary to this principle and forms no part of genuine AA. Such functions (where they are necessary, and this itself is a moot point to be debated perhaps at another time!) should rather be funded purely by voluntary contributions ie. by the amount designated by the attendee and NOT determined by the organiser(s) of the event. In the case of AA (weekend) conventions however (and where accommodation is required) it is entirely legitimate to include an element to cover such costs (ie. where they form part of a 'package') but not for attendance at the meetings themselves (the costs of which should be met again by the “voluntary contributions” of those attending). In our view day conventions are much easier to administer since these generally do not require such provision and serve mostly members from the local area. We regard the larger conventions (and especially the international ones) to be of dubious value in terms of carrying the AA message and believe that these serve mostly a “consolidating” function, that is in providing a platform to reinforce the sense of a wider community within AA. However in these times of modern communications it seems to us rather archaic to continue to indulge these “tribal” gatherings and believe that such a function can just as easily (and certainly more economically) be carried out via the various electronic media. The same principle might also be applied to the AA Conference and the various other service functions which up until now might have required members to travel some distance (with all the associated costs). We live (just in case you haven't noticed) in financially straitened times and AA is by no means exempt from such realities. Economies need to be made and all wasteful expenditure cut. However none of this should affect our ability to help the still suffering alcoholic. This service has always been provided FREE OF ANY CHARGE.