Amended in June 2015, Ra'anana Israel
ARTICLE I: NAME
The name of this association is the EUROPEAN RESEARCH GROUP ON MILITARY AND SOCIETY, acronymed ERGOMAS.
ARTICLE II: PURPOSES
ERGOMAS is an association of scientists who study and analyze the relationship between the military and society, and related phenomena. It focuses on all parts of the world, but with a special focus on Europe. Joint transnational research and intercultural comparisons in thematically oriented interdisciplinary working groups constitute the core of ERGOMAS. ERGOMAS promotes empirically and theoretically oriented research cooperation and international scientific communication.
ERGOMAS is a public, non-profit, politically and ideologically independent professional organization of scientists. Its purposes shall be pursued by the activity of Working Groups and through the Biennial ERGOMAS Conferences.
ARTICLE III: MEMBERSHIP
Any scientist sharing the purposes of the association and paying the membership fee may be a member of ERGOMAS, regardless of his or her academic discipline, profession, theoretical and ideological orientation, or citizenship.
Scientific organizations may be associate members of ERGOMAS.
Members who have paid their fee are entitled to:
1. attend, participate in, and vote at, the Biennial Business Meeting of ERGOMAS;
2. vote in all membership votes conducted by ERGOMAS;
3. participate in other general activities sponsored by ERGOMAS; and
4. receive copies of ERGOMAS Newsletters.
Only members of ERGOMAS can attend the biennial ERGOMAS conference.
ARTICLE IV: WORKING GROUPS
1. Working Groups shall be constituted of scientists working on thematically related topics. Their purpose is to conduct joint transnational research and intercultural comparisons in a thematically-oriented and preferably interdisciplinary way.
2. New working Groups shall be accepted by the Board of Chairpersons upon request of at least six members who have declared their intention to form a new Working Group.
3. Each Working Group shall have a Coordinator, elected by the group members and confirmed by the Board of Chairpersons.
4. The name of the Working Groups and their respective Coordinators should be published in the ERGOMAS Newsletter and on the ERGOMAS website.
5. If a Working Group Coordinator does not report for two years, the WG is considered inactive and is cancelled. This cancellation must be published in the ERGOMAS Newsletter and on the ERGOMAS website.
ARTICLE V: MANAGEMENT OF ERGOMAS
The steering body of ERGOMAS shall comprise the Board of Chairpersons, the ERGOMAS members attending the Biennial Business Meeting of members, and ERGOMAS members who vote in mail ballots.
1. The Board of Chairpersons.
1.1 The Board of Chairpersons shall include the following members:
- the President;
- the Coordinators of the active Working Groups;
- the Secretary General;
- the Treasurer; and
- the Webmaster for the website of ERGOMAS.
1.2 The duties of the Board of Chairpersons shall include to:
- cooperate in order to promote the purposes of ERGOMAS;
- support the preparation of the Biennial Conference;
- nominate candidates for the positions of President, Treasurer, Secretary General and Webmaster of ERGOMAS;
- in case of disputes, decide over internal issues of ERGOMAS;
- old at, at minimum, a Biennial Council Meeting (more frequent council meetings are beneficial);
- fix the amount of membership fees/dues;
- make general decisions on the allocation of funds;
- choose the location and the organizer of the Biennial ERGOMAS conference;
- report their activities to the Biennial Business Meeting of members;
- decide upon membership applications;
- accept the establishment of Working Groups;
- exchange information with the established Working Groups;
- support the preparation of the ERGOMAS Newsletter;
- update the list of Working Groups;
- update the content of their Working Group on the ERGOMAS website;
- actively participate in editorial work flowing from ERGOMAS related publications; and
- to the extent possible, foster collaborative projects, research initiatives, and publications with ERGOMAS members on the topics related to their respective working groups.
2. The President.
2.1 The President is the Executive Officer of ERGOMAS and represents the association in internal and external fora. He or she shall serve for one term of two years. Re-election is possible.
2.2 The President's duties include to:
- propose programs and policies designed to promote the purposes of ERGOMAS; and
- convene and to preside over meetings of the Board of Chairpersons and the Biennial Business Meeting of members.
2.3 In case of disability of the President, the most senior Working Group Coordinator takes over the Chairmanship until the next formal elections at the end of the term.
3. The Secretary General’s (hereinafter: the “Secretary”).
The Secretary's duties shall include:
- The Secretary, in collaboration with the President shall be responsible for the Newsletter.
- The Secretary, in collaboration, with the treasurer shall be responsible for the membership list.
- The Secretary, in collaboration with the President, Treasurer, and Working Group Coordinators (as required) will formulate proposals to the board and/or to the membership for voting and/or communication purposes.
- The Secretary is responsible for communications and organization related to the Biennial ERGOMAS Conference, including Call for Proposals, organization of conference submissions and communication with submitters, and the conference program.
The regular term of office for the Secretary is four years. The Secretary can run for a second (and last) term.
4. The Treasurer.
The Treasurer's duties shall include:
- The Treasurer shall be responsible for collecting the membership fee and the conference fee of the Biennial ERGOMAS conference.
- After the biannual conference and after the financial settlement of the conference the Treasurer reports back to the Board of Chairpersons.
The regular term of office for the Treasurer is four years. The Treasurer can run for a second (and last) term.
5. The Webmaster.
The Webmaster’s duties shall include to:
- run a website for ERGOMAS and other means of social media; and
- update the website/other means in cooperation with the Working Group Coordinators.
6. The Biennial ERGOMAS conference organizer.
The Biennial ERGOMAS conference organizer’s duties shall include organizing the Biennial ERGOMAS conference in cooperation with the Board of Chairpersons. This entails arranging the conference facilities, guest accommodation arrangements (e.g., hotel recommendations and block reservations), hospitality, transportation details, printing of pertinent conference materials such as tags and programs, and other local organizational aspects, as required.
7. Elections.
7.1 Thirty days prior to the business meeting, the Secretary will issue a call for candidates. This call will be issued to all ERGOMAS members regarding the positions of the functionaries whose term of office has expired.
7.2 Fourteen days prior to the conference, the Secretary will present the candidates to the Board of Chairpersons in order to nominate candidates for the positions. The Board of Chairpersons will nominate up to 3 candidates for each open position.
7.3 The decision of the Board of Chairpersons will be submitted to the Business Meeting for approval.
7.4 In the case that one of the holders of the positions listed above resigns between conferences, the Board of Chairpersons will nominate a new candidate by use of a) a call for candidates and b) a vote by mail ballot.
7.5 The Board of Chairpersons possesses the authority to remove the above-listed holders of positions from their posts for cause. In this case, the Board of Chairpersons will nominate a new candidate according to the process outlined in article 2.4.
8. The Biennial Business Meetings.
8.1 The Biennial Business Meetings shall consist of all members having paid their dues; only these members are eligible to vote.
8.2. The members’rights at the Business Meeting include to:
- receive and consider the Board of Chairpersons’reports, including discussion and provision of feedback;
- elect the President, Treasurer, Secretary and Webmaster upon nomination of the Board of Chairpersons and the Audit Committee.
9. Auditing Committee.
The Business Meeting will elect an Auditing Committee. The committee will have two ERGOMAS members who do not hold a position on the Board of Chairpersons.The committee will check the financial health of the organization and the integrity of the financial affairs. The committee reports biennially at the Business Meeting.
ARTICLE VI: AMENDMENTS
Amendments to the Bylaws shall be declared ratified if approved by two-thirds of the ERGOMAS members voting at the Biennial Business Meetings or email voting.
These Bylaws for ERGOMAS were adopted unanimously by 37 voting members at the Plenary Session on March 22nd, 1988, in Vienna functioning as the first Business Meeting of ERGOMAS. These bylaws were changed according to the decisions of 20 voting members at the V Biennial Meeting, October 4, 1996 in Zurich (see the agenda in the Newsletter 1997), according to the decisions of 17 members at the VI Biennial Meeting, September 24, 1998 in Stockholm, and according to the decisions of 20 members at the VII Biennial Meeting, December 9, 2000 in Prague, and according to the decisions of the Biennial Meeting, June 25, 2009 in Stockholm. Last changes were approved by at the Business Meeting in Ra'anana, Israel, June 10, 2015.