Whither By-laws: Association Regulations, Then and Now

Ancient associations had very few extant regulations, but those that have survived indicate a variety of functions, such as outlining the structure of the association; delineating the rights, responsibilities, and privileges of members; and establishing norms of behaviour and consequences for non-compliance. Moreover, by-laws codified procedures for decision-making, dispute resolution, and the amendment of governing regulations. The by-laws of these ancient occupational and religious groups can be compared to modern academic societies and in so doing shed light on one another's practices. In particular, the concern with purpose, membership, finance, meetings, and especially behaviour cross the temporal and cultural divide in ways that allow the Canadian Society of Biblical Studies and other academic societies to think more carefully about how they are constituted and, more importantly, how they might respond to broader societal situations that are not directly in their purview.