By-laws and Guidelines

Preamble:

The purpose of this association is to strengthen cooperation among development economics researchers within Europe, promote development economics research in Europe, promote capacity building in development economics research, and make European development economics expertise available to researchers in other regions as well as policy-makers in Europe and beyond. It is part of the Global Development Network (GDN), and specifically fosters cooperation among the individual and regional network partners of GDN with development researchers in Europe.

Article 1: Name and legal status

The name of this association shall be the European Development Research Network, hereafter abbreviated EUDN. EUDN will only become a separate legal entity if necessary.

Article 2: Objectives

The objectives of the EUDN are

  1. to generate knowledge related to development economics, development research and development policy with special focus on strengthening the research capacity and training in developing countries;
  2. to establish a 'centre of information' which attracts new ideas related to development research and delivers high-quality and up-to-date information to researchers and policy-makers;
  3. to promote the cooperation among development economics researchers and institutions within Europe and with developing countries;
  4. to promote the exchange of staff between development economics institutions, development organizations and think tanks;
  5. to improve the use of European development research in Europe and at the international level;
  6. to promote development economics research in Europe through workshops, networking, and outreach activities;
  7. to increase transparency by promoting/supporting networking between think tanks in cooperation with development organizations and networks in Europe and all over the world; and
  8. to participate in GDN-activities.

Article 3: Member(ship)

Membership refers to individuals and not institutions. There are three types of members: active full members, associate members, and inactive full members. 

Active full members

Active full members take part in the regular activities of EUDN, in particular its scientific conferences and policy workshops. New full members are nominated by current EUDN active full members. A public call may be used to identify potential nominees.  The criterias for nomination are that the nominee is visible as an established development researcher; active at a high level with at least three publications in the last 5 years in high-quality specialized or general journals or in books with reputable publishers; is committed to capacity-building: willingness to review proposals, participate in summer schools, PhD workshops etc.; and is based in Europe (or, in exceptional cases, based elsewhere but of European nationality). Decisions on membership are taken by confidential election of the current active full EUDN members by voting for nominated candidates. For ten candidates elected, three additional candidates can be determined by the Executive Committee to allow for a balancing of the association in terms of academic discipline, gender and country. A further enlargement of the network is possible, provided that the absolute majority of the members agree.

Nomination Process for full members

Anyone can suggest names to the Executive Committee, but a nomination should be explicitly supported by 3 active full members. If someone wants to nominate a candidate for full EUDN membership then he or she must support the application with a short nominating statement and a CV. At the time of the vote, the CV and the identity of people who supported the candidate will be made known. The Executive Committee submits the names of all candidates to the membership, indicating whether they satisfy the criteria and in what way a proposed candidate would strengthen EUDN, given the expertise represented in the EUDN. If one of the above criteria is not satisfied, and the members of the Executive Committee thinks there is a case for making an exception then they should argue clearly why they think an exception should be made.

Election for full members

Current full active EUDN members vote (yes/no) based on the list of candidates proposed by the Executive Committee. To be valid, each vote must have at least 50% of the full active EUDN members participating in the vote. To be elected, a candidate must have received a number of YES votes exceeding the number of NOs by a margin representing at least 25% of the expressed votes. 

Associate Members

Associate members are young researchers who do not yet satisfy the first two criteria of full members (i.e. visibility and publication record) but are expected to do so, satisfy the other criteria, have completed a PhD, have at least one good journal article published or accepted, and have presented to at least one EUDN conference.  Associate members will have access to all resources and information available to full active members.  Unlike active full members, associate members do not have the right to vote in the EUDN assembly, stand for elections of officers, or vote for new full members.  

Nomination process for associate members

Associate members are ordinarily nominated in association with participation in a scientific conference. Active full members can nominate young researchers to present work at a scientific conference.  Decisions on acceptance will be made by the President with the Executive Committee acting as reviewers.  The nominator is expected to also attend the conference for which s(he) nominated the young researcher.  If the conditions for associate membership mentioned above are fulfilled, the young researcher can apply to become associate member.  The application should be accompanied by a CV and a short supporting statement from a full active member.

Election for associate members

Current full active EUDN members vote (yes/no) based on the list of candidates proposed for Associate Membership. To be valid, each vote must have at least 50% of the full active EUDN members participating in the vote. To be elected, a candidate must have received a number of YES votes exceeding the number of NOs by a margin representing at least 25% of the expressed votes. 

Promotion from Associate to Full Member

Associate members will be promoted full members after a period of  four years, or more depending on personal circumstances, if they have been active in the network, they acquired visibility as a development researcher, and if their publication record is found to be above some minimum standard. Typically, this standard amounts to the equivalent of 2 single-authored development papers ( Single-authored paper equivalents normally obtained  by counting a n-authored paper for 1/n single-authored paper) published in the top 100 of REPEC's ranking of journals (http://citec.repec.org/search.html#journals).

The decision will be taken by the executive committee who base their decision on weighing all the criteria mentioned above.  However, final approval will have to be obtained at the following General Assembly.

Inactive Members

Full members who will not have participated in any EUDN activity (annual conference, Ph.D workshops, summer schools) for a period of 5 years will become “inactive members” and lose their voting right until they actually take part again in some EUDN activity. In the case of new full members, the period of inactivity that will trigger inactive status is reduced to 3 years.  Associate members who are inactive for three years will be dropped from membership entirely.  In each case, members will be contacted one year ahead of time before this rule is applied.  Inactive members can return to full membership by resuming active participation in the network.

Article 4: Organization of the association

Assembly

The assembly consists of all active full members.  It shall try to meet every year, preferably as part of the annual scientific conference.  All members can make suggestions to the agenda and it is the duty of the president to maintain minutes of the meeting.  The meeting will be chaired by the President.

President

The President of EUDN is elected by all full active members for a term of 3 years (renewable) by simple majority of voting members.  All full active members can stand for president.  The President shall preside over all meetings of the Executive Committee, act as official spokesperson for EUDN, and perform duties like scheduling of annual meetings, appointing working committees, holding elections, etc. The other members of the Executive Committee shall support and/or represent the Chair in case of absence of the president.

Executive Committee

The Executive Committee consists of 4-6 more officers who are also each elected by simple majority of all voting full active members for a term of 3 years (which is renewable).  If the organization has finances at its disposal, additionally a Treasurer will be elected for a term of three years (renewable) by simple majority of all voting full active members. The Treasurer shall be the financial representative of EUDN being responsible for the overall allocation of funds subject to the annual review and approval of the Executive Committee, and the monitoring of funds, etc. The Treasurer shall prepare an annual budget, and present it to the Executive Committee.

The Executive Committee may arrange for a secretariat to manage all affairs of EUDN, disseminate information, keep minutes and records, invite to meetings, etc.  Ordinarily the secretariat will be located at the location of the president.

Article 5: Change in bylaws

These bylaws can be changed by simple majority in a vote of full active members.  All full active members can make suggestions to change the by-laws.   

 

Membership Guidelines

 

Full Members

Members should fulfill the following requirements. They should be

  1. well-known in development research;
  2. active at a high level with at least three publications in the last 5 years in high-quality specialized or general journals or in books with reputable publishers;
  3. committed to capacity-building: willingness to review proposals, participate in summer schools, PhD workshops etc.;
  4. based in Europe (or, in exceptional cases, based elsewhere but of European nationality).

Nomination

Anyone can suggest names to the Executive Committee, but a nomination should be explicitly supported by 3 members. If someone wants to nominate X as a candidate for full EUDN membership then he or she must pass X's CV around. At the time of the vote, the CV of X and the identity of people who support X will matter. The Executive Committee submits the names of all candidates to the membership, indicating whether they satisfy the criteria and in what way a proposed candidate would strengthen EUDN, given the expertise represented in the EUDN. If one of the above criteria is not satisfied, and the Executive Committee thinks there is case for making an exception then they should argue the case clearly why they think an exception should be made.

Election

Current EUDN members vote (yes/no) based on this restricted list. Candidates are ranked in the order of the number of yes-votes received. To be elected, a candidate must obtain at least 25% of the expressed votes. To be valid, at least 50% of the members must participates in the voting. When a person has obtained more votes as affiliate than as full member, that person is considered eligible for the affiliate status, yet the votes in both categories are aggregated to reach a decision.
The newly elected members are appointed for five years. Afterwards, membership will be renewed if the criteria (except the one on expertise) are still satisfied. This will be judged by the Executive Committee.

Associate Members

Associate members are young researchers who

  1. do not yet satisfy the first two criteria of full members but are expected to do so;
  2. satisfy the other criteria;
  3. have completed a PhD;
  4. have at least one good journal article published or accepted;
  5. have presented to at least one EUDN conference.

Associate members will be promoted full members after a period of four years, or more depending of personal circumstances, if they have been active in the network and if their publication record is found to be above some minimum standard. Typically, this standard amount to the equivalent of 2 single-authored development papers ( Single-authored paper equivalents normally obtained by counting a n-authored paper for 1/n single-authored paper) published in the first half of REPEC ranking of journals (http://citec.repec.org/search.html#journals). The decision will be taken by the executive committee. However, final approval will have to be obtained at our next General Assembly.
Unlike full members, associate members do not have the right to vote in the EUDN assembly