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When they stopped the magazine and I stopped attending tournaments there was very little benefit to me but I continued for a while just to support the organization. When there were politic issues at the committee level several years ago I decided to drop out. Those are probably now gone but I just never got the impetus to rejoin.
I was a long time member of the British equivalent, the BGA, initially just in order to get the benefits but latterly mainly as a way of supporting the organisation. I eventually dropped out for two reasons, but both might be said t come under the heading of "I felt they had lost their sense of community."
The main spur was constant moaning by several people, mainly officials, about what they considered a large amount of traffic on an e-mail discussion group they had set up for members. There was a patronising attitude of we officials are the parents and you members are the children, so shut up and don't speak until you are spoken to. I'm sure others will recognise this syndrome even outside of go.
Related to that, but in reality showing the other side, was a comment that the secretary didn't want any more members (therefore didn't want any more publicity) because it would mean too much extra work for an already burdened, unpaid official. I imagine this syndrome exists, even if unspoken, in other organisations. I can sympathise, but it does call into question why the organisations exist.
A third syndrome which a friend of mine calls the "church committee" syndrome is the constant whining about overwork by officials who suddenly turn vicious if you offer to replace them. Not part of my personal experience in go, but I've seen it a lot, especially in Europe.
Nowadays we have to add the "why should I bother?" syndrome for go organisers. The internet and not their go organisations is the first and often only port of call for most new players now, and the internet has destroyed the book market which was often a major raison d'etre for go associations. I am one of several people who have bought all or most go books by western publishers just to support them. I have many not just unread but even unopened. But in the last couple of years I have stopped that, mainly because UK tournaments no longer offer a bookshop.
The tenor of all that may be negative, but I think these issues need to be addressed. More importantly, I get a strong feeling, from meeting people at go conferences and the like, that the number of people who would like to support go on a voluntary is actually increasing (more retired people?). But these people do not seem to find an entirely satisfactory role within the current national organisations. Many are still searching for a role.
I haven't got the answers, except for one that I have pushed, with some success, at the international conferences. I believe the long-time emphasis on inviting one player from each western country to compete in oriental tournaments is largely misplaced. These players tend to be self-absorbed, which is why they become the strongest local players in the first place, and any encouragement they get from attending oriental tournaments just makes them even more self-absorbed and want to become pros. In my view, the oriental sponsors would get a bigger bang for their bucks if they supported instead the people who organise go, the overworked officials and teachers. Individual players will return home and tell their family and a few friends they had a great time. Officials and teachers will return home and tell their families and friends but also their associations and schools they had a great time.
I know I have pushed that specific line with partial success, but on the last occasion I extended that approach and made a bigger impression (I was even invited to write a book about my views - won't happen, but it demonstrates I had a receptive audience). What I have now advocated is that the real audience for oriental sponsors is not go players, but parents and even the general public.
Western parents have to be chary about their kids spending a lot of time on go. Chess may elicit similar concerns, but at least most schools have chess clubs, most towns have chess clubs, many people play socially, and so the children have an opportunity to learn social skills as well as an intellectually beneficial game. Chess sets are also easily and cheaply available. Go sets tend to be hard to procure and expensive.
The general public is still largely unaware of go, or its intellectual benefits, but probably is aware that it is an oriental game, and those orientals (Trump notwithstanding) are people we want to trade with and learn to get along with.
These two concerns can be addressed by repackaging go to aim at the parents and general public. For example, parents can be shown that go offers a portal to the Far East, its languages and cultures. Even if a child eventually gives up go, he will have seen over the other side of the mountain. The general public may not be drawn into the go net, but will at least develop a favourable view of it, and the ground is tilled ready for a savvy western sponsor to say things like, "Hey, let's sponsor a team in the Chinese weiqi league." That's not fanciful - I did get as far as British Telecom discussing the prospects with the Chinese via the British Embassy, but a change of business focus scuppered that.
There's a lot more nitty gritty detail than that, of course. For example, the survey done by boardgamesgeek showed that the beauty of go equipment was a major factor in western interest in the game. That brings into question the prior wisdom of making free equipment available just to clubs. Most of the week it sits in a cupboard. Individuals would value it more - so make it cheap instead of free.
My recommended approach now is therefore much less emphasis by oriental sponsors on players and officials/teachers and much more on media people and other opinion formers such as politicians. Instead of inviting a strong player who will tell ten people about his visit to China/Japan/Korea, invite a journalist who will go back and tell ten million people about the game AND its cultural benefits. The player's comments will disappear into the ether in the pub, the journalist's comments will stay in print for ever.
Invite the editor of a major western women's magazine to write about women in go. That way you will not only strike a blow for women, you will also reach mothers who think most about their children's education.
Even if the readers don't take up go directly, their views on the sponsor's country may change. They may think more about holidays their, about trade opportunities there.
Invite a politician to see the oriental equivalent of Chess in Schools" and learn how go has not just social and cultural benefits, but also intellectual benefits that remain even if the child gives up the game. Even if the politician is not convinced, he will probably feel warmer towards the sponsor's country, so again the sponsoring country always gets some benefit.
Invite parents and non-go teachers, not their children, to see how go schools work. Show how their children can learn not just go but a valuable foreign language and culture.
In my view, if the oriental sponsors can be persuaded to shift focus sufficiently like this, a new role can emerge in the west for go associations. Instead of struggling to be publicisers, they can become enablers.
We can actually see this process at work already in the oriental martial arts in the west. Mainly because of films, but also tv, comics and books, most people in the west have some awareness of mot just the martial arts themselves but, perhaps even more so, of the physical benefits and cultural benefits. Even if a western person doesn't develop an interest in a martial art himself, he wouldn't think a friend weird for taking one up, a western parent will happily allow a child to go to karate or taekondo class, a leisure centre will happily set up a taiji class for older people, and so on.
I could see a day when a big role for western go organisers is organising a group trip to the Far East, in just the same way as martial arts groups here do already for their members. Go tourism rather than go tournaments may be the way forward.
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