Composition
The IAU has 9,902 individual members, all of whom are professional astronomers and most of whom hold PhDs. There are also 70 national members who represent countries affiliated with the IAU. 87% of individual members are male, while 13% are female, among them the union's former president, astronomer Catherine J. Cesarsky.
The sovereign body of the IAU is its General Assembly, which comprises all members. The Assembly determines IAU policy, approves the Statutes and By-Laws of the Union (and amendments proposed thereto) and elects various committees.
The right to vote on matters brought before the Assembly varies according to the type of business under discussion. The Statutes consider such business to be divided into two categories:
- issues of a "primarily scientific nature" (as determined by the Executive Committee), upon which voting is restricted to individual members, and
- all other matters (such as Statute revision and procedural questions), upon which voting is restricted to the representatives of national members.
On budget matters (which fall into the second category), votes are weighted according to the relative subscription levels of the national members. A second category vote requires a turnout of at least two-thirds of national members in order to be valid. An absolute majority is sufficient for approval in any vote, except for Statute revision which requires a two-thirds majority. An equality of votes is resolved by the vote of the President of the Union.
Read more about this topic: International Astronomical Union
Famous quotes containing the word composition:
“Viewed freely, the English language is the accretion and growth of every dialect, race, and range of time, and is both the free and compacted composition of all.”
—Walt Whitman (1819–1892)
“There is singularly nothing that makes a difference a difference in beginning and in the middle and in ending except that each generation has something different at which they are all looking. By this I mean so simply that anybody knows it that composition is the difference which makes each and all of them then different from other generations and this is what makes everything different otherwise they are all alike and everybody knows it because everybody says it.”
—Gertrude Stein (1874–1946)
“Boswell, when he speaks of his Life of Johnson, calls it my magnum opus, but it may more properly be called his opera, for it is truly a composition founded on a true story, in which there is a hero with a number of subordinate characters, and an alternate succession of recitative and airs of various tone and effect, all however in delightful animation.”
—James Boswell (1740–1795)