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JANET LEE SCOTT
their capacity as president, to work for the committee's benefit outside the block. Other than these, there are no special duties clearly set out as the responsibility of the president. A similar situation exists for the other honorary members, such as the consultant and honorary consultant. "The ten members of the consultant subcommittee are those who have been members of the MAC for a long time, but who have no special duties. To give them an honored term for committee members to use, they are referred to as consultants, and give general advice." In this way, the chairman of one of the most active committees described the position of consultant.
Some committees have a great many honorary members. For example, one committee I visited in Tze Wan Shan Estate in 1977 was extremely active in recruiting honorary members, as it had thirty-six: thirteen honorary presidents, five advisors, seven consultants, and eleven special presidents (Scott 1980:41). A few of the larger committees in Lok Fu Estate have appointed honorary members in numbers large enough to equal or surpass this total. Block #15, for example, has twenty-four consultants (of which seven are businesses), fifteen honorary presidents, five presidents, and two medical advisors, giving a total of forty-six. Thirty-nine honorary members serve on the MAC of Block #16: eight presidents, and thirty-one honorary presidents (one a restaurant). A third committee, that of Block #19, has invited thirty honorary members, including: one management consultant, eighteen honorary consultants (all businesses), four honorary medical consultants (among which is a herbal medicine shop), and seven honorary presidents (of which two are businesses). Three other MACs have twenty-five, nineteen, and eight honorary members.
Structure and Beyond
The preceding discussion examines the basic structure of the Mutual Aid Committees. Although this structure is the same for all committees, it is clear that each MAC has the freedom to alter and expand on the design. While the study of MAC design is interesting and valuable for its own sake, it becomes especially important when it is realized that a clear idea of both the basic structure of a Mutual Aid Committee and the variations on this