The Board of Directors supports the renaming of our society to the German Chemical Society. A member survey in summer 2024 showed 69% approval. The Board sees the high level of participation in the survey and the positive vote as an order to conduct a corresponding member vote and has initiated the necessary survey on the amendment of the statutes (Nachr. Chem., 12 (2024) 82).
The vote on the amendment to the statutes will take place in February 2025. You can find further information on these pages.
published in issue 01/2025 of Nachrichten aus der Chemie ( read the letter as pdf )
In July 2024, we asked you for your opinion on a possible renaming of our German Chemical Society to the "German Society for Chemistry". We would like to clarify that this was not an official vote on a name change, but merely a survey of the mood among our members.
Almost 8,100 people (27% of all members) took part in this vote within a few days. This is an impressive result. More than 68% of participating members voted for a name change. As expected, the proportion of women who voted for a name change was even higher than that of men at 83%, but it was still a remarkable 63%. And we saw something else: the assumption that younger people would favor a new name was not confirmed. In all age groups, broken down into five-year cohorts, the support value was between 60% and 72%, with no correlation with age. We see this vote and the high level of participation in the survey as a clear mandate to pursue this topic further.
We would like to thank all members who took part in the survey, as well as those who added comments and suggestions, which was the case for more than a quarter of the responses. This topic is therefore important to all of us. We assure you that we listen to and take seriously all opinions, whether they are positive, negative or weighed up.
For this reason, we are writing to you today to set out in more detail what we consider to be the most important aspects and to specifically address the points you have raised most frequently.
Why did we initiate this survey? We are repeatedly told that the name German Chemical Society no longer corresponds to the reality in three respects.
Firstly, we have not only male members, but now also around a third female members. When the GDCh was founded in 1949, the few female chemists who existed at the time played hardly any role in the GDCh. That is different today. We are increasingly being asked at Conferences or other events or on social media that our name does not include everyone - including and especially by people who are or would like to be involved in society. There have also been suggestions from our honorary members to reorient ourselves in line with the times. These are all serious voices that we do not want to ignore. Many of our members value diversity and a language that includes all genders.
Secondly, the GDCh is not just made up of German chemists. Our members come from all regions of the world and we are proud of this because this diversity enriches our society.
Thirdly, not all of our members have studied chemistry. In addition to chemical laboratory technicians, chemical technical assistants and members from the physics, biology and engineering professions, we are open to all other professions - everyone who is committed to our statutes is welcome.
The name "German Chemical Society" would take all of these points into account: a chemical society based in Germany that is active internationally and interdisciplinary through its multinational and interdisciplinary membership. And - this was also important to many members who took part in the survey - this name is inclusive, it excludes no one, but everyone who wants to be part of it.
Many participants in the survey who are open to a name change have suggested that the name German Chemical Society (DChG) should be used again. This would be obvious, but not wise for the following reason: The name " German Chemical Society " is associated with a predecessor organization of the GDCh of the same name, whose (name) tradition one does not want to take lightly - especially after examining the behavior of the DChG during the years of National Socialism in Germany. The GDCh commissioned a study on this in the early 2010s. It was published in 2015 as a 700-page book "Chemists in the Third Reich". The interview with the historian and author of the study Helmut Maier at the time can be found here: gdch.app/doi/10.1002/nadc.201590119. We believe that the title “Historians must evaluate and so must the GDCh” sets a good tone: We cannot regard the DChG as a model for the GDCh, and therefore we should save ourselves the trouble of having to repeatedly draw distinctions and explain ourselves by using this name.
An understandable objection raised by many opponents of the name change is that the proposed new name is not consistent with the abbreviation "GD-Ch". However, we think that this drawback is bearable when you consider that other professional societies have long been doing this (such as the Austrian Chemical Society, which continues to abbreviate itself as "GÖCH", after its previous name "Society of Austrian Chemists").
DECHEMA is also now called "Society for Chemical Engineering and biotechnology e. V." and no longer "German Society for Chemical Apparatus Engineering", as it was when it was founded in 1926. Only "CHEM" remains in accordance with the long name. However, no one has ever been bothered by the fact that "DE" and "A" no longer apply and that neither "T" nor "B" have been included in the acronym.
Internationally, we have long been known as the “German Chemical Society, GDCh”, which doesn’t bother anyone (perhaps the coincidental congruence of “German” and “G” is an advantage here). And in the final analysis, we are simply the GDCh.
The survey also showed that tradition is important to many members, after all we have been the "German Chemical Society" since 1949. There is no doubt that the GDCh has done well with this name for 75 years and has thus established a tradition. However, we see that this name no longer fits our modern society. Of course, we also hope that the GDCh will continue to exist for many decades to come, so that a new name would at some point be just as rich in tradition.
This is what some participants asked in the survey. Others see the initiative as a concession to the "gender debate" or to what they consider to be an undesirable or fleeting zeitgeist. In addition to a general rejection of any change, in some cases this feedback may also reflect the fear that the GDCh could neglect other activities and projects because of the debate on the name change.
Let us expressly emphasize that this is not the case and will not be the case. We - that is, the employees in the GDCh Office and the members of the board - are constantly dealing with numerous important tasks and challenges of our professional society and the many facets of chemistry in Germany. For this, you have expressed your trust in the elected Board and given the mandate, which is why we do not ask you to vote on all activities.
The topic at hand here is just one of many - but it requires a change to the statutes in order to be implemented. And for this purpose, the GDCh statutes provide for a vote among the membership in accordance with good association law. In our opinion, more than 8,000 members who took part in the survey within a few days clearly show that the name of our society is important to many of them. We are therefore convinced that it is right to have this discussion now.
We are aware that there are many women who can live well with the "generic masculine" and therefore feel addressed by the current name of our society. But we want to show respect to all members - and there are enough of them for whom this no longer applies in our day and age. We would also like to take this opportunity to point out our young members who decided by vote a few months ago that "JCF" should no longer stand for "JungChemikerForum" but for "JungesChemieForum".
There will therefore be a motion to amend the statutes, which will be announced to all members in good time. At its meeting on December 3, 2024, the Board decided to hold the vote from February 10 to 22, 2025. A change to the statutes is approved if at least three quarters of the incoming responses agree to the motion ( GDCh statutes §20, paragraph 3 ).
The hurdles for a name change are therefore high. The decision is made neither by the Executive Committee, nor by the Board or the office, but by all of our members. We would therefore like to promote this and ask you to support the GDCh in giving us a new, contemporary and future-oriented name that better suits our current society and our guiding principles.
Your Stefanie Dehnen and your Tom Kinzel
President and Executive Director of the GDCh
On the statutes of the German Chemical Society
The vote on the amendment to the statutes will take place from February 10 to 22, 2025. Members of the GDCh will receive a link by email that they can use to vote electronically. Members who have not registered an email address with the GDCh will receive the voting documents by post.
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Questions about the amendment to the statutes:
GDCh public relations
pr@gdch.de
This page has been machine translated. If you have any feedback or comments please feel free to contact us.
last modified: 31.12.2024 11:33 H from K.J.Schmitz