AA in Ireland: The Service Structure

Alcoholics Anonymous in Ireland operates across the island as a single fellowship. The service structure reflects the principles of the Ninth Tradition at every level: service bodies exist to support groups and members, not to direct them.

This page describes the current service structure of AA in Ireland as set out in the Service Handbook for Ireland (2025 Edition). The Traditions and Concepts, not the handbook, remain the principles against which any structure is understood.

Levels of service

The structure of AA in Ireland has five main levels, from the individual group up to the national service office.

The group

The AA group is the primary unit of AA. Each group is autonomous and manages its own affairs. Groups elect their own officers — typically a secretary, treasurer, and group service representative (GSR) — on a rotating basis. The GSR is the group's link to the wider service structure.

Groups are not directed by areas, intergroups, or GSO. They contribute voluntarily to the service structure and send representatives to participate in it, but no outside body has authority over how a group conducts its meetings or its internal affairs.

Areas

Groups in Ireland are organised into Areas. The Areas map to the counties of Ireland — all thirty-two — with a number of additional Areas covering large metropolitan centres where the concentration of groups warrants it.

An Area is a subdivision of the relevant Provincial Intergroup, usually covering a county or metropolitan district and generally comprising not more than twenty groups. The Area Committee is made up of two group service representatives (GSRs) from each group within the Area, together with elected Area officers. It coordinates local services — hospitals, prisons, public information, telephone work — and provides the link between group-level service and the provincial Intergroup.

Like every other tier, an Area exists to serve the groups within it. It does not direct them. Area officers are trusted servants holding rotating positions, and the Area Committee is responsible to the groups whose representatives form it.

Intergroups

The four Provincial Intergroups are based on the historic provinces — Connaught, Leinster, Munster, and Ulster. Each Area sends four elected Intergroup Representatives to its Provincial Intergroup. Alongside these representatives, an Intergroup Committee also includes its elected officers (Chairperson, Secretary, Treasurer), its four General Service Conference Delegates, and the Provincial Trustee. The Intergroup coordinates service across the province and undertakes work that operates best at provincial level.

The Intergroup is responsible to its Areas and, through them, to the groups; it does not have authority over them. Its officers are trusted servants drawn from the Area Representatives, holding rotating two-year terms.

Northern Ireland's groups and areas are served by Ulster Intergroup, which participates in the all-Ireland General Service Conference alongside the other three provinces.

General Service Office

The General Service Office (GSO), based in Santry, Dublin, provides administration, literature distribution, and services to groups throughout the island of Ireland. Its day-to-day running is the responsibility of an Operations Manager under the supervision of the General Service Board.

GSO does not govern AA in Ireland. It provides services to the fellowship, and the structure's authority derives not from the office but from the groups.

The General Service Conference

The General Service Conference is the means by which AA in Ireland functions nationally. It is the guardian of the Twelve Steps, Twelve Traditions, and Twelve Concepts, and is the group conscience of the fellowship in Ireland. Its authority is derived from the fellowship as a whole; it is not a government of AA and is responsible to those it serves.

Conference comprises thirty members: sixteen General Service Conference Delegates (four from each province), four Provincial Intergroup Secretaries, four Provincial (Alcoholic) Trustees, three non-AA Trustees, the Board/Company Secretary, and two World Service Delegates. The Delegates and Intergroup Secretaries reach Conference by election through the structure; the Trustees are appointed. All members may participate and vote.

Conference embodies the principle of the Ninth Tradition at the national level: it is a service body, directly responsible to the groups. Its decisions, where passed, are recommended in trust to the groups, areas, intergroups, and board rather than imposed as binding directives — and the groups retain final responsibility for carrying them out.

Two bodies: the Fellowship and GSBAA

AA in Ireland comprises two separate but closely connected organisations. The first is the Fellowship of AA — the groups, areas, provincial intergroups, and the General Service Conference. The Fellowship is an unincorporated body and, as such, is not subject to Company Law or Charity Law; it is run in accordance with the Service Handbook and with custom and practice built up over decades, with its constituent parts guided by their group conscience.

The second is the General Service Board of Alcoholics Anonymous of Ireland CLG (GSBAA) — a company limited by guarantee and a registered charity, subject to both the Companies Act 2014 and the Charities Act 2009. Its seven directors are both company directors and charity trustees, with specific legal and fiduciary obligations. GSBAA provides services to the Fellowship, including literature publication, the national archives, public information at national level, the website, GSO, and management of the Fellowship's central funds.

The two arms are linked: the thirty members of Conference are also the thirty members of the company, and the seven directors of GSBAA are members of Conference and trustees of the Fellowship. This is the arrangement by which the Fellowship and the legal entity that holds its central funds and property are currently constituted in Ireland.