The General Meeting of the Association takes place every three years. It is the largest and most important of the meetings sponsored by the Association, and is the only occasion on which members are able to meet and discuss their work with a large proportion of the membership. It is also the occasion on which the Business Meeting (or 'members meeting' as it is called in the Articles) takes place. Among other matters, this is when new members of the Executive Committee are announced, and the roles of President, Secretary, and Treasurer typically change hands.

Organisation

The philosophy of the General Meeting is that all members should be able to present their research. With the increasing size of the Association, it is no longer possible to ensure that all members are able to make oral presentations. In recent meetings, the role played by poster sessions has therefore grown in importance. A typical General Meeting consists of a number of symposia, a number of individual paper sessions, and two or more poster sessions. An attempt is made to strike a good balance between offering a broad choice of presentations, and keeping the number of parallel sessions to a minimum.

The task of running a General Meeting used to be one that was taken on by a local organiser, who made local arrangements, and the Secretary of the Association, who looked after the scientific programme. The current scope and complexity of the General Meetings means that local arrangements are now dealt with by a Local Organising Committee, and the setting up of the programme is handled by a specially appointed Scientific Programme Committee.

The Association supports each General Meeting financially.

Next General Meeting

The next General Meeting will be held in 2026 in Strasbourg, France.