April 22. On this date in 2018, the Bahá'í World News Service carried an article announcing the retirement of Gustavo Correa and Firaydoun Javaheri from the Universal House of Justice. The subsequent election results announced April 30 were easily predictably, and Andrej Donoval will be the next member elected to the Universal House of Justice.
How does membership in the International Teaching Centre lead to election to the Universal House of Justice?
How is it that with its nine members elected every five years from the male membership in good standing of the worldwide Bahá'í community by an electoral college consisting of all the members of each Bahá'í National Spiritual Assembly throughout the world, the membership of the Universal House of Justice consists exclusively of men who have previously been appointed to the International Teaching Centre by the Universal House of Justice?
With no overt campaigning or politicking permitted, upon what does the electoral college base its election of new members to the Universal House of Justice?
In the Bahá'í electoral system, the exposure of potential candidates to electors is a premium. Members of the International Teaching Centre routinely travel throughout the world, giving them vital face-time with members of the National Spiritual Assemblies who serve as electors for the Universal House of Justice.
Consider the cases of Stephen Birkland and Stephen Hall. Stephen Birkland was appointed to the International Teaching Centre in 2008 and elected to the Universal House of Justice in 2010. Stephen Hall was appointed to the International Teaching Centre in 2005 and elected to the Universal House of Justice in 2010.
In a letter dated October 20, 2008, the Universal House of Justice called for a series of 41 Regional Conferences intended to mark the mid-point of the Five Year Plan and motivate participants to re-dedicate themselves to the goals of the Plan upon returning home. The Regional Conferences were held from November 1, 2008 through March 1, 2009.
In that period, Stephen Birkland attended the following Bahá'í Regional Conferences...
| Date | Location of Bahá'í Regional Conference |
|---|---|
| November 1-2, 2008 | Lusaka, Zambia |
| November 8-9, 2008 | Johannesburg, South Africa |
| November 29-30, 2008 | Antofagasta, Chile |
| December 6-7, 2008 | Atlanta, Georgia, United States of America |
| January 17-18, 2009 | Vancouver, Canada |
| February 7-8, 2009 | Frankfurt, Germany |
| February 21-22, 2009 | Accra, Ghana |
In that period, Stephen Hall attended the following Bahá'í Regional Conferences...
| Date | Location of Bahá'í Regional Conference |
|---|---|
| November 15-16, 2008 | Bangui, Central African Republic |
| November 22-23, 2008 | Lubumbashi, Democratic Republic of the Congo |
| November 29-30, 2008 | Yaoundé, Cameroon |
| December 6-7, 2008 | Portland, Oregon, United States of America |
| December 13-14, 2008 | Stamford, Connecticut, United States of America |
| January 3-4, 2009 | Abidjan, Ivory Coast |
| January 17-18, 2009 | Lae, Papua New Guinea |
| January 24-25, 2009 | Sydney, Australia |
| January 31-February 1, 2009 | Auckland, New Zealand |
| February 7-8, 2009 | Frankfurt, Germany |
No other Bahá'ís receive as much exposure to electors of the Universal House of Justice as do members of the International Teaching Centre.
With the turnover of the Universal House of Justice's nine members and with the International Teaching Centre's being composed of nine members, some of whom are women and therefore ineligible for election to the Universal House of Justice, a man's appointment to the International Teaching Centre serves as a presumption to eventual election to the Universal House of Justice.
When the Universal House of Justice appoints members to the International Teaching Centre, they are in fact selecting their own replacements.
In the Bahá'í electoral system, with no overt campaigning and politicking permitted, the exposure of potential candidates to electors is a premium. The nine members of the International Teaching Centre routinely travel throughout the world, giving them vital face-time with members of the National Spiritual Assemblies who serve as electors for the Universal House of Justice. In fact, every single one of the current members of the Universal House of Justice previously served as a Counsellor member of the International Teaching Centre.
With the turnover of the Universal House of Justice's nine members and with the International Teaching Centre's being composed of nine members, some of whom are women and therefore ineligible for election to the Universal House of Justice, a man's appointment to the International Teaching Centre serves as a presumption to eventual election to the Universal House of Justice.
To illustrate further, in a letter dated October 20, 2008, the Universal House of Justice called for a series of 41 Regional Conferences intended to mark the mid-point of the Five Year Plan and motivate participants to re-dedicate themselves to the goals of the Plan upon returning home. The Regional Conferences were held from November 1, 2008 through March 1, 2009.
Each of the 41 Regional Conferences was attended by two Counsellor members of the International Teaching Centre with the exception of the Conference held at Uvira, the Democratic Republic of Congo, which had only one representative. The Counsellor members of the International Teaching Centre at the time of the Regional Conferences were Juan Francisco Mora, Ayman Rouhani, Stephen Hall, Stephen Birkland, Zenaida Ramirez, Joan Lincoln, Rachel Ndegwa, Uransaikhan Baatar, and Penelope Walker.
Of this cohort of Counsellors, the five lady members (Zenaida Ramirez, Joan Lincoln, Rachel Ndegwa, Uransaikhan Baatar, and Penelope Walker) were ineligible for election to the Universal House of Justice.
Of the four male members at the time of the 41 Regional Conferences (Juan Francisco Mora, Ayman Rouhani, Stephen Hall, and Stephen Birkland), all have been elected to the Universal House of Justice.
In practice, the Bahá’í electoral system most closely resembles council democracy as it still exists in Cuba, wherein individuals elect Local Spiritual Assemblies, who then elect National Spiritual Assemblies, who then elect the Universal House of Justice. With no politicking or partisanship allowed, there is little turnover in leadership and Universal House of Justice members almost invariably serve until retirement or death. In the people's democracies of the Eastern Bloc, these career bureaucrats were known as the nomenklatura.
The next member elected to the Universal House of Justice will be Andrej Donoval, who is the longest tenured male member of the International Teaching Centre, having been appointed to that body in 2013.
Gustavo Correa is the husband of Haleh Arbab and brother-in-law of Farzam Arbab. Before his election to the Universal House of Justice in 2008, Correa was appointed to the International Teaching Centre in 2005. Along with his brother-in-law, Farzam Arbab, Gustavo Correa was one of the founders of FUNDAEC and later served as its Director, the position currently held by his daughter, Bita Correa.
Born in Tehran, Iran on October 27, 1941, Farzam Arbab would go on to earn a Bachelor of Arts degree from Amherst College in 1964 and a Doctor of Philosophy in physics from the University of California, Berkeley in 1968. Shortly after earning his doctorate, Arbab moved to Colombia where he quickly established himself in the leadership in the Bahá’í community of that country and by 1970 was Chairman of the National Spiritual Assembly. While in Colombia he helped found Foundation for the Application and Teaching of the Sciences (FUNDAEC).
Initially elected in 1993 to the Universal House of Justice, the supreme governing body of the Bahá’í Faith, Farzam Arbab retired from that body in 2013. Before his election to the Universal House of Justice, in 1988, he was appointed to the International Teaching Centre. The International Teaching Centre, whose seat is at the Bahá'í World Centre in Haifa, Israel, is composed of nine Counsellors appointed by the Universal House of Justice and tasked with duties to stimulate and coordinate the Continental Board of Counselors and assist the Universal House of Justice in matters relating to the teaching and protection of the faith. All of the current members of the Universal House of Justice previously served as members of the International Teaching Centre. In 1980 he was appointed to the Continental Board of Counsellors for the Protection and Propagation of the Faith in the Americas, on which he served for eight years. From 1970 until 1980 he served as the Chairman for the National Spiritual Assembly of the Bahá’ís of Colombia. In 1980, while still a Counsellor, Arbab was on the initial board of directors for the Anís Zunúzí Bahá'í School in Haiti.
Farzam Arbab's son, Paul Arbab, is administrator at the Luxembourg-based Unity Foundation, which works with Luxembourg's Ministry of Foreign Affairs) and "a network of local development agencies assisting them in their efforts to build capacity amongst populations to take charge of their own social and economic development." "Born in the US, Paul grew up in Colombia. He holds an MBA and joined the board of Unity Foundation in January 2007. Since then he has been able to provide valuable input to the strategic direction of the Foundation. He is a proud father of two toddlers and strongly believes in the power of education." Unity Foundation is "governed by a board of directors which regularly meets to consult on the strategic direction of the organization. The day-to-day work is being carried out by the office team. Our external consultancy body, the Office of Social and Economic Development (OSED) in Haifa, Israel connects us to grass-root development agencies which have the capacity to work with external funding organization. OSED and the [Luxembourg] Ministry of Foreign Affairs act as two filters ensuring the quality and integrity of our projects."
Farzam Arbab's sister, Haleh Arbab, is currently director of the Institute for Studies in Global Prosperity, a non-profit educational and research organization "dedicated to building capacity in individuals, groups and institutions to contribute to prevalent discourses concerned with the betterment of society" through "working in collaboration with the Bahá'í International Community." Born in Iran and educated in the United States, Haleh Arbab previously lived in Colombia from 1982 to 2005 where she worked with the Foundation for the Application and Teaching of the Sciences (FUNDAEC) and served as Rector of Centro Universitario de Bienestar Rural, a Colombian Bahá'í-inspired institute she helped found in 1988.
Farzam Arbab's brother-in-law, Haleh Arbab's husband, is Gustavo Correa who himself has been a member of the Universal House of Justice since 2008. Before his election to the Universal House of Justice, in 2005, Correa was appointed to the International Teaching Centre. Along with his brother-in-law, Farzam Arbab, Gustavo Correa was one of the founders of FUNDAEC and later served as its Director, the position currently held by his daughter, Bita Correa.
Farzam Arab's niece, Bita Correa, is a graduate of Bryn Mawr College. Aside from being FUNDAEC's current program director, Bita Correa participated as a member of the Bahá'í International Community’s delegation to the 55th United Nations Commission for Social Development. A recent graduate of Bryn Mawr College, Bita Correa is the daughter of Haleh Arbab, Farzam Arbab's sister, and Gustavo Correa.
Farzam Arbab was one of the founders of FUNDAEC (Foundation for the Application and Teaching of the Sciences). He served as its Director from 1974 through 1988 and continues to serve on its board. FUNDAEC was established in 1974 by a group of professors at the University of Valle in Colombia who were looking for new strategies to develop the capacities of people and to generate knowledge in isolated regions of the country. In 2002, the Club of Budapest recognized FUNDAEC's new rural education model. The model, known as SAT (for "Sistema de Aprendizaje Tutorial, Spanish for "System for Tutorial Learning") started in 1980 and centers on the use of interactive workbooks facilitated by a tutor. In Colombia, these tutors are trained at the Center for Rural Education.
The SAT techniques Arbab helped develop at FUNDAEC have been applied to the Bahá'í community in the form of the Ruhi Institute, which was named after Arbab's father. Centered on Bahá'í study circles, the goal of the Ruhi Institute courses is to "evoke a transformative learning experience through a learner-centered, experiential, and collaborative approach facilitated by a tutor rather than an instructor, a teacher, or an expert." Among the principles of the Ruhi curriculum is the utilization of service projects to implement learning into tangible action.
The Universal House of Justice has encouraged the emulation of the Ruhi model throughout the global Bahá'í community. According to one researcher, the Ruhi Institute's method has resulted in "nonhierarchical, self-initiated, self-organized small groups engaged in study, teaching, and action" and is "becoming the core of Bahá’í community life worldwide as the outcome of a process that has sought to nurture the spiritual life of individuals and families and to establish social foundations for the vision and practice of religious world citizenship." Paul Lample, another member of the Universal Hose of Justice, has stated "Doubtless the institute and its curriculum will continue to evolve, both in content and form, to a level of greater complexity in regions and nations within the framework of the administrative order throughout the various stages of the Divine Plan in the second century of the Formative Age."
For a number of years now, Unity Foundation has collaborated with FUNDAEC and "since June 2013, Unity Foundation has renewed its collaboration with FUNDAEC."
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