This is a fellowship of problem drinkers, both men and women, who voluntarily join in a mutual effort to remain sober. It was started in the United States in the 1930s and has been maintained by alcohol-troubledpeople who hadthemselves "hit bottom"—they haddiscovered that the troubles associated with their drinking far outweighedany pleasures it might provide. AA serves, without professional guidance, a significant minority of the population of alcoholics in the United States. Various professionally orientedtreatments serve other significant minorities of alcoholics.

AA is not the only hope for alcoholics; nor is it everything they need. Nevertheless, its program and meetings have restoredthousands of alcoholics to abstinence, both in the United States and in many other countries. In 1992, the General Service Office of AA, located in New York City, reporteda worldwide total of 87,403 AA groups, 48,747 of them in the United States, with an additional...