This type of system is characteristic of the placeful extreme on the spatiality scale. This is because there is a place - the conference - in which the participants agree they are, in some sense, present.

[…] even allowing for the detours through the back roads to avoid the scalies who man the highway truck-weight checking stations.

One of our Austrian readers who speaks and writes excellent English has translated the German, and placed it here, if the Googlish translation is doing your brain in.

If a wise woman fell under suspicion from the authorities her neighbours might rally to her defence, providing compurgators in court, or drawing up certificates testifying to her innocence.