The idea of "recommendations"

[Miriverite]

My introduction to sorority recruitment came, of course, from my own university's recruitment system. Here, we do not require "recommendations" at all, and to be quiet honest, I never even knew they existed until I stumbled upon GreekChat and talked with one of my friends who ended up pledging ADPi back home in Texas.

I guess I'm a bit curious on what the general trend with recommendations is. If it's not required by nationals, when and where and why did the trend begin? Does it only apply to specific sororities (or groups of sororities)? How heavily does it even factor into the bid process, because to me it seems as if the decisions are largely based on the recruitment parties instead of all the supporting information (I mean, seriously that's a lot of stuff to read through).

And just FYI, I am in no means trying to rush another sorority (AXO 'til I die!) and I don't have made-up relatives trying to get into sorority XYZ. I'm genuinely curious about the phenomenon of "recommendations" - hopefully some of you can clarify!