[Wikipedia-l] Arbitration/mediation on en

Fri Dec 5 12:25:30 UTC 2003

(Note: intlwiki-l is supposed to be about issues relating specifically
to internationalization, but I know that some people on intlwiki-l may
not read wikipedia-l.  I've set the reply-to on this message to
wikipedia-l, because this is really a global policy issue that should
be discussed there, but I've included intlwiki-l, because I want to
reach those people as well.)

To the present day, we have been operating under a 'benevolent
dictator' model as regards governance issues generally, and in
particular issues relating to suspension of editing privileges for
those who can't seem to co-operate with others.

This has worked reasonably well (depending on who you ask, I guess) on
the English wikipedia, because I have spent a lot of time doing
investigations into controversial people, and have been willing to
"take the heat" for the few bans that we've had to implement.

But that model doesn't work nearly so well for other languages,
primarily because I'm not able to read the direct controversies, and
so I have to rely on testimony from people who are arguing, and what
actually ends up happening is that whoever is most fluent in English
ends up carrying the day by presenting their side of the dispute.

We have just begun a process on en of formalizing the decision
procedures for banning people, through the use of two committees of
volunteers.  The first "line of defense" is a mediation committee,
which attempts to work with parties to find a mutually agreeable
solution to a problem.  This committee has no power to ban or to do
anything other than act as an outside recommendation for a solution.

The second "line of defense" is the arbitration committee, which will
be tasked with the difficult and painful and regrettable task of
banning someone from editing.

This is mainly an experiment, and we shall see over time how it works
out.  I hope it works well.

I would like to encourage a similar setup on the larger non-English
wikipedias, perhaps customized to some extent to fit localized needs.
But the overall concept is to have in place clear methods for group
decision making that are respectful of our overall ideals.

On the English wikipedia, this was not necessary until now, but on the
other wikipedias I think that it is necessary sooner because there is
no real way for me to be an effective benevolent dictator.

So, let's discuss this.

--Jimbo