[WikiEN-l] Re: Arbitrator recusal

[James D. Forrester]

Michael Snow wrote:

> James D. Forrester wrote:
> 
> > geni wrote:
> >
> > > On 11/12/05, Delirium <delirium at hackish.org> wrote:
 > > >
> > > > There's an informal (formal?) rule that if a majority of arbitrators
> > > > ever recuse on a case, they all are automatically unrecused. The
> > > > justification is that, in all probability, a situation that resulted
> > > > in a user having personal conflicts with nearly every single
> > > > arbitrator is more likely to be the fault of the user than the fault
 > > > > individually of every arbitrator.  A more practical justification
 > > > > is that it serves as a deterrent to trying to "win" a case by
> > > > forcing everyone to recuse.
> > >
> > > No. Last time we disscussed this the general conclusion was that we
> > > would call up past arbcom members and people from other languages if
> > > posible. The solution you list runs into the problem that if you have
> > > multiple sibjects to abitration it is posible for none of them to have
> > > gone overboard in disputes.
> >
> > Erm. What on Earth do you mean, "no"? Mark was entirely correct - that 
> > is exactly the policy we came up with back in January 2004, when we 
> > wrote the policies in the first place.
> 
> That was the policy as it existed in its original draft form, but not 
> the policy that was actually adopted. The provision for "unrecusing" 
> already recused arbitrators was dropped from the policy based on my 
> objections, see [[Wikipedia talk:Arbitration policy comments]].

I remember discussion about it, yes. It wasn't "dropped", though.

 > I refuse
> to accept that this could be policy, formal or informal, since it's 
> never been done in practice and was specifically objected to at the time.

Hmm. You mean, in the same way that the clause in the 25th Ammendment to 
the Constitution of the United States allowing (the majority of?) the 
Cabinet to sign a letter stating that, in their opinion, the President 
is unfit for and can be removed from office, never having been used, is 
not actually part of the Constitution? Emergency special-powers rules 
exist for a particular reason.

> The better approach is simply for arbitrators not to recuse themselves 
> over trivial issues, or when they have merely been targeted by the 
> editor in question.

Absolutely agreed. I have recused just once - when someone filed a case 
against me, where it would hardly be seemly to rule. My personal rule 
for recusals is if it 'feels like the right thing to do' - not only to 
be sure that one is able to neutrally comment on all parties and on all 
aspects, but

> For these reasons, I support the refusal of Kelly 
> Martin to recuse herself in the Silverback case. The conduct of the 
> arbitrator, not the person whose conduct is being arbitrated, is what 
> determines the necessity of recusal.

And the appearance of unimpeachable and impeccable behaviour - it is 
vital, I think, that Arbitrators behave in such a way so as not to 
diminish the Committee at all.

> Geni is correct that in March there was some discussion of how to deal 
> with arbitrator recusals. See this message I posted about the issue: 
> http://mail.wikipedia.org/pipermail/wikien-l/2005-March/020510.html
> My proposal received some acclaim, but I wouldn't say it was formally 
> adopted, and in practice we've never had occasion to need it. I still 
> think the "all arbitrators have to recuse themselves" scenario is pretty 
> chimerical.

Indeed. I would be very surprised, too, if it occurred.

In reality, what would happen if we /didn't/ follow the pre-specified 
policy is that it would be handed directly to Jimbo, rather than us 
doing it in his stead, and Jimbo, being awfully fair but no longer 
sufficiently un-busy enough to be able to understand the twists and 
turns of the sometimes-tortuous aspects of policy, written and 
otherwise, and would, equitably and rapidly, ban all members of the 
complaint for a month. :-)

> However, I maintain that we could benefit greatly from developing a 
> group of temporary arbitrators, or magistrates, for the purpose of 
> reducing the workload, filling in for recusals, and allowing cases to be 
> handled by smaller panels. It would also get us out of the dilemma we 
> currently have, between elections where we as a community make guesses 
> about who's qualified and will actually do the work, or having Jimbo 
> appoint everyone based on his own guesses and the advice of those he trusts.

This has been discussed e'er and anon. The primary problem that keeps on 
coming up is that there don't seem to be enough people who actually 
would want to take on the obligations and duties of becoming an 
Arbitrator, let alone a "second rate" one wherein you get more of the 
work and less of the "glory" (forgive me whilst I snort).

Yours,
-- 
James D. Forrester
Wikimedia : [[W:en:User:Jdforrester|James F.]]
E-Mail    : james at jdforrester.org
IM (MSN)  : jamesdforrester at hotmail.com