George Herbert wrote:
On Dec 18, 2007 10:55 AM, Ray Saintonge saintonge@telus.net wrote:
Milos Rancic wrote:
While WMF is better the it was, there are still a number of systematic problems. The main problem *is* ambivalent position of the Board: something between despotic, oligarchic and representative democratic body. (Of course, in the sense of from where power comes, not in the sense of methods.)
This is a fundamental problem in democratic organizations, despite the fact that it has been repeatedly stated that Wikipedia (and hence Wikimedia) is not a democracy.
I don't know about the "...and hence"; WMF is not en.wikipedia
Nobody is saying that it is.
WMF is a traditional charity company organization, with the added wrinkle that most of the board of directors come from the community via open elections. In that sense we resemble a republic, not a democracy, but it's still not a governmental structure... it's a charity company, mostly-elected board and hired executive(s) and staff.
I'm sure we could have long philosophical debates about the difference between a democracy and a republic, or between governance and government, and I'm sure that when and where that distinction is important I'll be right there insisting on it.
Rulership structures want to get on with the business at hand, and it can be terribly frustrating when decisions must be made to wait for any kind of consensus from the populace. We even have difficulty defining just who that populace is, and that makes it more difficult to know who should be a participant in the consensus. While the Paris Commune of 1871 debated, the outside forces did not hesitate to do what was necessary to run them over.
I think you're confusing the projects and Foundation too much, and misreading how the Foundation works.
Governmental analogies only go so far, and I think yours have gone past the breaking point...
I disagree, of course. It's in the nature of publics to debate minor issues to death, and be completely silent when their input is needed.
Ec