[Foundation-l] Money, politics and corruption

[Nathan]

> Just look at it dispassionately. Wikimedia has how many chapters? And aims to have how many more?  All self-organized, boot-strapped operations operating under different systems, in different cultures with varying tolerances for mixing self-interest with duty.  The odds dictate that some of these organizations will fail.  And there will be some level self-interest involved in failure or the floundering of chapters.  This should be expected.  The question is what sort of process we should have for dealing with chapters that exceed our tolerance for this sort of thing.  Ideally we should have such a process in place with clear expectations before there is ever any need to use it.
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> But pretending corruption is something that won't happen or can be prevented on a absolute level is silly.  I haven't a clue what anyone is referring to as current examples.  I don't really care for politics and gossip, so I personally don't even want to know.  But it is worth talking about what sort of process we should develop to deal with such things for its own sake.  We can't simply depend on people being better than human.  Given a large enough sample, people will do what they do; what they have always done. It shouldn't be controversial to ask for a system to be put in place to mitigate the harm from people behaving in such a reliably predictable fashion as becoming corrupted by money or power.
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> Birgitte SB
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I think it will be very difficult to meaningfully mitigate the risks
of waste, fraud and abuse in national chapters. Ideally the WMF can
place restraints on its funding by demanding careful vetting of
officers and strong internal risk controls -- but this places a large
burden on organizations still in their infancy, and may be a stifling
factor during a crucial period of expansion. The process for
requesting funds is not what I would call robust, and the annual
fund-raising drive (where donors can donate directly to national
chapters through the WMF front door) seems to be a vector that is
particularly vulnerable to misuse of funds, but addressing these
concerns should be balanced with the need for a strong relationship
with chapters that supports continued growth.

The best prophylaxis against corruption is transparency. The more we
ask the WMF and the chapters to operate in the open, the less likely
it is that problems will go long unnoticed. By accepting that chapter
finances and operations are "private issues", and that corruption or
accusations of corruption should be handled quietly and internally, we
leave ourselves open to those who would (through malice or
incompetence) take advantage of us.

Gerard wrote:

>The problem with behaviour that is not good / acceptable is that at some
stage it will be recognised and it will kill off the people in a similar way
as to Essjay. The best indication that such things can happen is the upset
of our capable, competent and upright former chair. I was convinced that he
would be re-elected and I would have welcomed his re-election.

>When there is substance to "officials" with problematic credentials, it is
certain that this will be noticed. When the system gets manipulated to keep
them where they are, it will get noticed. When they are chapter officials
and they damage the chapter it will be the members of the Foundation that
have the possibility to force the issue.

Gerard, can you elaborate on what you mean here? I'm not sure I
understand what you meant to convey. You mention Essjay, problematic
behavior, problematic credentials... and then refer to Michael Snow.
Is there some connection here that I'm completely missing, or is the
apparent implication unintended?

Nathan