[WikiEN-l] Shrink the Arbitration Committee (was Broken dispute resolution mechanisms)

[Daniel Mayer]

--- Michael Snow <wikipedia at earthlink.net> wrote:
> To deal with this, I propose that we take advantage of this election to 
> restructure the Arbitration Committee and shrink its numbers to nine 
> positions. I don't think a group as large as twelve is necessary, and 
> there are considerable advantages to be gained from shrinkage, namely:

As time goes by more, not fewer cases need to go through the process. Thus we
need more qualified people working on this to get things done. 

Setting a minimum number of arbitrators needed to hear a case to 3, regardless
of the number of total arbitrators there are, is the way to go, IMO (simple
majority would still rule and more than 3 arbitrators could be part of any
given decision in any case if they so choose). Any decision made by such a
self-organized sub-committee would be subject to review by the entire ArbCom if
at least one ArbCom member calls for a review and is seconded. Deliberations
would be conducted on IRC and the results along with rationale would be posted
on the wiki. A preponderance of evidence would explicitly be the standard of
evidence (this is the standard used in civil court). 

Everything else would pretty much work as it does now ; with the caveat that
any  minor wrinkles will be worked out by the ArbCom as time goes by. 

-- mav

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