[WikiEN-l] ArbCom Legislation

[Ray Saintonge]

Delirium wrote:
> It depends on the situation. The Arbitration Committee is only empowered
> to resolve specific disputes; their dispute-resolution does not 
> literally create precedent in some legalistic sense, although it can be 
> used as an indication of how similar disputes might be resolved in the 
> future, barring a change in sentiment or committee membership, and may 
> also influence how community consensus operates. To go from a ruling in 
> a specific case to actual general policy applying to all people, though, 
> requires the usual policy-creation consensus step. For example, the 
> Arbitration Committee banned a few people for excessive edit-warring, 
> but it did not invent the 3-revert-rule--- that was done through a 
> separate community process which turned the Arbitration Committee's bans 
> for excessive edit-warring in a few specific cases into a general policy 
> outlining what precisely is prohibited.
>
> In this case, I think it's fair to say that the Arbitration Committee's 
> ruling has not been accepted by consensus of the community as a general 
> policy to be applied in other cases, and so anyone banning a person not 
> directly involve in the case based on the "precedent" would be 
> overstepping their authority as an administrator.
>   

It seems to me that the Arbitration Committee has come a long way from 
it's original intent as an appeals vehicle.  In short, admins would make 
a ruling affecting some user's rights, and the Arbcom would review the 
action to see if that user's rights had been improperly violated.

When the Arbcom goes beyond its mandate it loses trust, and it is no 
longer seen as protecting individuals from the vagaries of 
administrative excess. It becomes identified with a kind of 
police-statism where the courts are at the bidding of the police.

While it is acceptable for rulings to be treated as precedents to be 
considered in future cases, such consideration should not be applied 
pre-emptively to cases that have not even been filed before the committee.

Ec