[WikiEN-l] Wikipedia Leadership (was NY Times article on gender gap in Wikipedia contributors} - repost

Tue Feb 1 17:11:37 UTC 2011

I think one thing leads to another here. Incivility leads to loss of
editors of all genders. ArbCom has too narrow of a function and too
little time to deal with every case of incivility. We have a lack of
effective governance to be able to bring about a solution to all of
these issues.

The conversation kindof jumped around a bit, but we have hit on some
very serious issues. Operationally, everything works, as far as
management, we are effectively leaderless and without any clear way to
govern - the consensus process being so easily thrown off course it's
become useless for any large-scale contentious issue. It's not that we
are unable to make decisions, it's that we are unable to make
controversial ones. We have a judiciary of sorts for our community,
but the design as a court of last resort, coupled with the lack of any
other authority with sufficient clout to deal with more established
contributors, effectively cripple us, because every other process
except ejection ("community ban") by community consensus is toothless,
and consensus to eject a vested contributor doesn't happen short of
them going suddenly and completely berserk and staying that way for an
extended period of time.

Admins can deal effectively enough with harmful behavior from
"outsiders", but the effectiveness disappears in all but open-and-shut
policy violations where it concerns another admin or an established
contributor.

So, that leaves us with several problems:

We need an effective way to sanction any member of the community that
is disruptive or incivil. We need ArbCom to become more of an
appellate than the sole "court" of English Wikipedia, because they
can't scale to that, and because they are specifically tasked with the
worst problems, not with the "death by a thousand cuts" of borderline
disruption. A start would be some form of binding dispute resolution
that doesn't require ArbCom involvement, but it has to be binding, and
it has to be able to consistently result in sanctions if the dispute
resolution process fails - without the case having to go before ArbCom
first.

As far as fixing dispute resolution, I suggest that a first measure,
we restore and revamp the mediation system and make it binding. The
way this would work, mediators would begin to be elected or appointed
to reach a suitable number of mediators for the expected caseload.
Mediators would be assigned to cases requesting mediation, under the
condition that prior dispute resolution steps must have been attempted
- or that only one of the parties were willing to participate in
dispute resolution. Once a case was reviewed and accepted, it would
enter a binding mediation.
Editors participating in binding mediations would reach a solution
mutually agreeable to the parties and found reasonable (by the
standards of policy and practical enforceability)  by the mediators,
or the failure to do so would be submitted to arbcom along with the
prior chain of dispute resolution activity and could potentially form
further evidence of tenditiousness and incivility. Agreements reached
from mediation would be binding on the parties, in that the standard
remedies of "any uninvolved administrator" being able to enforce an
agreement would apply, and such agreements would stand until
renegotiated or appealed to ArbCom. Finally, mediators would be given
access to an expedited ArbCom process (essentially, the ability to ask
ArbCom for an injunction in a case that has not yet been presented to
them)  for obtaining injunctions in order to stop a disputed activity
while negotiations take place - injunctions of this nature would
expire after reaching an agreement through mediation, or after
reaching a decision through arbitration.

-Stephanie

On Tue, Feb 1, 2011 at 11:25 AM, Fred Bauder <fredbaud at fairpoint.net> wrote:
> I guess I kind of forgot what we were talking about when Marc brought up
> an authority. The original subject was nastiness, but that too is
> possibly unrelated to the question of why more women don't edit.
>
> Yes, it is the community that determines the editing environment, not
> rules or enforcement. They are just useful when someone violates
> community norm and then wants to argue about it. Community norms that we
> all support are what works.
>
> Fred
>
>>
>> If you want a different editing environment, using a body like arbcom
>> will
>> get you nowhere fast. You can't create a friendly environment by
>> kneecapping
>> people who are uncivil - done like that it will either look like
>> arbitrary
>> justice of people we don't like - or in the interest of transparency of
>> process you'll be reduced to counting sweary words. The problem with NPA
>> is
>> that anyone with a good grasp of the English language knows how to
>> deliver
>> an infuriating put-down, or frustrate by playing dumb-insolence, without
>> personally attacking anyone. On the other hand, we end up blocking
>> someone
>> for calling a troll "a troll".
>>
>> What you need is something else. I'm not Jimbo's biggest fan, and I'm
>> never
>> greatly taken by his idealistic "Jimbofluff" approach, but when you
>> actually
>> had a leader (who at that time was perceived to have influence) those who
>> wanted to have influence with him, would strive not to disappoint the
>> leader. That ethos rubs off. Jimmy was very good at saying to people he
>> valued, "I'm disappointed with how you handled this" - and it stung.
>>
>> The problem with arbcom is that it although people may seek to avoid
>> behavior which might lead to sanctions, there's little positive
>> reinforcement. Unless one is angling to be elected (or still needs to
>> pass
>> RfA) then having, and expressing contempt, for all and sundry doesn't
>> have
>> consequences. I speak from experience here. I've battled for BLP issues
>> for
>> years, to do that I've had to fight for unpopular positions, and I've
>> needed
>> to know arbcom will support me.- That I am often overly-combatative,
>> short
>> tempered, and unnecessarily uncivil, ends up being beside the point -as
>> arbcom would look very petty were they to pass a critical resolution in
>> the
>> midst of dealing with important issues. A leader(ship) would find it
>> easier
>> to say "thank you, you're right, we should do this, but please could you
>> tone it down a bit".
>>
>> If you want a atmosphere change it needs led, and not driven by threats.
>> It
>> is also the case that much of the incivility of regulars is due to
>> long-term
>> frustration caused by the fact that getting any small change on
>> en.Wikipedia
>> means battle and endless debates with hundreds of people. The problem is
>> structural - change (when it comes) is driven and not lead - so you learn
>> to
>> fight and equally you get frustrated.
>>
>> As hard as it is to change structures, it is far easier to change
>> structures
>> than to change people. And structures shape people.
>>
>> But we've discussed structural change time and time again, and it can't
>> happen. The bastards won't let it, so sod the lot of them.
>>
>> Scott (Doc)
>>
>>
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