[Wikimedia-l] Your support is wanted: The WMF Board of Trustees is looking for a new Board member

[cyrano]

Le 18/02/2013 17:09, Jan-Bart de Vreede a écrit :
> Hi
>
> On Feb 18, 2013, at 8:52 PM, cyrano <cyrano.fawkes at gmail.com> wrote:
>
>> To ensure a representation of the interests of the community, the determination of a new Board Trustee cannot be influenced by the people within the Board Trustee (and even less by the WMF itself). Otherwise, it would boil down to a disguised form of cooptation.
>> Cooptation is a way to absorb new elements into a structure without threatening it, which is good for stability, but bad if changes or trust are needed. In particular, if the community differs  from what the WMF or the Board of Trustees are doing, cooptation cannot repair the divergence. In fact, it tends to aggravate it.
> But it wasn't intended to repair any possible divergence, this is what the five community (s)elected seats are for…
Do you mean three seats? Two seats are for Chapters. Chapters are not 
the community. Their interests may diverge from the community, in 
particular in the cases of power struggles or funds allocation.
Three seats out of ten cannot guaranty that the governance of the WMF 
will respect the values and intention of the community.


> if there is a divergence you can (s)elect different people for those five seats. The appointed seats are intended to help add specific skills/expertise to the board to make sure that it can perform its governance tasks effectively….
>
>> Now, if the Board of Trustees sets requirements, or pays the people who will recommend the candidates, it immediately breaks the guaranty that there is something else than people in power keeping their power structure intact. It doesn't mean it is happening, but it can't guaranty it's not, which defeats the point of having Trustees.
> Simply don't agree with that reasoning. The point of trustees it to provide governance and direction to the WMF.
Of course they must provide governance and direction, but with the 
greater priority of representing the values of the community, in order 
to deserve the alleged trust.


>   If you cannot trust them to select the right people, how can you trust them to do anything?
Exactly my point.

>
>> That's why, even if you agree with the strategy behind the current proposal and its advantages, you should be aware that it decreases the legitimacy of the governance structure to the eyes of the community.
> I don't think it does, or should. If it does then I think its worth explaining (like I have hopefully done above)
Yes, it's worth explaining.

>
>
>> Personally, I think the main function of the Board of Trustees should be to increase the trust of the community, thanks to a rigorous and transparent scrutiny of its internal processes.
>>
> I, and most of the non-profit world (not to mention the law ;)  respectfully disagree and would argue that the main function of any board of trustees is more governance related.
You should not leave the community out the equation. I agree that the 
internal function of the Board of Trustees is governance related. But 
from the community's perspective, WMF should not exist by itself and for 
itself, and that's why there are trustees: to *guaranty *that the main 
reason of its existence is something else that getting money, prestige 
or any other personal leverage. That's where the trust comes from.
WMF exists to empower the community and its cause, and all the 
governance's decisions are subsumed by this principle.


>   For a good summary of what our Board of Trustees' function is I would refer you to:
>
> http://meta.wikimedia.org/wiki/Wikipedia_board_manual#Roles_and_responsibilities
Thank you for the link. I understand now why you think that five seats 
belong to the community, the article is twice misleading: by saying that 
Chapters ARE the community, and by saying that five out of ten is a 
majority.

Cheers